Interoception and Co-Regulation: Reading Body Signals Together

What if the behaviors we're trying to manage are actually children's attempts to communicate what's happening inside their bodies? In this transformative conversation, award-winning occupational therapist Kelly Mahler reveals how interoception - our eighth sense of how our body feels - is the essential yet often overlooked bridge between co-regulation and self-regulation.

Kelly explains how interoceptive awareness develops from infancy through countless cycles of caregivers curiously responding to a baby's distress, making guesses, and helping the body find comfort. But somewhere between infancy and elementary school, curiosity dies and compliance takes over. Through practical insights, Kelly exposes how well-intentioned practices actually derail interoceptive development - common approaches used daily in homes, schools, and therapy sessions that inadvertently teach children to disconnect from their body signals.

The irony? We're pursuing "good behavior" through methods that destroy the very thing children need - interoceptive awareness - to achieve genuine self-regulation. Kelly offers an alternative path grounded in curiosity, providing specific language shifts and approaches that create teachable moments helping children truly understand their bodies. Learn why every person's body signals are unique, why certain common teaching tools may be doing more harm than good, and how simple changes in how we respond to children can honor the internal experiences that drive their behaviors.

This session provides a paradigm shift for anyone working with children: from compliance to curiosity, from teaching how emotions "should" feel to exploring how each body uniquely experiences the world, and from managing behaviors to honoring the internal experiences that drive them.