Self-Regulation

The capacity to manage one’s internal experience, including emotions, energy, self-image, cognitions and body reactions. This capacity is often compromised by exposure to early, chronic or severe interpersonal abuse or neglect. Considered a primary focus of complex trauma intervention with children and adults. All complex trauma treatments have been designed to address multiple domains of self-regulation: some address all major domains; others emphasize one or more particular domains. Some treatment approaches incorporate or co-opt auxiliary or complementary techniques such as yoga and mindfulness to address specific domains of self-regulation. Other approaches emphasize the timing or combination of treatment elements to build self-regulatory capacity in an incremental fashion.