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Marie is nine years old, is in the third grade and is a rather quiet, shy child. She does have her best friend, but they never meet up after school. School? Well. She finds math difficult, she doesn't enjoy learning, and after all-day care from 3 p.m., Marie has no energy for much else. All she wants to do is eat, play Switch, watch TV or hang out with her big brother. A little worrying, isn't it?
Step 1: Optimization begins, the calendar fills up!
The parents see a need for action. No hobbies? That's not good. So the mother enrolls Marie in ballet and swimming. More exercise, new friends - win-win! Marie is skeptical, but she tries it out and is in good spirits.
Meanwhile, her father is worried about math. What if she doesn't make it through the school year? So now she's getting tutoring in math and German, since things aren't looking good there either.
Ballet on Mondays, tutoring on Tuesdays, swimming on Wednesdays.
The first few weeks pass. Swimming? Does Marie enjoy it? Ballet? Not her thing. The ballet teacher is strict and fussy - Marie doesn't join in and has a bad feeling when she enters the ballet room.
The parents sign Marie out – and on Monday it is time for something new again.
Horses maybe?
Step 2: Incident Diagnosis - Emotional Regulation in Children
Then comes the news from the teacher: suspected reading and writing difficulties (LRS) or even dyslexia.
After what feels like an eternity of waiting, there is finally a diagnosis. And because Marie already has maths tutoring on Tuesdays, she can start learning therapy on Thursday - with a prescription, of course.
The parents breathe a sigh of relief - finally an explanation for what had previously seemed like an unsolved mystery. But suddenly this diagnosis is the pivotal point. Teachers, therapists, everyone has their own opinions and suggestions. What was previously simply said that Marie "doesn't like reading" and was plagued by mistakes now and again is now officially recognized as a deficit. Measures have been initiated, the problem now seems to have been identified - and it feels as if the solution is already within reach.
Step 3: Offer optimization
After a few months, Marie still has no real friends, just this one friend who she doesn't meet up with. Maybe dancing would help? Or maybe she'd prefer to play the violin? The violin seems like a good idea: there are some nice girls in the group, and her musical development is also covered at the same time.
So on Fridays I go to violin lessons.
On Mondays there is horse riding, on Tuesdays there is math tutoring, on Wednesdays there is swimming, and on Thursdays there is learning therapy.
A few weeks later, Marie seems increasingly exhausted and somehow noticeably sadder. But when you ask her, she says: "Everything is okay."
Step 4: Optimize emotions
The mother is increasingly worried that something is wrong with Marie. She notices that her daughter often reacts uncontrollably and wonders what she could be doing wrong. Since she recently read how important emotion regulation is for children, she decides to do something. She orders cute monster books from Amazon that are supposed to show how to recognize feelings and deal with them better.
Marie leafs through the books with interest, finds the monsters quite cute and even plays a little with the pictures. But is there any real reaction or noticeable progress? None.
Then, one evening at dinner, it suddenly happens: Marie pushes her brother with a strong shove. Without warning. The parents are completely surprised and don't know how to react.
The consequence: immediate withdrawal from the Switch - no more screen time for Marie that evening. But instead of understanding, she bursts into tears and immediately retreats to her room. Her parents are left helpless in the living room. Is this still "normal"? Did they act correctly?
In their desperation, they ask another mother for advice. The answer comes promptly: "Globuli, that always helps!" Well, it can't do any harm, can it? The parents aren't quite sure whether this is really the right approach, but they try it anyway - after all, you can never have enough resources when you have to regulate your own emotions as a parent.
Step 5: The situation escalates
It seems as if everything is suddenly falling apart at the same time. Marie is constantly having problems with a girl while riding, she can neither concentrate nor find enough time to practice her violin, and she also suffers from recurring middle ear infections that make swimming impossible. Her mood is getting worse day by day and she seems increasingly irritable and stressed. It is as if everything is conspiring against her at once. She is starting to feel like a failure because she feels like she is not meeting the requirements - no matter what she does.
The parents, who are increasingly worried, react with consequences: riding is cancelled in order to give her at least a little more space and relaxation.
Instead, a new activity is introduced on Mondays: kickboxing. Dad thinks it would be a good way to let off steam. But although the intention is good, the overall situation does not fundamentally change.
Marie also has trouble sleeping. She finds it difficult to relax in the evenings, and when she wakes up at night, she can no longer fall asleep. She often complains of stomach aches and headaches, which means that she is increasingly absent from school. It becomes particularly stressful when she sees things on her phone that scare her. To relax, she spends more and more time "playing" on her phone. It is difficult for her to say exactly what is worrying her, but she shows a noticeable sensitivity, especially when it comes to topics such as war and floods.
Is Marie highly sensitive or does she have a disorder?
The parents are increasingly worried and are seriously considering whether psychotherapy could help their daughter to better deal with her fears and physical symptoms. They know that Marie needs support to get out of this vicious circle of stress, fears and physical symptoms.
Step 6: The Over-Optimization of Childhood
We parents mean well. We want our children to be strong in life, to be able to deal with their challenges - be it ADHD/ADD or specific learning disorders - as if they were superheroes who could eliminate any problem immediately. It is commendable that we deal with this and want to support our children as best as possible. But in our striving to do everything right, we sometimes overlook the very simple truth: we cannot optimize everything at once.
Many things in a child's brain simply develop over time. There are children who need a whole football team of friends to be happy, and others who only need one good friend. And that's OK! Our children don't need a thousand badges to document their abilities or prove their achievements. In the past, it was one medal in athletics or one badge in judo - won honestly, and that was enough. Today, however, these "proofs of achievement" are found in all areas, often without us really thinking about what they mean for the child.
What we lack today is the right dose. Instead of talking about emotion regulation, we should think about dose regulation .
It seems as if parents often try to compensate for their child's weaknesses or 'quirks' by helping them succeed in other areas - whether by compensating for poor academic performance with awards in hobbies or by covering up problematic characteristics with particularly good grades.
Our world is so tightly packed, so packed with media, offers and possibilities, that children hardly have any space to simply be. We parents, from the 70s/80s generation, who grew up with three TV channels and hours of playing outside, have learned a lot. But what made us strong back then was the "slowness" of life - the yawning boredom that made us become creative, discover ourselves and come to terms with ourselves. Children only stood out when they were REALLY standing out, the rest just slipped through the cracks. And lo and behold, we are all still alive and actually know better.
Today, every hint of peculiarity is catalogued and optimized. A teacher suspects dyslexia? Bam, therapy! The child is shy? Social training! And woe betide if it suddenly shows emotions - then that has to be regulated.
Parents mean well. They want to do everything right. They invest time, money, energy. But maybe sometimes “right” is simply: let things run more smoothly.
This does not mean a laissez-faire parenting style, but rather right and wrong remain in the parents' values. It is not about letting everything go, but about giving children the space to develop, make mistakes and grow without constantly being exposed to the pressure of optimization. And perhaps it is precisely the imperfection that makes our children strong.
Final question:
What would have happened to Marie if her parents hadn't 'over-optimized' her so much? Would she have been able to develop at her own pace, without the dyslexia support for once, without the constant pressure and the many additional offers? Would things really have been worse for her if nothing had been done?
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Emotional Regulation in Children
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