Building a Bridge Out of Suffering: Using Attuned Relationships to Promote Affect Regulation with Mentors of At-Risk Children

ABSTRACT

A psychoanalytic model of intervention with mentors of traumatized children is presented which uses emotional attunement to promote emotional regulation and attenuate trauma. Neurological research and theorizing are applied to the explication of the healing power of attuned relationships. Three mediators for promoting emotional regulation are applied in this setting: stress management, or containment; strengthening the capacity to pay attention; and reflective function, or mentalization.

Acknowledgments

Author gratefully acknowledges Marian Birch DMH, Mary Brady PhD, Eileen Keller PhD, Farris Page PhD, and Toni Vaughn Heineman DMH for their valuable feedback on this manuscript.

Thanks also to the talented and dedicated mentors of San Francisco Bay Area Friends of the Children for sharing their fine work with their children in the examples in this article.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.