What is "the hum?"

Karen Khaleghi, PhD, gives parenting advice about how understanding your child can help you soothe them and interact with them
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What is "the hum?"

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The greatest gift that a parent can give their child is to help them to understand what their hum is. The hum essentially is what they're born with. What is their emotional DNA? As a parent I know I have four children, and each child emerged and was soothed a little bit differently. Laughed at different things, smiled at different things. They each had their own individual hum. And they were able to interact with me and my hum, and together, we formed a bond. Now, one of the things that's most essential from a parenting perspective is to be able to hear that hum within your child. How can you do that? From the beginning what you want to do is you want to understand again what soothes them? What makes them smile? What makes them stop crying? Do they like to be rocked? Do they like to be walked? Do they like quiet? Do they like loud? Start to attend to what is your child responding to? So, if you understand that perspective and then you put that under the perspective of understanding how that inter-relates with you, and how that inter-relates in their world. When they are stressed, how does that make you feel as a parent? Do you want to reach in and help? And how do you help? How can you help them? As my daughter would spin out of control because she was angry and frustrated and couldn't get her shoes to tie, how did I help her? Was I able to sit down and say, "Okay, let's learn to tie these shoes," and what did that look like for her versus my son who only wanted slip-ons? So we need to understand and meet them where they are. Help them to understand when they have difficulties, and how they can move through those difficulties, we help them to hear their own hum. And they take that forward into their school life. So when they start into preschool, they know that when they're feeling upset, or when they're anxious, how they can identify that within themselves and then what can they do to help work it through? Do they need quiet time? Do they need to talk it through? Do they need to get out and play a little bit and get out and be able come back? So you begin to help them to define what works in their world. So you're continuing to help them to define how their hum is and how it interacts with everybody else in their given world. Then they're able to meet with success.

Karen Khaleghi, PhD, gives parenting advice about how understanding your child can help you soothe them and interact with them

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Karen Khaleghi, PhD

Co-founder of Creative Care Malibu

Dr. Karen Khaleghi is a pioneer in the field of dual diagnosis, or co-occurring drug and alcohol addiction along with mental health disorders. As one of the co-founders of Creative Care in Malibu and co-author of The Anatomy of Addiction, Dr. Karen speaks to parents and organizations about the formation of addiction, the critical aspects of nature and nurture and the resulting disconnection between emotions and behavior as well as the genesis of addiction and the path to recovery, a process she calls "connecting the dots." 

There are many things that set Dr. Karen Khaleghi apart from others including her individualized treatment approaches and excellent treatment facility Creative Care which is filled with clinical staff comprised of professionals that offer the highest standard of care in the industry. Karen graduated from California Graduate Institute with her Ph.D in 1989 and lives in Los Angeles, CA with her loving husband and children. Dr. Karen Khaleghi has been featured on The Today Show, KCAL 9, Dr. Phil and many others!

 

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Transcription: 
The greatest gift that a parent can give their child is to help them to understand what their hum is. The hum essentially is what they're born with. What is their emotional DNA? As a parent I know I have four children, and each child emerged and was soothed a little bit differently. Laughed at different things, smiled at different things. They each had their own individual hum. And they were able to interact with me and my hum, and together, we formed a bond. Now, one of the things that's most essential from a parenting perspective is to be able to hear that hum within your child. How can you do that? From the beginning what you want to do is you want to understand again what soothes them? What makes them smile? What makes them stop crying? Do they like to be rocked? Do they like to be walked? Do they like quiet? Do they like loud? Start to attend to what is your child responding to? So, if you understand that perspective and then you put that under the perspective of understanding how that inter-relates with you, and how that inter-relates in their world. When they are stressed, how does that make you feel as a parent? Do you want to reach in and help? And how do you help? How can you help them? As my daughter would spin out of control because she was angry and frustrated and couldn't get her shoes to tie, how did I help her? Was I able to sit down and say, "Okay, let's learn to tie these shoes," and what did that look like for her versus my son who only wanted slip-ons? So we need to understand and meet them where they are. Help them to understand when they have difficulties, and how they can move through those difficulties, we help them to hear their own hum. And they take that forward into their school life. So when they start into preschool, they know that when they're feeling upset, or when they're anxious, how they can identify that within themselves and then what can they do to help work it through? Do they need quiet time? Do they need to talk it through? Do they need to get out and play a little bit and get out and be able come back? So you begin to help them to define what works in their world. So you're continuing to help them to define how their hum is and how it interacts with everybody else in their given world. Then they're able to meet with success.