Regulation Bins & Tools for Big Feelings
Big feelings are part of growing up — but sometimes a child needs somewhere to put them besides fight, flight, or shutdown. That’s what a Regulation Bin is for: hands-on tools — things to squeeze, draw, breathe with, and talk through — that give a dysregulated nervous system somewhere real to land.
Each one is built around the same IFS and somatic principles I use in sessions, with tools across four regulation zones — Express & Draw, Focus & Solve, Sensory & Touch, and Quick Fidgets — plus cards and guides that bring the adults in a child’s life into the process too.
Below are three ways to bring one home: a stationary bin for a calm-down space, a grab-and-go bag for wherever your family is headed, and a classroom bin to keep at school or give to a teacher. If your child could use support in more than one place, the Complete Regulation Set bundles all three at a savings.
This isn’t theoretical for me. I started using Regulation Bins with my own two boys when they were still toddlers, long before I built one to sell, and I’ve gotten to watch those same tools become a real part of our routine as they’ve grown. I’ve seen the same shift happen in classrooms — a student who now has the words and the space to say “I need to regulate,” and actually takes it, instead of getting swept up in whatever they’re feeling. That’s the whole idea: when kids get real space to be curious about what’s happening in their bodies instead of just reacting to it, it changes how they move through the rest of their day. I think it could change a lot more than that, too, if more kids grew up with that kind of space built in.
