Dr. Siegel’s Hand Model of the Brain

A helpful analogy for understanding emotional dysregulation

Image created by author — (book by Drs. Siegel & Bryson)

Help Explaining Emotional Dysregulation to Children & Youth

Dr. Siegel’s Hand Model of the Brain for Kids, Youth, young adults… and anyone who is looking for a more accessible and easy-to-understand explanation of what happens in our brains, bodies, and nervous systems when we become dysregulated.

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The limbic system

As I explained in my last piece, everyone’s brain has something called a limbic centre. This is the area of our brain primarily responsible for emotions. A key area of the limbic system is the amygdala, often called the fear centre of the brain because its most important job is alerting us to danger.

This is a very important job when there really is possible danger… but sometimes our amygdala over-reacts, and tells us there’s a threat when there is none.

Images created by author

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Amygdala takeover

When things feel out of control, our brain and body go into emergency mode. This means the parts of our brain that help us stay calm and make thoughtful choices are standing back and letting our limbic centre and survival instincts take over.

Dr. Dan Siegel is a child psychiatrist, a doctor who works with children and youth, and does important research about emotions and behaviour. Dr. Siegel developed a model to help people understand what happens to the brain when we get overwhelmed by intense feelings.

I’ll explain a bit about the limbic system first, and then how it is connected to the hand model of the brain.