Dr. Andrea DePetris: Staying Regulated at Custody Exchanges

The word trigger gets used casually enough that it has stopped meaning one thing. Dr. Andrea DePetris separates two uses of it. In the trauma field it means a stimulus that activates the trauma memory network, where a person feels as though the danger is happening right now. In everyday use it means something in the present activating something unresolved from the past, often tied to early attachment.

Dr. Andrea DePetris is a clinical psychologist with an academic appointment at Yale School of Medicine who also works in private practice. Much of her caseload is adults who present as though they have it together and describe the opposite privately: anxiety, stress, and a sense that it could all come apart. Her work is helping people understand what earlier circumstances and relationships are still running underneath, and then updating it so their inside matches the life they are actually living.

In this episode she explains the window of tolerance, the range in which a person can stay clear, connected, and responsive. Trauma narrows it. Above the window is hyperarousal: fast speech, urgency, heat, volume, tension, the pull to win the exchange. Below it is hypoarousal: going silent, passivity, shrinking, emotional flatness, checking out. Andrea points out that which direction your body takes depends partly on how much agency you feel in the moment and partly on the environment you grew up in, and that both are the body protecting you rather than failing you.

The practical half covers what to do in the moment and what to rehearse beforehand. Adjusting posture and feeling your feet on the floor if you tend to shut down. A prepared sentence and physical distance if you tend to activate. Breathing with a long exhale to reach the parasympathetic system. Scanning your surroundings for five neutral objects, or one color, when focusing inward does not feel safe. Andrea and Lisa also talk about doing this in front of children on purpose, and about the repair conversation afterward, because a parent modeling regulation is teaching it.

As always, this is strategic education, not legal or mental-health advice for your specific situation.

🎓 What you'll learn

• Two different meanings of "trigger," and which one people usually mean
• The window of tolerance, and what narrows it
• Hyperarousal and hypoarousal: the body signals that tell you which way you're heading
• Why your reaction depends on how much agency you feel, and on how you grew up
• The pause, and what it looks like differently for shutting down versus escalating
• Breathing for a long exhale, and why the exhale is the part that matters
• Grounding outside your body when focusing inward doesn't feel safe
• How to repair with your kids afterward, and why that's the modeling, not the failure

⏱️ Chapters
0:00 Intro
1:00 What "trigger" actually means, and whether warnings help
5:00 Meet Dr. Andrea DePetris, and the window of tolerance
8:00 Hyperarousal and hypoarousal: which way your body goes
11:00 The body signals to catch before an exchange goes sideways
12:00 The pause: posture for shutdown, stepping away for activation
16:00 Practice beats perfection, and repairing after you lose it
18:00 Breathing in flowers, blowing out birthday candles
19:00 When the body doesn't feel safe: grounding outside yourself
23:00 Coaching yourself, and completing the cycle with your kids

Keep going 💜
Book a free 30-minute discovery call and we'll help you map your next steps: https://beentheregotout.com/call
📘 Been There Got Out: Toxic Relationships, High-Conflict Divorce, and How to Stay Sane Under Insane Circumstances — https://www.amazon.com/dp/194627495X
📘 Been There Got Out: When Your Ex Turns the Kids Against You (our parental-alienation book) — https://www.amazon.com/dp/1967674183
🔗 Dr. Andrea DePetris, The Verity Practice: https://drandreadepetris.com/

About Been There Got Out
Chris Barry and Lisa Johnson are high-conflict divorce, custody, and co-parenting strategists, and the founders of Been There Got Out. They know these cases from the inside: both have successfully represented themselves in family court. Few attorneys have a playbook for a case like this — Chris and Lisa write yours with you, so you and your kids can get through it as unscathed as possible.