RIDGEFIELD, Conn. - s4story -- A simple request becomes a standoff. A five-minute warning turns into a 45-minute battle. A child melts down, shuts down, or seems unable to cope—and the parent is left trying to remember the right script while their own heart is racing.

That is the moment Dr. Roseann Capanna-Hodge wrote The Dysregulated Kid: The Parenting Playbook for Helping Your Child Find Calm in a Chaotic World (Page Two) for.

Released today, the new book gives parents a different place to begin when big behavior takes over: not with another consequence, lecture, reward chart, or perfectly worded script, but with the nervous system underneath the behavior.

"Parents are not failing because they have not found the perfect consequence," says Dr. Roseann, therapist, school psychologist, and creator of Regulation First®. "When a child's brain and body are overwhelmed, they may not have access to the flexible thinking, language, or self-control we are asking for. We have to help create enough calm before correction has a chance to land."

For decades, parents have been taught to ask, How do I make this behavior stop? In The Dysregulated Kid, Dr. Roseann offers a more useful first question: What is this nervous system trying to tell me—and what does it need before this child can do what I am asking?

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The answer is not permissive parenting. Boundaries, accountability, repair, and consequences still matter. Dr. Roseann's point is that the order matters. Her approach gives parents a simple sequence for the moments when families are most likely to get stuck: Regulate → Connect → Correct™.

First, the adult pauses and steadies their own response. Next, they help the child move out of threat mode and toward enough calm and connection to think. Then they return to the boundary, teaching, repair, accountability, or problem that still needs to be addressed.

"You can set the right boundary and still have a dysregulated child in front of you," Dr. Roseann says. "The answer is not to abandon the boundary. It is to help the child's nervous system become capable of handling it."

Written for parents who are exhausted by meltdowns, anxiety, shutdowns, rigidity, attention struggles, sensory overwhelm, and walking on eggshells at home, The Dysregulated Kid turns nervous-system science into practical, real-life tools. Readers learn how to recognize overload earlier, understand the stresses that fill a child's Stress Cup™, interrupt co-dysregulation, and use brief resets that help everyone find their way back to calm.

The book includes Dr. Roseann's proprietary tools—The Love Pause®, RESET to Regulate®, and the CALMS Dysregulation Protocol®—all designed to help parents move from reacting to behavior to responding to what is happening beneath it.

Early reviewers have praised the book's compassionate, usable approach. Kirkus Reviews calls it "a must-read for parents, other caregivers, and educators," and BookLife named it an Editor's Pick.

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"The goal is not a perfectly calm child or a perfectly calm parent," says Dr. Roseann. "The goal is a family that knows what to do in the hard moment—and knows how to find its way back."

Dr. Roseann is available for television, podcast, radio, and print interviews on:

• Why consequences, reasoning, and rewards often fail in the middle of a meltdown.
• The first thing parents can do when they are one sentence away from losing it, too.
• The difference between understanding dysregulation and excusing harmful behavior.
• Why walking on eggshells is not peace—and what families need instead.
• How to hold boundaries without turning every hard moment into a power struggle.

Book Details

Title: The Dysregulated Kid: The Parenting Playbook for Helping Your Child Find Calm in a Chaotic World
Author: Dr. Roseann Capanna-Hodge
Publisher: Page Two
Publication Date: September 22, 2026
ISBN: 978-1774587331
Available: Wherever books are sold and at dysregulatedkid.com

Review copies and interviews are available upon request.

About Dr. Roseann Capanna-Hodge

Dr. Roseann Capanna-Hodge, Ed.D., LPC, BCN, is a therapist, school psychologist, author, and founder of the Global Institute of Children's Mental Health. She is the creator of Regulation First® and host of the Dysregulated Kids podcast. With more than 30 years of clinical experience, she has worked with thousands of families and reviewed more than 10,000 QEEG brain maps. Her work has been featured by Forbes, The New York Times, NBC, Fox News, and The Mel Robbins Show. Learn more at drroseann.com.