How to Use This Script

This script is designed to be read aloud during your coaching session. "You" sometimes addresses you as the coach and sometimes your loved one — just as it would in a natural conversation. Speak it in your own voice; paraphrase where it feels right. Sections in blockquotes are exercises to do together.

You: "This week we're going to talk about something that every supporter needs and almost nobody teaches well: how to hold limits with someone whose nervous system reads limits as abandonment."

You: "First, a distinction. A limit is about what you will and won't do. An ultimatum is about what they must do or else. Limits are relational — they describe your behavior. Ultimatums are coercive — they try to control their behavior. With someone whose abandonment alarm is hair-trigger, ultimatums almost always backfire. They activate the alarm, which escalates the behavior, which makes you more likely to follow through on the ultimatum, which confirms the abandonment fear. That is a cycle you do not want to be in."

You: "A limit sounds like: 'I can't stay in this conversation when there's yelling. I'm going to take a 20-minute break and come back.' An ultimatum sounds like: 'If you keep yelling, I'm leaving.' The first describes your behavior. The second threatens theirs."

You: "Notice the critical addition in the limit: 'I'm coming back.' That is not weakness. That is the difference between a limit and an abandonment. The abandonment alarm cannot hear 'I need a break.' It hears 'I'm leaving.' So you have to say both things: I'm stepping back, and I'm coming back."

Non-Negotiable Limits: You: "There are some limits that are non-negotiable — not because you're punishing them, but because you cannot function without them. Physical safety is one. Verbal abuse in front of children is another. You know your list."

You: "For non-negotiable limits, the language is direct but relational: 'I love you and I'm not going anywhere. And I cannot [specific behavior]. When [specific behavior] happens, I will [specific response]. Not to punish you — because I need to stay regulated enough to keep showing up for you.'"

You: "Notice the frame: you are holding the limit in service of the relationship, not as a threat to it. That is not manipulation. That is the truth. If you burn out, you cannot stay. The limit is what makes staying possible."

The Hardest Limit: You: "The hardest limit to hold is the one around your own wellbeing. 'I need to sleep.' 'I need to not be called at 3am every night.' 'I need one day a week that is mine.' These feel selfish. They are not selfish. They are the conditions under which you can continue to show up. We'll go deeper on this next week."

Nervous System Regulation Exercise: Containment

You: "Before we close, a regulation exercise that is particularly relevant to limit-setting: Containment.

Containment is a technique from trauma therapy. The idea is that you can acknowledge something difficult without being consumed by it. You create an internal container for the feeling — not to suppress it, but to hold it until you have the capacity to process it.

Here's how it works: Close your eyes. Think of a container — a box, a safe, a vault, whatever feels right. Give it a lock. Now take whatever is activated right now — the guilt about the limits, the fear of the reaction, the exhaustion — and place it in the container. Lock it. You are not throwing it away. You are storing it until you have the time and space to work with it.

The mechanism: Containment activates the prefrontal cortex's capacity for affect regulation — the ability to observe a feeling without being driven by it. It is not avoidance. It is the difference between being flooded and being present.

You can use this before and after difficult conversations."

Go Deeper

Attachment Theory

Polyvagal Theory