What is the appropriate level of touch, what is the appropriate level of physical closeness, what is the appropriate quantity of words to speak when talking to someone?
How well do you know them?
What type of relationship do you have with them? Quantify the type of relationship? Quality of the relationship?
What is the goal of your communication with them? What verb are you seeking as an outcome from them? What verbs are you using? Are you using spoken verbs or body verbs?
How are you coping with the information being given back to you? Does it match with what you wanted or do you need to change your interaction (your choice of verb, or shift from spoken to body / movement)?
What happens when you can’t get your message across verbally? When you reach your limit of explanation? But yet the other person still doesn’t understand. Do you reach out to touch to gain their attention? Do you keep your hands on them to make sure they keep their attention to you? Do you change how you are touching them so that they ‘listen’ to what you are saying ‘better’? Was it that they weren’t listening to you before or was it difficult for you to get your message across? Or is there a proper real gap in their understanding because it doesn’t get them to do what you need them to do or to change their behaviour to what you are asking? So what do you do then? Do you know how to walk away if you needed to? Do you know how to ask them for help? Do you know how to …. what is it that you need? What happens when you don’t get something? When its not possible to go out for a swim at night time despite the fact that you want or need to. What happens when you keep asking for food but aren’t being given anymore? What is an appropriate amount of food? What happens when that isn’t enough? Learning to regulate yourself is also about knowledge about what you need and don’t need, and the details of ‘why’ you ‘need’ the things that you need. Is that an option? Is it even possible to do that? Gaining more detailed vocabulary can significantly assist in providing you with what you need. But. Do you know the words to choose to increase the vocabulary? Where do they come from? Do they come from knowledge of what is / was wrong in the first place? Is that a language skill or a comprehension of what ‘needs are’?
How many people in the environment around you regulate themselves well? Consider the impact that an environment which can be threatening can have on them and then how they regulate themselves. Individuals behaviours can often be significantly different in one setting versus another because of the involvement of specific others or issues.