What Emotional Reactivity, Defiance, and Low Resilience Are Really Telling You

As parents, it can feel overwhelming (not to mention overstimulating!) when your child goes from 0 to 60 in a heartbeat, yells “No!” right away at any suggestion or change, and gives up at the first sign of difficulty. Parents who often feel like they're walking on eggshells know just what I mean; these moments often feel like power struggles, disrespect, or a behavior problem.

We’ve said before “Your child isn’t giving you a hard time, they’re having a hard time.”  But let’s expand that to say: “They’re having a hard time because they haven’t yet developed the skills they need.”

Emotional self-regulation, flexible thinking, distress tolerance, resilience, and problem-solving are learned skills, not automatic abilities. When kids don’t yet have those skills, their behaviors show it through tantrums, meltdowns, aggression, rigid thinking, avoidance, or what looks like power and control battles.

In our play therapy work, we see every day that behavior is communication. And when we shift the lens from “won’t” to “can’t yet,” everything from your parenting strategies to your connection with your child transforms.

Emotional Reactivity

If your child’s emotional reactions feel explosive or disproportionate, it’s not intentional drama - it’s a developing nervous system trying its best.

Kids who escalate quickly often struggle with:

• Emotional self-regulation
• Recognizing internal body cues (hunger, thirst, tiredness, discomfort)
• Naming and tolerating uncomfortable feelings (and feeling shame if others name it for them!)
• Pausing before reacting

This is why we often tell parents in therapy: Your child’s meltdown is their whole-body SOS signal.  They need help, not consequences.  And importantly - kids learn regulation best when they’re calm, not when they’re escalated.

Defiance

A child who automatically says “no” isn’t being oppositional - they’re overwhelmed, and they don't have the skills to think fast on their feet or recover quickly from their disappointment.

Children with underdeveloped flexible thinking skills often:

• Feel safer with predictability
• Have difficulty shifting from one idea to another
• Struggle when plans change
• Get stuck in power and control battles
• Feel threatened by anything that wasn’t their idea first

“No” to your child feels like a protective shield.  When you can see the fear under the rigidity, your approach shifts from “How do I stop this behavior?” to “How do I support my child’s developing skills so they feel capable of flexibility in unpredictable moments?”

Low Resilience

Low resilience is better described as underdevelopment distress tolerance. 

Does your child:

• Quit tasks early?
• Throws away their work because of little errors?
• Declare “I CAN’T!” before trying?
• Avoid anything that feels too challenging?

This isn’t laziness. It’s a sign that distress tolerance and resilience muscles are still growing.  If no one has helped them build stamina for frustration, they don’t yet know they can make it through difficult moments.  This is where parents can make a huge impact: through relationship, modeling, and little celebrations of success.

A Skill-Deficit Lens Changes Your Parenting Approach

Children who struggle in these areas aren’t making bad choices; they’re doing the best they can with the skills they have.

Here are some developmental skill areas that often show up in “big behaviors”:

✔️ Emotional Self-Regulation: Understanding, naming, and tolerating big feelings.

✔️ Flexible Thinking: Shifting plans, tolerating “no,” adapting to new ideas.

✔️ Resilience & Distress Tolerance: Not giving up when something is hard or unfamiliar.

✔️ Executive Functioning: Pausing, planning, organizing, and thinking before acting.

✔️ Self-Efficacy: Believing “I can do hard things.”

When one or more of these skills is still developing, behaviors fill the gap.

What To Do

One of the most powerful tools for strengthening these skills is collaborative decision making: a strategy that invites your child into problem-solving with you instead of reacting against you.

This approach:

• Reduces power and control battles
• Strengthens flexible thinking
• Builds resilience through shared problem solving
• Creates emotional safety
• Teaches skills explicitly and implicitly

It sounds like:

• “We have a problem. Let’s figure this out together.”
• “You wanted X, and we need Y. How can we make this work?”
• “You don’t like this plan. Tell me your idea, and we’ll see what fits.”
• “I won’t force you, but I won’t leave you alone with hard feelings either. Let’s work this out as a team.”

When kids feel included, their nervous systems soften, their rigidity loosens, and they show you what they’re capable of. 

What Else to Try

Here are accessible strategies - many of which you’ve seen throughout our blogs - that parents can start using right away:

1. Teach coping skills when kids are calm, not mid-meltdown

Kids can’t learn new skills when flooded. Keep skill-building for peaceful moments.

2. Create a “Resilience Jar” or “Coping Skills Jar”

Pull ideas together for when things feel challenging.

3. Model what flexible thinking looks like

Say things like, “That wasn’t my plan, but I can adjust.”

4. Narrate internal states

“I’m noticing my hands are tight in little fists – I think my body is trying to tell me I need to take a break. Hang on, I’ll be right back.” (Then practice slow breathing a few feet away)

5. Offer choices to reduce power struggles

“Do you want to start with the blue cup or the green cup?”

6. Validate early and often

Validation takes down a LOT of emotional reactivity before problem-solving even begins. “I’d feel mad about that too.”

7. Use play-based problem solving

Role-play flexible thinking or resilience through pretend play, building toys, or art.

8. Normalize the skill-building process

“So many seven year olds are still figuring this out.”

These small relational moments accumulate and become the foundation for healthier emotional responses over time.

When Big Behaviors Feel Persistent

If your child’s meltdowns, aggression, defiance, or emotional reactivity feel overwhelming to navigate on your own, play therapy can help.

Play is a child’s natural language. It allows them to practice new skills, work through emotional barriers, and strengthen their internal sense of capability—all in a developmentally appropriate way.

Whether your child is struggling with:

• Rigid thinking
• Emotional dysregulation
• Tantrums or meltdowns
• Anxiety or frustration
• Power and control battles
• Low confidence
• Transitions or change

…they can learn and grow with the right support.  You don’t have to do this alone—and neither does your child.