Everyone, from adults to teens to children, experiences a variety of positive and negative emotions each and every day. While oftentimes these emotions can be dismissed quickly and with ease, there are also times when these feelings are so overwhelming that they can be tricky to manage.
This is especially true for highly sensitive teens who have a tendency to feel emotions more strongly than others.
When teens are feeling an overwhelming sense of guilt, shame, anger, sadness, frustration, or fear, it can reach the point where your teen cannot stand to cope with these emotions for even a minute longer. This can make it difficult for them to regulate or manage their emotions, causing them to behave in ways that are not healthy.
Emotional dysregulation
Emotional dysregulation occurs when teens try to deal with their emotions in an unhealthy way or when they avoid handling their emotions altogether.
Imagine your teen’s strong emotions as a beach ball that is filled to the max with feelings like disappointment, anger, and anxiety. When your teen is trying to relax on the “beach,” the beach ball is a nuisance, and they don’t want to carry it around. They also don’t want anyone to notice and judge them for carrying around their beach ball of emotions, so they try to get rid of the ball as quickly as possible.
This can happen in a few ways:
Suppression: They might try pushing the beach ball under the ocean’s waves to hide it, only for it to aggressively pop back out of the water.
Avoidance and distractions: They may try to take their mind off of the fact that they have the beach ball by distracting themselves with other activities at the beach.
Dangerous behaviors: They may even try something dangerous like finding a sharp stick to try to pop the beach ball and release the air or using all of their strength to squeeze it until it bursts.
Just like trying to get rid of the beach ball in these ways wouldn’t work, these are not effective ways for teens to handle their emotions. Instead of managing tough emotions, these behaviors are examples of emotional dysregulation.
Suppression
Suppressing tough emotions might seem like it works in the moment, but it actually causes more harm than good. Shoving emotions down and pretending that they don’t exist is not only ineffective, but it can also cause these emotions to fester and build until they eventually erupt, just like a beach ball splashing violently out of the water.
Here are some signs that your teen might be suppressing their emotions:
Your teen is denying that they feel upset, angry, or frustrated when asked
Your teen responds with “I’m fine,” or “I’m great,” when they are displaying signs that they are upset
Your teen is refusing to validate their own feelings and accept when they are having a difficult time
Your teen has violent or aggressive outbursts and arguments that seemingly come out of nowhere
Avoidance and distractions
Instead of facing emotions head-on, sometimes teens choose to avoid facing these emotions by distracting themselves with something else. Although this form of emotional dysregulation might seem helpful to your teen at first, they are always left carrying the metaphorical beach ball of their tough emotions when they run out of distractions.
Here are a few signs to consider:
Your teen is playing video games, watching television, or using their phone an excessive amount
Your teen tends to want to eat whenever they are feeling upset
Your teen has a tendency to withdraw from conversations or situations that are not going their way
Your teen has been sleeping a lot more than usual
Dangerous behaviors
When your teen’s emotions get to the point where they feel like they cannot handle the emotions any longer, they might feel like they need to do something in order to make these emotions disappear.
This may involve engaging in risky or dangerous behaviors. You might notice any or all of the following:
Your teen engages in self-harm
Your teen abuses drugs, alcohol, and other substances
Your teen engages in risky behaviors like reckless driving or refusing to wear a seatbelt
Your teen is practicing unsafe sex
Your teen is provoking fights
While your teen might feel like these behaviors are helping, popping their beach ball of emotions in this way will often hurt themselves and others.
Supporting emotional regulation
If you notice any of these indicators that your teen might have trouble regulating their emotions, there is still hope.
Here are a few things you can do to support positive emotional regulation:
Share your emotions
Don’t be afraid to let your teen know when you are wrestling with tough emotions.
When your teen knows that there are times when you feel sad, frustrated, and afraid, they will feel less alone when they face these emotions. They will also know that their feelings are normal and valid, and they will understand that there is no shame in sharing them with others instead of trying to push them down and pretend like they don’t exist.
Emphasize the importance of thoughts
While thoughts and feelings often go hand in hand, thoughts are often a lot easier to control.
For instance, while you might not be able to stop yourself from feeling sad or disappointed when you are passed up for a promotion, you can prevent yourself from thinking thoughts that will only intensify your emotions like, I’m a failure. I’ll never get anywhere in life. Why did I even think I was capable of getting a promotion?
The same thing is true for your teen. Teach them that while their emotions might seem out of control, if they can take a moment and get a handle on their thoughts, they can stop themselves before they begin to spiral and make themselves feel even worse.
Encourage healthy emotional regulation strategies
One of the best ways to help your teen find positive ways to handle their emotions is to teach them healthy coping strategies and model these strategies with your own emotions.
Here are some examples of healthy emotional regulation strategies:
Exercising
Attending therapy
Journaling
Deep breathing
Spending time with friends and family
Practicing meditation
Keeping track of positive and negative emotions and their triggers
Creating art
Talking about their feelings
Practicing good sleep hygiene
These are just a few of the many different ways for teens to manage their strong emotions before they spiral out of control. Sharing these ideas with your teen and practicing these strategies yourself will go a long way toward helping your teen regulate their emotions.