Is Your 'Difficult' Child Actually Highly Sensitive? The Hidden Truth Behind Their Intense Emotions l Emotional Dysregulation in Children l E397
About this episode
This episode explores the connection between highly sensitive children and their intense emotional responses, providing insights for parents on understanding and managing these behaviors.
Parents often wonder whether their difficult child is actually highly sensitive when big emotions feel constant and overwhelming. These emotions may reflect a sensitive nervous system. Dr. Roseann Capanna-Hodge, founder of Regulation First Parenting™, helps families address emotional dysregulation in children. Parenting a child who reacts intensely can feel exhausting and confusing. When small moments trigger big emotions, it’s easy to wonder what’s really going on. The truth? It’s often not defiance—it’s a nervous system that processes sensory input and emotional cues more deeply. In this episode, I explain how to reframe what parents see as “overreactions” and understand how emotional sensitivity, sensory processing, and nervous system overload shape behavior. Why does my child react so strongly to small things? Many parents ask this when their child melts down over socks, noise, or schedule changes. What looks “small” on the outside can feel overwhelming internally for a highly sensitive child with a reactive nervous system. In child development, how sensitive children respond is often different from other children, as conceptualized sensitive children process sensory input…
People in this episode
Host: Dr. Roseann Capanna-Hodge
Topics covered
- emotional dysregulation
- highly sensitive children
- parenting strategies
- nervous system sensitivity
- sensory processing
- intense emotions
Keywords
- emotional sensitivity
- parenting
- ADHD
- anxiety
- behavior management
- stress cup
- sensory input
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