What is distress tolerance?
Distress tolerance is the ability to experience a hard feeling, like frustration, disappointment, worry, or embarrassment, without being overwhelmed by it or needing it to disappear right away. Kids build it the same way they build any skill, through practice.
I listen to a lot of podcasts. Between drives and dishes, they're where I do much of my professional thinking, and two of my favorites are Dr. Lisa Damour's podcast and Good Inside with Dr. Becky Kennedy. I recommend both often, to parents and to fellow clinicians. Recently, one episode from each landed in my week, and they were describing two threads of something I see come up constantly with kids and parents in my office. I haven't been able to stop thinking about it, so I wanted to write it down.
Thread one: confidence isn't the whole story
Most of us want our kids to feel confident. So when our child says "I can't do it" or dissolves at the school drop-off door, we do what loving parents do: we reassure, rescue, and smooth things over. You're so smart! You've got this! Here, let me help.
In her episode "Stop Trying to Make Your Kid Feel Good About Themselves," Dr. Becky talked about how much we focus on building confidence, and how much that focus can miss. Confidence matters, but there's something that matters just as much: the ability to feel uncomfortable and stay okay.
The idea that stuck with me is that our job isn't to manage the road for our kids. It's to help them learn to manage it themselves. When we step in to remove every bump, we send a quiet message: this feeling is too big for you, so I'll take care of it. Kids don't get to find out that they can feel nervous before a birthday party and still walk in, or lose a game and recover, or get a hard puzzle piece wrong five times and eventually get it.
Confidence built only on praise and easy wins tends to be fragile. Confidence built on "I felt awful, and I got through it" holds up much better. None of this means withholding encouragement. Feeling good in the moment just isn't the same as feeling capable.
Thread two: it's hard for us, too
Dr. Damour's episode, "How Your Kid's Exclusion Hurts You Too," named the other half of this. Watching our kids struggle is really hard for us, especially when it feels like they've been wronged: a friend group that leaves them out, a teacher who feels unfair or tough to connect with, a team that didn't pick them. Everything in us wants to dive in and smooth the waters.
But before we can help our kids tolerate hard feelings, we have to build our own tolerance for uncomfortable ones like anger, frustration, and fear. When we can stay steady through our own discomfort, we can reassure our kids that they are capable of handling hard things. That reassurance carries weight because it comes from someone who isn't panicking.
It will feel like an emergency to them
These two ideas show up together in my office all the time. A child is hurting, a parent is hurting for them, and the natural instinct is to fix it fast. I understand that instinct completely.
Here's what I gently remind families: in the moment, being left out or dreading a challenging teacher's class will feel like an emergency to your child. That's real, and it's okay to say: "This feels awful right now." But most of what kids face is within the range of normal. Friendship drama, disappointment, and awkward moments are part of growing up, and growing up is hard. They're not emergencies to be fixed.
This is where we come in. When it feels like an emergency to them, we can be the steady voice that says, This is really hard, and you can do hard things. Then we say it again the next time, and the time after that. Kids borrow our belief in them until they can build their own.
What to do instead
Name the feeling. "You're really frustrated. This is hard."
Stay close. Your calm presence does more than a fix. Sitting with your child in a hard moment is not the same as leaving them alone with it.
Express belief in them, not just comfort. "This is uncomfortable, and I know you can handle uncomfortable things."
Pause before you rescue. Give them a moment to try, and check in with your own feelings first.
Notice the recoveries. "Remember when you were so nervous about that class? You got through it."
None of this means being cold or pushing kids into things they aren't ready for. It means trusting them a little more than feels natural at the moment.
Why it matters later
The habits we build with a five-year-old melting down over shoes are the same ones that help a fourteen-year-old through a friendship rupture or a hard week at school. Damour connected this to something bigger: a child who has never had practice with challenge will have a much harder time when it inevitably arrives. That's often where we see young adults who struggle to launch, or who have big emotional reactions to things that could have been coped with.
Small struggles now are the practice ground for the big ones later. The goal isn't to make childhood harder. It's to let kids build the skill while the stakes are still low and a caring adult is right beside them.
A note from me
I'm sharing this as a therapist and as a parent who is still working on it. I feel the pull to swoop in and fix things too, and I'm continually practicing staying steady when my child is struggling. It's a practice for all of us, not something we master once.
If your child is dealing with anxiety, big emotions, or school stress, I'd love to help. I work closely with parents, because you're a big part of this. You can reach me at our Mill Valley location to schedule a consultation.
And if you have a favorite podcast that's shaped how you parent, I'd love to hear it.
