Raising Emotionally Strong Boys: Tools Your Son Can Build on for Life

by David Thomas

After all, it’s not that difficult to melt down like a toddler or to lose your mind like a teenager. Regulation is work. It’s effortful. But it yields good growth.

Learning to pay attention to the sirens and signals takes reflection, insight, and awareness. It’s much easier to ignore the signs and keep your foot on the gas. However, it isn’t safer to do so.

Getting stuck is a human condition. Men and women, boys and girls, any one of us can get stuck in any moment, and in any space—physically, emotionally, relationally, spiritually.

I know women who struggle to ask for help and men who are great at doing so. But generally speaking, males struggle more in this space, and I strongly believe it’s connected to our definition of masculinity.

I don’t believe the traditional definition of masculinity includes tenderness. The longer I study the person of Jesus, the character of Christ, the more I come back to how his strength was founded in tenderness, compassion, mercy, and love. They were the pillars of his humanity.

A foundational part of raising emotionally strong boys includes anchoring them to a clear understanding of the character of Christ and seeing the strength of sacrifice.

Boys have a lot of physicality to their emotions. Having a physical release is foundational to navigating strong emotions.

Research reminds us that males have more difficulty identifying how they feel, resist taking action when they are struggling, are more reluctant to opening up, and engage in more risk-taking behaviors.

What would it look like to raise a generation of boys who see vulnerability as a strength?

Emotionally strong males are Resourceful—having the ability to name and navigate emotions Aware—having a rich interior world, including strengths and weaknesses Resilient—having the capacity to cope and feel competent Empathetic—having an ability to understand and share the feelings of another

Boys throw out wild cards often, especially those with an underdeveloped emotional vocabulary. They are trying to cue the grown-ups around them to an emotional storm inside of them, and they say the biggest, scariest thing they know to say.

The second emotional milestone is perspective. This milestone is learning to accurately categorize the events of life. Learning that a one in life is losing my car keys and a ten is losing a family member. I don’t want to go to ten over losing a scrimmage, though many boys can and do.

Doing the emotional work for him is the equivalent of doing his homework. He will never get the benefit of learning unless he does the work himself. It’s the only way he makes needed connections.

Avoid the trap of becoming his resources so he can develop resourcefulness.

We have to allow the boys we love to struggle. Struggle is good soil for growing resilience and resourcefulness. They can’t develop strong emotional muscles unless they use them.

In summary, you’re hearing me say clearly there is work involved for you and for him. We can only take the boys we love as far as we’ve gone ourselves. If regulation is difficult for you, it will be almost impossible for him. Kids learn more from observation than information. He has to see this practiced by the grown-ups he trusts. He needs to hear you using an expansive emotional vocabulary. He needs to hear you articulate your experience and see that adults have emotions. He needs to hear you identify what helps you work through moments when you are emotionally charged, how your body signals you, and what you do to bring yourself back to a state of calm. But he doesn’t just need to hear it; he needs to see it. He needs to see and hear this to develop a full, expansive, healthy, accurate definition of masculinity.

By nine to ten years of age, boys begin to channel all primary emotions—fear, sadness, disappointment—into anger.

This swing from blame to shame is one that boys make often. They struggle to get to the healthy middle space of taking ownership and rebuilding anything that needs repairing.

Any time a parent or a child is in an emotionally charged space, it’s a bad time to do much talking. Furthermore, it’s not a good time for discipline. Discipline is all about learning. We want kids to make the needed connections that allow for new behaviors next time. If they aren’t regulated, they can’t make the connections. If we aren’t regulated, we’re likely to shame, over-discipline, yell, or lecture.

I’d argue that regulation is some of the most important emotional work we can do as adults to position ourselves to model and teach this to the kids we love. We can only take the kids we love as far as we’ve gone ourselves. If regulation is a hurdle for you as a parent, that’s the place to begin. It’s difficult for kids to learn to be more responsive than reactive when they can’t see it in the adults they trust the most in this world.

We don’t do it because it makes kids happy. We do it because it makes them healthy. Prioritizing well-being over happiness is a mark of love.

As you’re setting goals, do your best to make them measurable and manageable.

This young man’s anxiety is a reminder that presentation is sometimes misleading. Anxious boys often look rigid, stubborn, controlling, perfectionistic, angry, or explosive. With boys, anxiety can certainly present as fearful and worried, but more often it looks agitated and explosive.

Depressed boys sometimes look sad and lethargic, but more often irritable and volatile.

Interestingly enough, over-performing is a dressed-up version of numbing out. An inability to deal with the discomfort of life drives a need to shut down the internal storm with external performance. To the degree that I feel out of control internally, I will work to try to control something externally—people, outcomes, situations, or circumstances.

Getting help isn’t a sign of weakness—it’s a sign of wisdom. In my opinion, putting another set of eyes on the situation is a sign of intelligence, not incompetence.

Whatever age your son (or husband) may be as you’re reading this book, hear me say those words again: It’s never too late. It turns out you can teach an old dog new tricks. The learning may simply take longer.

I think it’s great when boys hear parents acknowledge they didn’t grow up voicing feelings and have some catch-up work to do.

when we are calm most of that is hovering around our prefrontal cortex, which houses our frontal lobes. Our frontal lobes help us think rationally and manage our emotions. When we are emotionally charged, anxious, or worried, the blood flow moves to the back of the brain to the amygdala. The amygdala is the part of the brain that triggers a fight, flight, or freeze response. At that point, we are at a heightened state of arousal. Our job is to get the blood flow back to the front of the brain so we can think rationally and manage our emotions. Breathing is the most efficient and effective way to create that backward-to-forward movement.

discuss the advantage of living at a time in history when we understand mental health to be as important as physical health.

When in doubt, lean into support.

I know many males who are physically strong but not mentally strong. I know countless men who are vocationally strong but not mentally strong. I’ve even known men who were spiritually strong but not mentally strong.

Men are often reluctant to openly discuss their health or how they feel about the impact of significant life events; Men are more reluctant to take action when they don’t feel physically or mentally well, and; Men engage in more risky activities that are harmful to their health. They go on to say, “These behaviours are strongly linked to . . . traditional masculinity. Men often feel pressure to appear strong and stoic,” they resist support and help,4 and they experience greater amounts of hopelessness and despair.

In life we’ve been promised struggle, but we’ve also been guaranteed hope. It’s not one or the other. It’s both.

Thoughts inform emotions. Emotions inform behaviors. All three are connected but separate.

it’s some of the most important work we do on behalf of the boys we love. I call it weight training for life.

In tears he said to me, “I’m 100 percent certain I shamed this boy I love. Over spilled milk. All because I have never developed skills around what to do with my own anger.”

Parents are the foundation of the house. The safe relationships that allow kids to develop identity, purpose, and meaning. It’s where kids see what it looks like to name and navigate emotions.

Long term, you are preparing him to have healthy relationships with all the other females in his life as opposed to using them or needing them in order to survive.

Staying steady means you may be impacted by his words and emotions, but they don’t inform who you are. Staying steady positions us to prioritize his well-being over his happiness.

Developing this idea of conflicting feelings allows more space for healthy emotional development, alongside opening up more room to be present for others.

Twenty-five years into marriage, we look back and laugh at how likable we both were in those times. We barely knew one another and could easily present our “best selves” when we saw so little of each other and had a limited history.

The pacesetters who run alongside Eliud Kipchoge can hear him breathe. They are close enough to him to know when he’s falling behind and when he’s needing more support. Those things are harder to identify from a distance.

The victory may be shared, but the medal goes around one neck. To be an ally means you are comfortable with this arrangement. An ally is aligned with loyalty and commitment. An ally is acquainted with sacrifice and struggle. An ally is anchored to meaning and purpose.

Many times these parents sacrificed peace for pushback. They were choosing character over happiness.

he simply realized how uncommon it is for those relationships and for passion for pastoral ministry to still be intact.

I recently heard a dad say he hoped his kids would one day say he was someone who was aware of his failures and transformed over time.

He hoped his kids could identify the difference between who he was when they were young and who he became over the decades they knew him. He hoped they would see what Jesus did to him, through prayer and community, and that it would give them hope for who they could become in Christ.

Wisdom comes from lived experience. Wisdom also comes from surrounding yourself with folks who outpace you. I believe much of the wisdom I’ve collected was birthed out of marrying out of my league, befriending folks who outrun me, and working alongside a team that outperforms me. I’m simply surrounded by people who are smarter, stronger, wiser, and more talented than I am, and it has served me beautifully. I could spend a lot of time swimming in envy and jealousy, but I’d prefer to just learn and let their collective talents spill out onto me.

I once heard it said that discomfort is the price of admission to a meaningful life.