Helping Boys Understand Brains, Emotions, and Anger: A Neurodiversity-Affirming Perspective
This month we spoke with Real Work Therapist Collin Alteneder, LMFT who told us about his niche in working with neurodivergent boys.
You can read the interview summary in our Monthly Magic Newspaper, and scroll for an expanded scholarly summary on the topic below:
Parents often tell us some version of the same concern:
"My son gets angry so fast."
"He goes from zero to sixty."
"He has such a big heart, but when he gets overwhelmed, everything falls apart."
As therapists, we hear these concerns from families of all kinds of children, but especially from families raising boys and neurodivergent children. While anger is often what adults notice first, anger is rarely the whole story.
At The Real Work, one of our therapists, Collin Alteneder, LMFT, works closely with children who struggle with emotional regulation, frustration, and anger. His approach offers an important reminder: children are not their emotions. Emotions are experiences that move through us, not identities we become.
Anger Is Often the Emotion We See First
Research consistently shows that boys receive different emotional messages than girls from a young age. While sadness, fear, embarrassment, or vulnerability may be discouraged or overlooked, anger is often one of the few emotions boys are socially permitted to express openly.
Psychologist Ronald Levant's work on normative male alexithymia suggests that many boys and men receive limited support in identifying and expressing a wide range of emotions. Over time, this can make it difficult to recognize what is happening internally before emotions become overwhelming.
What adults experience as "anger" may actually be:
Anxiety
Shame
Disappointment
Sensory overwhelm
Social confusion
Fatigue
Grief
Fear
Anger can become the visible tip of a much larger emotional iceberg.
Children Need Language Before They Need Strategies
One of the most powerful things adults can do is help children develop emotional vocabulary.
Research on emotional development suggests that children who can accurately identify and label their emotions often demonstrate stronger emotional regulation skills over time. Naming an experience helps the brain organize it.
This is one reason play therapy can be so effective. Rather than expecting children to discuss emotions like adults, play therapists use stories, metaphors, movement, art, toys, and imagination to make internal experiences visible and understandable.
Collin often helps children explore emotions through playful language, parts work, and familiar references such as Inside Out. These approaches allow children to build awareness in ways that are developmentally appropriate and engaging.
Instead of hearing:
"You are angry."
Children begin hearing:
"A part of you is feeling really angry right now."
That small shift creates space between a child and their emotional experience.
Separation Creates Self-Awareness
In psychology, the ability to observe an emotion without becoming consumed by it is sometimes called differentiation.
Children who learn to say:
"I notice I'm frustrated."
"A worried part of me showed up."
"My body feels really overwhelmed."
are developing emotional awareness that can support regulation throughout their lives.
The goal is not to eliminate anger.
The goal is to understand it.
When children learn that emotions are information rather than emergencies, they often become better equipped to respond thoughtfully instead of react automatically.
Neurodivergent Children May Experience Emotional Overwhelm Differently
For many autistic children, ADHDers, and children with sensory processing differences, emotional experiences are often closely connected to nervous system experiences.
A child who appears angry may actually be experiencing:
Sensory overload
Executive functioning fatigue
Social exhaustion
Cognitive overwhelm
Difficulty shifting between activities
Unmet sensory needs
This is one reason neurodiversity-affirming approaches focus on understanding the environment, not just the behavior.
Rather than asking:
"How do we make the child stop doing this?"
We may ask:
"What is the child's nervous system communicating?"
"What supports are missing?"
"What environmental changes could help?"
Research in developmental neuroscience continues to demonstrate that regulation develops through supportive relationships and environments, not through punishment alone.
Parents Can Model Emotional Literacy Every Day
Children learn emotional language from the adults around them.
One of Collin's favorite strategies is encouraging parents to "hyperverbalize" their own emotional experiences throughout the day.
This might sound like:
"I'm noticing my shoulders feel tight. I think I'm stressed."
"I'm feeling disappointed our plans changed."
"My brain feels overwhelmed. I'm going to take a few deep breaths."
"I'm frustrated, but I know I'll feel different in a little while."
These moments teach children that emotions are normal, manageable, and temporary.
Over time, children begin borrowing that language for themselves.
Small Moments Matter
Parents sometimes assume emotional development requires lengthy conversations or perfectly executed parenting strategies.
More often, growth happens in ordinary moments.
A child feels angry and an adult stays curious.
A parent helps name a feeling.
A therapist uses play to explore a difficult experience.
A child discovers they can have an emotion without becoming that emotion.
These small moments build emotional awareness, resilience, and self-understanding over time.
As Collin reminds families, helping children understand their brains and emotions is not about fixing them. It is about helping them make sense of their internal world so they can move through it with greater confidence and self-compassion.
References
Denham, S. A. (2006). Social-emotional competence as support for school readiness.
Levant, R. F. (1992). Toward the reconstruction of masculinity.
Siegel, D. J., & Bryson, T. P. (2011). The Whole-Brain Child.
Porges, S. W. (2011). The Polyvagal Theory.
Shonkoff, J. P., & Phillips, D. A. (2000). From Neurons to Neighborhoods.
Greenspan, S. I., & Wieder, S. (2006). Engaging Autism.
Perry, B. D., & Winfrey, O. (2021). What Happened to You?