Big Reactors: Practical Strategies for Parenting Highly Sensitive Children

COMING OCTOBER 2025!

Big Reactors takes a deep dive into the key traits of highly sensitive children: intense reactions to emotional and sensory experiences, anxiety, inflexibility, perfectionism, sore losing, hesitancy to try new things, and relationship challenges with siblings and peers. It shows how these traits translate into common and vexing behavioral challenges, and how to support these kids’ amazing strengths while helping them learn to manage their emotions and reactions so they can: cope with not getting everything they want when they want it, cooperate with necessary tasks, adapt to new people and situations, muscle through challenges, and form healthy relationships with family and friends.

Through detailed case descriptions from my decades of work in the trenches with these complex and sometimes confusing kids, I reveal the process—the “detective work”—I guide parents and other caregivers/teachers through to understand the root cause of their child’s challenges and to come up with sensitive, effective strategies that work in real life, not just in theory. This provides a reality-based roadmap for how parents and other caregivers can find solutions to their unique experiences with their amazing, fierce and feisty kids that takes into consideration that every child and family is different, and that there is not a one-size-fits-all approach. 

This book fills a very necessary gap. Parents today are bombarded with messages about and strategies for being a “gentle parent” that rarely work for big reactors. These kids go from 0-60 in a nanosecond, often in reaction to seemingly minor events, such as their parents: cutting their sandwich the wrong way; parent paying ANY attention to the new baby; not letting them have more screen time; or, not getting their blankets on exactly the way they want after 20 minutes of trying at bedtime. ⁠⁠When triggered into distress, these kids can have epic meltdowns that may be destructive—hitting, kicking, spitting, or hurling objects.

This book shows how to thread the needle of being a loving, calm, connected parent while setting the limits and boundaries that create peaceful homes with strong relationships and happy kids and families.

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PODCASTS ON BIG REACTORS
EXCERPTS

  • Big Reactors is a lifeline for any parent raising deeply feeling kids. Claire Lerner is a master and her book is full of empathy and wise insights. She replaces guilt and confusion with understanding and concrete strategies that truly work."

    Melinda Wenner Moyer is a science journalist and author of “How Not To Raise KIds Who Aren’t Assholes”

  • Claire Lerner speaks with genuine empathy and immense experience to parents who are feeling distraught and confused by typical parenting advice that is failing them—that doesn't reflect the reality of life with these fierce kids. She fills a critical gap by offering insights and tools developed from her decades of experience working with families of big reactors that enable their sensitive, "orchid" kids, and thus their families, to thrive.

    -Aliza Pressman, New York Times bestselling author of The Five Principles of Parenting and host of Raising Good Humans Podcast

  • Big Reactors is a compassionate, wise, and clinically grounded guide for anyone raising a highly sensitive child. With deep insight and decades of experience, Claire Lerner helps parents understand the “why” behind their child’s big feelings—and what to do about them. Her practical, real-world strategies empower families to move from confusion and self-doubt to confidence and connection. This is a must-read for any parent seeking to better support their deeply feeling child.

    — Helen Egger, MD, Child Psychiatrist and Co-Founder of Little Otter Health

  • As a parent to a big reactor, I devoured this book. Lerner translates her decades working with families of highly sensitive children into relatable narratives, weaving in just enough research to establish her expertise with these kids without straying from her common sense, practical approach. She’s cracked the art of teaching caregivers how to set compassionate limits with children who have intense reactions to not being in control. With Lerner’s guidance, parents can help these kids learn the elusive skills of resilience, frustration tolerance, and flexibility. Parents to big reactors—often left out of advice books—will feel more seen and empowered than ever!

    Shelly Miller, founder of The Teacher Momma

  • Big Reactors meets parents where they are by offering compassion, validation, and practical support for raising highly sensitive children. Claire Lerner’s insightful book acknowledges the self-doubt many parents feel, reassuring them that while supporting children with big emotions and unique needs is undeniably challenging, it is absolutely possible. Through a responsive, nurturing lens, Big Reactors empowers parents and caregivers with actionable strategies rooted in empathy and connection. The book’s approach mirrors the very mindset it encourages—one that is responsive, patient, and attuned to the temperament of “orchid children” who require an individualized approach to thrive.”

    Katrina Macasaet, senior professional development manager, ZERO TO THREE