Why Your Child Struggles With Losing — And What You Can Do to Help

Understanding the Emotional Weight of Losing

We’ve all seen it: the moment your child loses a game, whether it’s math bingo at school or Mario Kart on a screen, and everything unravels. Tears, shouting, maybe even storming off. If you're reading this as a parent, chances are you've asked yourself, “Why does my child take losing so hard?”

It’s a deeply human response, especially in children ages 6 to 12 who are still building the emotional scaffolding to handle defeat, competition, and performance. While it can feel frustrating in the moment—especially when you’re tired and just trying to hold the household together—this behavior is better understood not as defiance or entitlement, but as a signpost pointing us toward unspoken feelings and unmet needs.

The Developmental View: It’s Not Just About the Game

Kids at this age are beginning to develop a stronger sense of identity and social belonging. They’re starting to compare themselves to peers. So when they lose—even in something seemingly trivial—it can feel like a referendum on their worth. “I’m not good at this,” might spiral internally into, “I’m not good enough.”

Within this window of childhood, perfectionism can emerge; comparison becomes sharper. And in some cases, children haven’t yet learned that losing doesn’t diminish their value. To them, a loss is not just a moment—it feels like a judgment.

This reaction can be especially strong in kids who are already facing academic struggles or school-related stress. When so much of their day involves effort (and often frustration), games and competitions may be one of the few areas where they feel some control or possibility of success. Losing, then, feels like just one more disappointment.

What's Actually Happening in Your Child’s Brain and Heart

The emotional reaction to losing is rooted in the child’s developing nervous system. At this age, the prefrontal cortex—the part of the brain responsible for impulse control and emotional regulation—is still under construction. Add to that a surge of emotions, a competitive environment, and perhaps an audience of peers or siblings, and losing becomes not just a result, but a full-body experience.

So what might look like an overreaction is, for your child, a real sense of loss. They haven’t yet learned the tools to self-soothe, put the moment in perspective, or stay connected to their sense of self-worth.

Helping Your Child Without Minimizing Their Feelings

It’s tempting to jump into fixing mode: “It’s just a game,” “You’ll win next time,” or “No one likes a sore loser.” While often well-intentioned, these phrases can unintentionally dismiss your child’s emotional experience. Instead, the goal is to validate their feelings while offering a framework to work through them.

Some ways to approach these moments:

• Label the emotion: “It looks like you’re really frustrated that you didn’t win. That makes sense—you tried really hard.”
• Connect before correcting: Hug them or sit beside them before discussing behavior. Regulation needs connection first.
• Model resilience: When you lose at a board game, articulate how you feel calmly: “I really wanted to win, but it was still fun to play together.”

It's a long game—no pun intended. You’re not just helping your child react better to losing; you’re shaping the voice they’ll carry in their heads when they face challenges in learning, school, and bigger life disappointments.

Making Room for Healthy Competition in Daily Life

Sometimes, children need safe, low-stakes spaces to experience both winning and losing. Games without judgment, activities just for fun, and storytelling that includes characters learning from mistakes can help soften their edges around competition.

One simple but powerful ritual is storytelling—especially stories that explore friendship, resilience, or the ups and downs of learning. If bedtime is your reset moment as a family, consider adding age-appropriate audiobooks that model how characters face failures and continue trying. The Apple App Store or Google Play versions of the LISN Kids app offer a variety of original stories crafted for kids aged 3–12.

Having an emotionally layered children’s story playing in the background—especially one where the main character doesn’t succeed immediately—can sometimes reach your child in ways instruction can’t.

More Than a Game: Creating a Learning Environment Around Loss

Losing gracefully isn’t about pretending not to care. It’s about knowing that mistakes and disappointment are tolerable—and temporary. This understanding must be practiced consistently, across a variety of platforms, both at home and at school.

If your child is heavily invested in video games and reacts strongly to losing there, the game environment itself may be over-stimulating or too fast-paced emotionally. Here's a thoughtful reflection on the link between video games and imagination in children, as well as this post about screen-free evening rituals to help children wind down emotionally after digital interaction.

Intentional unplugged family time—games that don’t rely on winning, collaborative puzzles, or creative storytelling—can help rewire the narrative around loss. Consider this list of creative offline ideas for kids ages 5–12 as a starting point.

In Closing: Hold Space, Not Perfection

The real challenge isn’t just helping your child handle loss. It’s helping them hold on to their sense of self when they lose. And that takes time, space, and a steady hand from the adults around them.

You don’t have to get it perfect. None of us do. The key is consistency, empathy, and the willingness to name what’s hard out loud. If you’re looking to continually build your child’s inner resilience, this related article on helping your child handle losing with confidence and compassion might offer more depth as well.

Above all, know that every meltdown and every redirected moment is part of something bigger—a child learning who they are, and how to be okay, even when things don't go their way.