Walking on Eggshells? How to Work with Someone Who Lacks Emotional Regulation

Ever find yourself bracing for a reaction before you’ve even finished your sentence or pressed send on an email? Or rehearsing how to have a conversation just right so they won’t explode, withdraw, or spiral?

Working with someone who lacks emotional regulation, is like being on a roller coaster, you just don’t know which way the ride is going to go on any given day, it can be exhausting.  Rather than focusing on how to improve work, you find yourself spending your time and mental energy managing the person. And that’s a cost, on your energy, your effectiveness, and your own sense of psychological safety.

So how do you lead, collaborate, or communicate with someone when you feel like you’re constantly walking on eggshells?

Let’s break it down.

First: What’s Going On For Them?

Emotional dysregulation often isn’t about you. It’s about a nervous system that doesn’t feel safe.

When a team member struggles to regulate their emotions, they may be living in a near-constant state of amygdala hijack, where the brain’s threat centre takes over, and rational thought goes out the window. This can lead to:

• Outbursts that feel disproportionate,
• Withdrawal or shutting down,
• Hyper-sensitivity to tone, words, or even body language, often stemming from assumed meaning or intent.

The brain perceives threat, not logic. So even routine feedback, a question, or minor mistake can feel like danger. And when the threat response is activated, cortisol floods the system, narrowing their ability to think clearly or see nuance.

Your approach?  Curiosity becomes your greatest tool. Ask yourself:

• What might this person be protecting themselves from?
• What part of this interaction feels unsafe to them?
• How do I avoid making it about me when it’s likely not? 

Then: What’s Going On For You?

Let’s be honest, dealing with someone else’s big emotions is not easy and can start to affect our own, or trigger a response.

We can start to find ourselves:

• Overthinking how to say something “safely”,
• Avoiding conversations altogether,
• Mirroring their reactivity, or becoming passive-aggressive in return, none of which reflect how we want to work with others.

This is your own threat response kicking in. Your prefrontal cortex, the rational, decision-making part of the brain, starts to dim, while your limbic system takes the wheel. You might move into fight (snapping), flight (avoiding), freeze (saying nothing), or fawn (people-pleasing).

It’s why staying consistent matters so much.

The Power of Consistency

When emotional unpredictability is in the room, you being consistent becomes a stabiliser. Not a fixer. Not a rescuer. Just consistent.

What that means is staying grounded in your values, using predictable patternsa dn language, choose a response rather than a reaction and holding the line, not swaying from accountability or team standards.

If clarity, respect and accountability are values you lead with, hold that line. You can be respectful and clear, even if someone else is spiralling. You don’t need to shrink.

Often emotionally dysregulated people may unconsciously test boundaries. Your job isn’t to tiptoe, or wibble-wobble around, it’s to set a rhythm that calm and predictable, they can eventually trust. That means clear expectations, follow-through on consequences and a consistent tone (not matching their volume or emotion).

If there are behaviours that are not consistent with whats acceptable within your team, before you respond, pause. Check in with yourself first. A deep breath. A mental note: “This isn’t about me.” Let your brain get back online.

You can be compassionate without tolerating poor behaviour. You can be curious and have boundaries. 

A Quick Word on Safety

When someone’s emotional instability moves into unreasonable, unsafe, or aggressive behaviour, this becomes more than a leadership or communication issue.  If these issues persist over time or your physical or psychological safety is at risk, it’s time to escalate or seek support. You’re not responsible for managing another person’s emotions to your own detriment.

What if You Feel Like You Can Never Get It Right?

When you're constantly adjusting your words, walking on eggshells, and still getting it wrong, it’s exhausting. You might feel like no matter how careful, kind, or clear you are, their reaction is still unpredictable. That can impact your confidence, your mindset and leave you questioning your own leadership.

If that’s where you’re at, here’s a final word of advice to remember, you’re not the regulator.  

Your job is to show up in a way that aligns with your values, not to manage their emotional responses. When someone lacks emotional regulation, there might not be a “right” version of delivery that avoids a reaction, because the issue isn’t your message, it’s their response.

What you can do is:

• Reality check your role that you are being fair and respectful. That’s your responsibility. Their reaction isn’t.
• Seek feedback from someone you trust.  Sometimes an external person can offer a clearer lens on whether your approach needs tweaking or just backing.
• Decide what boundary you need.  If this relationship is undermining your psychological safety, consistency may no longer be enough. Boundaries, escalation, or even changing how you engage may be required.

You don’t have to bend yourself out of shape trying to minimise someone else’s responses. Lead from who you want to be, not who they need you to be to stay calm.

If you’re constantly adjusting your energy, tone, and communication to manage someone else, you’re doing the emotional labour they need to do.

That’s not your role.

Your job is to lead with integrity, communicate respectfully, and act in alignment with your values.

So next time you feel the eggshells under your feet, ask yourself:

• What’s mine to carry here?
• How do I stay consistent, even when they’re not?

Because when you lead from your centre, not their chaos, you don’t just protect your peace.  You set the standard.