The Extra Spring: What a Hard Pilates Class Taught Me About Kids Who Are Struggling

By Courtney Bledsoe, LCSW | Courtney Bledsoe LCSW PLLC | Oak Park, IL

A friend told me about a Pilates class that nearly broke her.

Movements that were usually challenging-but-doable felt impossible. She was sweating, out of breath, and confused. This was her regular class, her regular body, so why did everything suddenly feel so much harder?

Her mind went where most of ours go first: What’s wrong with me?

Maybe she hadn't slept enough. Maybe she hadn't eaten right. Maybe she was losing her fitness. Maybe she was just having an off day.

Then she looked down at her reformer and found the answer. An extra spring had been added to the machine—without her noticing, before class even started. She had spent the whole hour asking her body to work against more resistance than she was actually prepared for. Once she took the spring off, she was back to herself: challenged, but capable.

I keep thinking about that story when I think about kids who are struggling.

A child is having a hard time with reading. Another is taking forever to get ready for school because choosing clothes feels overwhelming. Another can't seem to sit still in class. Another comes home devastated because everyone else got invited to play and they didn't.

Kids don't always know to check the setup

Adults can usually consider the possibility that something around us has changed. Is this task harder than usual? Did something change at work? Am I tired? Is there something about the environment that's making this harder?

Kids have less experience to draw on. They may not yet know that the world sometimes quietly adds a spring. So when something feels harder than it should, they can move quickly from this is hard to:

I'm bad at this. I'm not smart. Everyone else can do it. Something is wrong with me.

A child can't easily inspect their classroom, their sleep schedule, their learning profile, their family stress, or their social world and determine which of those things might be adding resistance. If the adults around them don't help look at the setup, the easiest explanation can become themselves.

And sometimes there really is an extra spring.

Sometimes the spring is real

A child who is struggling with reading may be working against a learning difference that makes reading genuinely harder for them than it appears to be for their classmates. A child who can't focus may be sitting next to a particularly distracting peer—or may have ADHD that makes sustained attention more effortful. A child who is melting down every morning may be exhausted, overwhelmed by a transition, or carrying stress that nobody else can see.

The answer isn't always to tell a child to try harder. Sometimes the right response is to change the setup: a different seat, reading support, an adjusted workload, more sleep, a predictable routine, extra processing time, a different kind of support that helps a child to engage in what is meaningful to them.

Some springs can be removed. Some can't. And sometimes the goal isn't to remove the spring at all. It's to recognize that the person using the equipment may need a different setup, different support, or a different way to approach the task. ADHD, a learning difference, or another neurodevelopmental difference doesn't simply disappear because we understand it. But understanding it can change the experience dramatically. A child can stop interpreting this is harder for me as there is something wrong with me.

Sometimes we add a second spring

A child struggles with something—and then begins to make sense of what that struggle means.

I can't do this. I'm the only one who doesn't get it. If I try and fail, everyone will know I'm stupid. I can't handle feeling this way. I have to make sure this never happens again.

Now the child isn't just dealing with the original difficulty. They're carrying the meaning they've begun to attach to it.

A child who has difficulty reading may begin avoiding books because reading has become evidence of being "bad at school." Or a child who is anxious about making friends may begin avoiding social situations because feeling awkward has become evidence that nobody will like them. Or a child who is overwhelmed by uncertainty may begin relying more and more heavily on routines, reassurance, or other ways of making the world feel predictable. 

Sometimes those strategies are genuinely supportive. Sometimes they become so restrictive that anxiety starts determining what the child can do.

The original spring may still be there. But now there's another one.

The goal isn't to make everything easy

Sometimes the resistance is actually part of the challenge. Learning to read is hard. Making a new friend is hard. Speaking in front of a class is hard. Walking into a new school is hard. Feeling anxious and doing something anyway is hard.

We don't want to remove every uncomfortable feeling from a child's life. Discomfort is part of learning, growing, taking risks, and doing things that matter to us.

But discomfort isn't automatically something a child needs to push through, either. Sometimes discomfort is information: this environment isn't working for me; I need more support; this demand doesn't fit my current capacity.

The question isn't simply, How do we make this easier? It’s What is making this hard?

Is there a barrier we can remove? Is the child carrying a fear or belief that's adding to the difficulty? Or is this simply a hard thing that matters to them and needs to be practiced?

Sometimes the answer is one. Sometimes it's two. Often, it's all three.

Self-compassion isn't lowering the bar

Here's the part I think gets missed: self-compassion isn't the opposite of growth. Sometimes it's what allows us to see clearly what needs to change—and what doesn't. Sometimes self-compassion is simply seeing the problem accurately.

My friend wasn't being generous with herself when she assumed she was out of shape. She was wrong. The rigorous move—the accurate move—was checking the equipment.

The same can be true for kids. Telling a struggling child, "This feels harder than it should right now, and that doesn't mean something is wrong with you," isn't a comforting story we tell to make them feel better. It may simply be the truth.

And once a child knows that, we can have a much more productive conversation about what comes next. Maybe something needs to change. Maybe they need more support. Maybe they need to practice something they're not yet good at. Maybe they need to learn how to tolerate a feeling they've been trying very hard to avoid. Maybe they need some combination of all of those things.

But they don't have to begin from the assumption that their struggle is evidence of a personal failure.

Find the spring

As we head into a new school year, when a child seems to be working much harder than everyone expected, I think it's worth pausing before we immediately ask them to try harder.

Look at the equipment. What changed? What might be adding resistance? Is there something about the task, environment, expectations, or the child's needs that we haven't noticed?

Then look at the child. What are they telling themselves about the fact that this is hard? Are they carrying a second spring made of shame, fear, avoidance, or the belief that struggling means something is wrong with them?

The goal isn't to make the challenge disappear. It's not to lower the bar. It's not to rescue kids from every uncomfortable experience. It's to figure out which resistance belongs to the challenge, which comes from the environment, and which resistance we've accidentally added.

Because that's the last piece of my friend's Pilates story that matters most.

Once the extra spring came off, she realized that quitting the class or blaming herself wasn't the answer. She was able to go back to challenging herself—and she could actually meet the challenge.

That's what we want for our kids, too. Not a lower bar. The right one.

If your child is struggling and you're not sure whether they need more support, more practice, or help with the anxiety surrounding the challenge, you don't have to figure that out alone.

I work with children, teens, and parents around anxiety and OCD, including parent-focused SPACE treatment. Together, we can look at what's making things harder, identify where support is needed, and figure out how to help your child move toward the things that matter to them.

If you're wondering what might be adding resistance for your child, I’d be happy to help you find the spring.

Courtney Bledsoe, LCSW, is a therapist specializing in anxiety and OCD in children and adolescents in Oak Park, IL. She is the only certified SPACE provider in Illinois, offering in-person sessions in the Chicago area and western suburbs, and virtual sessions throughout Illinois. Her work focuses on helping families break the anxiety cycle — with or without the child in the therapy room.