Horrible title, but DS1 does not deal with pain, discomfort, emotional issues, etc very well.  He will give a catastrophic reaction to the tiniest of things eg stubbing his toe, or falling over with barely a graze to show as evidence.  As he is approaching 10 now, I feel he should be able to cope with things a little better, but not sure how to enable him to do so.  We have also got to the point when we don't actually believe it when he cries out, so making it difficult to tell when he really has hurt himself. 

Has anybody got any suggestions to help us help him deal with things a little better? 

My brother was like this if I remember.  In the end, I can remember my mother drawing a chart of his body and mapping out each of his "terrible injuries".  I think it made him stop and think a bit before he complained as he didn't want yet another pen mark on the blasted chart!! Not sure how sensitive a cure this was though!

Maybe try to explain that by reacting loudly to mishaps in life, it actually increases the pain, rather than if he just tries to distract himself from it or maybe encourage him to only make a loud declaration of his mishap when it is very bad, otherwise you won't know whether it's serious or not - boy who cried wolf, that kind of thing!!

I think, though I may be wrong, that this might be a boy thing.  My boys are much, much more likely to create over a small thing than the girls are.  I think he'll grow out of it.  

My daughter is like this, always has been. I suspect she will learn to moderate her reactions better as she grows up but basically, she is a classic Highly Sensitive Person ( see Elaine Aron's book of the same title) so her nervous system is actually more sensitive than the average person's. It's a genetic trait in about 20% of the population and my daughter inherited it from me  :-\ so at least I know where she's coming from. Reading The Highly Sensitive Child may help you understand your son better and help him to learn for himself to react 'better' but you may also find you need to change your attitude to him - these things are catastrophic to him, he's just wired that way. It probably also means he's thoughtful, sensitive emotionally, probably creative, bit dreamy…

I know it's frustrating when you come pelting down the stairs to piercing screams and it's just a paper cut *again* but letting him know you think he's a wuss or belittling his actual feelings definitely won't help him learn to deal with things better. (not that I am suggesting you are belittling him). The modern world is not designed for us HSPs as it is, so help him make home a bit of a haven of understanding.

My DS is only 2 1/2 and everything is a drama, I try to acknowledge that he is experiencing XYZ give him reassurance and then redirect him to something else so whe/we don't dweell on it and 'feed' it IYSWIm, I was hoping that it was a toddler phase, at the worst end of it he will vomit if he is really over wrought :(
I shall read this thread with interest just in case it isn't!

I'll check out those books. Thanks Liz.  Alot of what you have said makes sense.  He is very emotional, and creative (his teacher is expecting him to be an author, and having read some of his stories at the age of 9, I can quite believe it!) 

I think if he was an only child I would just expect this is how other children behave, but as DS2 is so tough (first thing we know about him having an ear infection was when it had burst his eardrum!) it makes you realise that perhaps not everything as straight forward as we initially thought!