How To Handle Your Anger At Your Child

All parents get angry at their children.

It doesnt help that there are always the endless

pressures of life: appointments were late to, things

weve forgotten until the last moment, health and

financial worries -- the list is endless. In the middle of

that hectic momentum, enter our child, who has lost

her sneaker, suddenly remembered she needs a new

notebook for school today, is teasing her little brother,

or is downright belligerent. And we snap.

In our calm moments, if were honest, we know that

we could handle any parenting moment much better

from a state of calm. But in the storm of our anger,

we feel righteously entitled to our fury. How can this

kid be so irresponsible, inconsiderate, ungrateful?

But no matter how aggravating we find our child's

behavior, that behavior doesn't cause our angry

response. We see our child's behavior ("He hit her

again!), and we draw a conclusion (He''s going to be

a psychopath!") which triggers other conclusions

("I've failed as a mother!"). This cascade of thoughts

triggers a run-away train of emotions, in this case fear,

dismay, guilt. We can't bear those feelings. The best

defense is a good offense, so we lash out at our child

in anger. The whole process takes all of two seconds.

Your child may be pushing your buttons, but he isn't

causing your response. Any issue that makes you feel

like lashing out is a deep issue, with roots in your own

early years. We all enter the parenting relationship

wounded in some way from our own childhoods, and

our kids surface all those wounds. We can expect our

kids to act out in ways that send us over the cliff at

times. That's why it's our responsibility as the

grownup to stay away from the cliff.

WHY We Get So Angry At Our Kids

Parents and kids have the ability to trigger each other

as no one else can. Even as adults we are often

irrational in relation to our own parents. (Who has

greater power to annoy you? Make you act childish?)

Similarly, our kids push our buttons precisely because

they are our children. Psychologists call this

phenomenon ghosts in the nursery, by which they

mean that our children stimulate the intense feelings

of our own childhoods, and we often respond by

unconsciously re-enacting the past thats etched like

forgotten hieroglyphics deep in our psyches. The fears

and rage of childhood are powerful and can

overwhelm us even as adults. It can be enormously

challenging to lay these ghosts to rest.

It helps to know all this, if we are struggling to cope

with anger. Just as important, because it gives us

incentive to control ourselves, we need to know that

parental anger can be harmful to young children.

What Happens to Your Child When You Scream

or Hit

Imagine your husband or wife losing their temper and

screaming at you. Now imagine them three times as

big as you, towering over you. Imagine that you

depend on that person completely for your food,

shelter, safety, protection. Imagine they are your

primary source of love and self-confidence and

information about the world, that you have nowhere

else to turn. Now take whatever feelings you have

summoned up and magnify them by a factor of 1000.

That is something like what happens inside your child

when you get angry at him.

Of course, all of us get angry at our children, even,

sometimes, enraged. The challenge is to call on our

maturity so that we control the expression of that

anger, and therefore minimize its negative impact.

Anger is scary enough. Name calling or other verbal

abuse, in which the parent speaks disrespectfully to

the child, takes a higher personal toll, since the child

is dependent on the parent for his very sense of self.

And children who suffer physical violence, including

spanking, have been proven to exhibit lasting negative

effects that reach into every corner of their lives.

If your young child does not seem afraid of your

anger, its an indication that he or she has seen too

much of it and has developed defenses against it --

and against you. The unfortunate result is a child who

is less likely to want to behave to please you, and is

more open to the influences of the peer group That

means you have some repair work to do. Whether or

not they show it -- and the more often we get angry,

the more defended they will be, and therefore less

likely to show it -- our anger is nothing short of

terrifying to our children.

How can you handle your own anger?

Since youre human, youll sometimes find yourself

in fight or flight mode, and your child will start to

look like the enemy. When we're swept with anger,

we're physically ready to fight. Hormones and

neurotransmitters are flooding our bodies. They cause

your muscles to tense, your pulse to race, your

breathing to quicken. It's impossible to stay calm at

those points, but we all know that clobbering our kids

-- while it might bring instant relief -- isn't really what

we want to do.

So commit now to No hitting, No swearing, No

calling your child names, No meting out any

punishment while angry. What about screaming?

Never at your children, that's a tantrum. If you really

need to scream, go into your car with the windows

rolled up and scream where no one can hear, and don't

use words, because those make you angrier.

Your children get angry too, so its a double gift to

them to find constructive ways to deal with your

anger: you not only dont hurt them, you offer them a

role model. Your children will certainly see you angry

from time to time, and how you handle those

situations will teach them a lot. Will you teach them

that might makes right? That parents have tantrums

too? That screaming is how adults handle conflict? If

so, they'll adopt these behaviors as a badge of how

grown-up they are.

Or will you model for your child that anger is part of

being human, and that learning to manage anger

responsibly is part of becoming mature? Heres how.

1. Set limits BEFORE you get angry.

Often when we get angry at our children, its because

we havent set a limit, and something is grating on us.

The minute you start getting angry, its a signal to do

something. No, not yell. Intervene in a positive way

to prevent more of whatever behavior is irritating you.

If your irritation is coming from you -- lets say

youve just had a hard day, and their natural

exuberance is wearing on you -- it can help to explain

this to your children and ask them to be considerate

and keep the behavior thats irritating you in check, at

least for now.

If the children are doing something that is

increasingly annoying -- playing a game in which

someone is likely to get hurt, stalling when youve

asked them to do something, squabbling while youre

on the phone -- you may need to interrupt what youre

doing, restate your family rule or expectation, and

redirect them, to keep the situation, and your anger,

from escalating.

2. Make and post a list of acceptable ways to

handle anger.

When you feel this angry, you need a way to calm

down. Many people can harness their biology and get

it under control just with awareness: Stop, breathe,

remind yourself it isn't an emergency. Shake the

tension out of your hands. Take ten more deep

breaths. If you need to make a noise, hum.

You might try to find a way to laugh, which

discharges the tension and shifts the mood. Even

forcing yourself to smile sends a message to your

nervous system that there's no emergency, and begins

calming you down.

If you feel you need to physically discharge your rage,

put on some music and dance. Some people still

follow the timeworn advice to clobber a pillow, but

it's best if you can do that kind of discharging in

private, because watching you clobber that pillow can

be pretty scary for your child. He knows perfectly

well that the pillow is a stand-in for his head and the

image of crazy hitting mommy will be seared into his

memory. I should add that I personally think this is a

questionable strategy, because research shows that

hitting something -- anything -- confirms to your

subconscious that indeed this is an emergency and

you should stay in "fight or flight." If you can breathe

deeply and tolerate the angry feelings, you will

probably notice that right under the anger is fear,

sadness, disappointment. Let yourself feel those

feelings and the anger will melt away.

3. Take Five.

Recognize that an angry state is a terrible starting

place to intervene in any situation. Instead, give

yourself a timeout and come back when you're able to

be calm. Move away from your child physically so

you won't be tempted to reach out and touch him

violently. Just say, as calmly as you can, I am too

mad right now to talk about this. I am going to take a

timeout and calm down. Exiting does not let your

child win. It impresses upon them just how serious the

infraction is, and it models self-control. Use this time

to calm yourself, not to work yourself into a further

frenzy about how right you are.

If your child is old enough to be left for a moment,

you can go into the bathroom, splash water on your

face, and do some breathing. But if your child is

young enough to feel abandoned when you leave, just

use the kitchen sink instead. Then, sit on the couch

near your child for a few minutes, breathing deeply

and silently saying a little mantra that restores your

calm, like "This is not an emergency.....Kids need

love most when they don't seem to deserve it.....He's

acting out because he needs my help with his big

feelings...This too shall pass." It's good role

modeling for our kids to see how we regulate our big

emotions.

4. Listen to your anger, rather than acting on it.

Anger, like other feelings, is as much a given as our

arms and legs. What were responsible for is what we

choose to do with it. Anger often has a valuable lesson

for us, but acting while we're angry, except in rare

situations requiring self-defense, is rarely

constructive, because we make choices we would

never make from a rational state. The constructive

way to handle anger is to limit our expression of it,

and when we calm down, to use it diagnostically:

what is so wrong in our life that we feel furious, and

what do we need to do to change the situation?

Sometimes the answer is clearly related to our

parenting: we need to enforce rules before things get

out of hand, or start putting the children to bed half an

hour earlier, or do some repair work on our

relationship with our twelve year old so that she stops

treating us rudely. Sometimes we're surprised to find

that our anger is actually at our spouse who is not

acting as a full partner in parenting, or even at our

boss. And sometimes the answer is that we're carrying

around anger we dont understand that spills out onto

our kids, and we need to seek help though therapy or a

parents support group.

5. Remember that expressing your anger to

another person can reinforce and escalate it.

Despite the popular idea that we need to express our

anger so that it doesnt eat away at us, theres nothing

constructive about expressing anger to another

person. Research shows that expressing anger while

we are angry actually makes us more angry. This in

turn makes the other person hurt, afraid, or angry, and

causes a rift in the relationship. So discharge your

anger physically if you need to, but then calm yourself

and consider what the "message" of the anger is

before you speak with the other person.

Rehashing the situation in our mind always proves to

us that we are right and the other person is wrong,

which again makes us more angry as we stew. What

works is to find a constructive way to address

whatever is making us angry so that the situation is

resolved, and our anger stops being triggered.

6. WAIT before disciplining.

Make it a point NEVER to act while angry. Nothing

says you have to issue edicts on the fly. Simply say

something like I cant believe you hit your brother

after weve talked about hitting being against the

rules. I need to think about this, and we will talk about

it this afternoon. Until then, I expect you to be on your

best behavior.

Once youve taken a ten minute timeout and still dont

feel calm enough to relate constructively, you can say

I want to think about what just happened, and we

will talk about it later. In the meantime, I need to

make dinner and you need to finish your homework,

please.

After dinner, sit down with your child and, if

necessary, set firm limits. But you will be more able

to listen to his side of it, and to respond with

reasonable, enforceable, respectful limits to his

behavior.

7. Avoid physical force, no matter what.

85% of adolescents say they've been slapped or

spanked by their parents (Journal of Psychopathology,

2007). And yet study after study has proven that

spanking has a negative impact on childrens

development that lasts throughout life. The American

Academy of Pediatrics recommends strongly against

it.

I personally wonder if the epidemic of anxiety and

depression among adults in our culture is caused in

part by the aftermath of so many of us having grown

up with adults who hurt us. Many parents minimize

the physical violence they suffered, because the

emotional pain is too great to acknowledge. But

repressing that pain just makes us more likely to hit

our own children.

Spanking may make you feel better temporarily

because it discharges your rage, but it is bad for your

child, and ultimately sabotages everything positive

you do as a parent. Spanking, and even slapping, has

a way of escalating, sometimes into deadly violence.

Do whatever you need to do to control yourself,

including leaving the room. If you cant control

yourself and end up resorting to physical force,

apologize to your child, tell him hitting is never ok,

and get yourself some help.

8. Avoid threats.

Threats made while youre angry will be

unreasonable. Since threats are only effective if you

are willing to follow through on them, they undermine

your authority and make it less likely that your kids

will follow the rules next time. Instead, tell your child

that you need to think about an appropriate response

to this infraction of the rules. The suspense will be

worse than hearing a string of threats they know you

wont enforce.

9. Monitor your tone and word choice.

Research shows that the more calmly we speak, the

more calm we feel, and the more calmly others

respond to us. Similarly, use of swear words or other

highly charged words makes us and our listener more

upset, and the situation escalates. We have the power

to calm or upset ourselves and the person we are

speaking with by our own tone of voice and choice of

words. (Remember, you're the role model.)

10. Consider that you're part of the problem.

If you're open to emotional growth, your child will

always show you where you need to work on yourself.

If you're not, it's hard to be a calm parent. In every

interaction with our child, we have the power to calm

or escalate the situation. Your child may be acting in

ways that aggravate you, but you are not a helpless

victim. Take responsibility to manage your own

emotions first. Your child may not become a little

angel overnight, but his acting out will diminish

dramatically once you learn to stay calm.

11. Still angry?

Look for the underlying feelings. Dont get attached

to your anger. Once youve listened to it and made

appropriate changes, let go of it. If that isnt working,

remember that anger is always a defense. It shields us

from feeling vulnerable.

To get rid of anger, look at the hurt or fear under the

anger. If your daughters so obsessed with her friends

that shes dismissive of the family and that hurts you,

or your sons tantrums scare you, work with those

feelings and situations, and address them. Once you

get to the underlying feelings, your anger will

dissipate.

12. Choose your battles.

Every negative interaction with your child uses up

valuable relationship capital. Focus on what matters,

such as the way your child treats other humans. In the

larger scheme of things, her jacket on the floor may

drive you crazy, but it probably isnt worth putting

your relationship bank account in the red over.

13. Keep looking for effective ways to discipline

that encourage better behavior.

There are hugely more effective ways to discipline

than anger, and, in fact, disciplining with anger sets

up a cycle that encourages misbehavior. Some parents

are surprised to hear that there are families where the

children are generally well-behaved, although

physical force is never used and parental yelling is

infrequent. In fact, it is my observation (although the

research has yet to catch up because the numbers are

small) that families where there is no discipline or

yelling at all, but only empathic limits, produce kids

who take complete responsibility for their behavior at

an early age and are the best-adjusted emotionally.

We know that punishment is ALWAYS a negative,

and I would say that Discipline as we think of it is

punishment, and is therefore counter-productive.

14. If you frequently struggle with your anger, seek

counseling.

Theres no shame in asking for help. The shame is in

reneging on your responsibility as a parent by

damaging your child physically or psychologically.

Latest Posts

When Your Child Makes You Want To Scream:

10 Steps to Calm

"The hardest thing is still to calm myself down when

my boys get wild and my buttons get pushed. I end up

screaming despite my best intentions." - Mollie

"When my kids become wild and unruly, I use a nice,

safe playpen. When they're finished, I climb out." --

Erma Bombeck

http://www.ahaparenting.com/_blog/Parenting_Blog/post/When_Your_Child_Makes_You_Want_To_Scream/http://www.ahaparenting.com/_blog/Parenting_Blog/post/When_Your_Child_Makes_You_Want_To_Scream/

Mollie's right. The hardest part of parenting is

regulating our own emotions. In our last post, we

talked about how to get angry less often. But what

happens when your child does something that makes

you want to scream, and a playpen won't work? What

are your options?

You can:

a. Scream and then feel remorseful later.

b. Resist screaming by calming yourself down.

In other words, you can escalate the upset, or you can

try to stay calm to settle everyone down.

Of course, you have more options if you take positive

action BEFORE you feel like screaming. Often when

we lose it with our children, its because we havent

set a limit, and something is grating on us. Some

parents are trying so hard to be patient they let things

get out of hand, and then snap.

The key is to set limits BEFORE you get angry. The

minute you start getting annoyed, its a signal to do

something. No, not yell. Its time to intervene in a

positive way to meet everyone's needs, including your

own!

http://www.ahaparenting.com/_blog/Parenting_Blog/post/Take_care_of_yourself_emotionally/

But what if despite your best efforts something

happens that pushes you over the edge?

1. If necessary, intervene to move a child out of

danger. And, of course, tend to anyone who is crying

or hurt. But don't open your mouth to the child you

want to scream at. Whatever comes out will make you

sorry later. Bite your tongue. Just focus on making

sure everyone is safe.

2. There is no emergency. This is the critical

moment; your body has been hijacked by fight or

flight hormones and part of you thinks it's an

emergency. You feel an urgent need to act; probably

by clobbering your child. Repeat after me: IT'S NOT

AN EMERGENCY.

3. Take Five. Consciously speak in as calm a tone as

you can manage. "I need to calm down. I'll be back in

a minute" and move away from your child. (If one

child was being attacked by the other, take that child

with you to keep him safe.)

Maybe you're wondering how your child will learn

not to do such things if you stay calm. Research

shows that when we get upset, our kids get more upset

-- and the learning functions of their brains shut down.

Kids learn best through a limit given empathically so

that it lessens their upset, followed by a problem-

solving discussion once they calm down. By

comparison, when we act like it's an emergency, our

child spins further out of control.

4. Do whatever calms you and defuses your anger.

Breathe deeply at least ten times to turn off your

body's alarm response. Shake the tension out through

your hands. Splash water on your face. Look in the

mirror and reassure yourself: "I'm a good parent.

This will be ok. Whatever happens, I can handle it."

5. Change your thoughts so you can change your

feelings. If you're thinking your child is a spoiled brat

who will grow up to be a bully, you can't calm down.

The truth is, your child is a little person who is in pain

and is showing you that by his behavior. Remind

yourself "He's acting like a child because he IS a

child....My child needs my love most when he least

'deserves' it."

6. Once you're calm, move back to your child and

set whatever limit you need to as empathically as

you can. You're role modeling for your child how to

regulate emotions. Hopefully, you're feeling calm and

kind enough now to help your child express whatever

emotions led to her outburst, so she can move beyond

them. But if you're still too upset, just say "I'm still

upset about what happened. I know you were upset

too, but you know it's not okay to behave like that.

We'll talk about this in a while, once we're both

calmer."

The disadvantage to waiting is that you aren't helping

her with her feelings now, while she's in touch with

them, and they'll still be driving her behavior. On the

other hand, if you're still angry, you can't really be

kind to your child, and anything you say will make

things worse. So wait to do the hard work of

connecting until you can empathize instead of attack.

7. When everyones calm, talk with him about

what happened. Your first goal is create safety, so

your child can process the emotions that led to the

behavior and move past them. That way those

challenging feelings won't drive more bad behavior in

the future. The key to this is for you to actually feel

compassion and empathy for your child's perspective.

Remember, actions must be limited but all feelings are

allowed: "You hit your brother...you must have been

very angry.....you get mad at your brother a lot....it's

hard to share me, I know....sometimes you wish you

didn't have a brother.....everyone feels that way

sometimes....you know that I could never love anyone

more than you.....you have a special place in my heart

just for you...."

8. Once you're both calm and feeling connected,

teach. Explore with your child how he might handle

such a situation in the future. "I know you were so

very mad, AND I will not let you hit your brother. I

know what it's like to feel that mad. ... What could you

do next time instead of hitting?....Use your words?

Yes. What else? ...Do you think you could call me for

help?... Stomp your foot? Great! Let's practice those

things...What could you say to your brother next time

this happens?" Notice you're not lecturing. You're his

coach, supporting him to be his best self.

9. Prevention is the best medicine. If your cup isn't

full, you're at the mercy of your triggers. One little

push from your three year old, and you've slipped

from the high road of parenting to the low road. You

can only give what you have inside, so keep your cup

full. Talk with a trusted friend about the trials of

parenting. Turn off the computer and go to bed early.

Make daily opportunities to laugh with your children.

Try to just stop and really enjoy your child, even with

all the chaos and mess.

10. Fake it till you make it. What if you find

yourself screaming before you can stop yourself? The

minute you notice it, just stop. In mid-sentence.

Close your mouth. You're not embarrassing yourself,

you're demonstrating the kind of self control you want

your child to learn. If you do this every time, sooner

or later you'll be able to stop yourself before you start

screaming. You'll be on your way to becoming a

parent who never screams. And you won't get

triggered nearly as often.

Easy? No. Possible? Absolutely. I've seen thousands

of parents do it. We're actually re-wiring our brains,

and de-activating those triggers from our own

childhoods. So the next generation won't have to.