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How to get through situations that make you really angry without losing your cool
Have you ever found yourself really angry at your children or at something your child did?
Have you ever been shocked at the intensity of the anger you feel as a parent?
Have you ever been so angry that you yelled or otherwise lashed out at your children?
Have you ever regretted your actions following an anger-filled situation?
Do you wish you had a way to get through those situations that really make you angry without losing your cool?
If you answered yes to any of these questions, you’re not alone. Everyday there are parents who find they are feeling very angry and are wondering where those intense feelings came from and how to keep them in check. Understanding a little about where that intense anger comes from can help relieve some of guilt you may feel and can help you choose words and actions that are focused on something positive, rather than focused on your anger.
Why do we sometimes get so angry as parents? This article discusses three factors in the anger that parents feel and three tools that will help you choose parenting words and actions that you won’t regret later. Obviously, this does not cover every situation and every parent. It is my hope that you will find at least one tool that will help in your angry situations.
Jane is a mother of three children, ages 15, 10, and 6. She has recently found herself getting very angry in many parenting situations. Jane wanted to know how she could respond to her children without yelling or losing her composure, even when she was very angry.
I asked Jane to describe some recent angry situations. Jane discovered that her anger showed up differently with each of her three children. I helped Jane use three different tools with her children that made it easy for her to choose parenting words and actions that she felt good about, even when she found herself very angry.
Intense love for our children
One factor in our anger as parents is our intense love for our children. We love our children so much, we want so much for our children, and we work so hard to give them everything they need. When we see a little bit of that falling apart, we sometimes fall apart. Intense love for a child can sometimes translate into intense anger when that child is doing something that may hurt him/herself, that may jeopardize his/her future, or that is hurtful to us as his/her parent. Sometimes we get so angry because we fear that everything will not be okay for our child.
When you find yourself getting really angry, ask yourself, “What fear is behind my anger?” Then turn the fear statement into a want statement. For example, the statement, “I fear that my child will hurt others.” can be turned into “I want my child to respect others.” The fear statement, “I fear my child will not be successful.” can be turned into the want statement, “I want success for my child.”
Then ask yourself, “What can I do or say, right now, to express that want for my child?” You have now focused your parenting words and actions around the positive intense feelings you have for your child rather than the negative ones. You’re likely to feel better about the words and actions you choose to use and your child will get the message you want him/her to hear, rather than the message of anger.
Jane described a situation recently when her 15-year-old son decided not to go to his afternoon classes at school. Jane described becoming very angry and the situation resulted in both Jane and her son yelling at each other followed by her son stomping out the door. Jane felt terrible about how she handled the situation and was sure her son did too.
Jane tried the tool described above to find more effective parenting words and actions to use instead of yelling. First, Jane asked herself, “What fear is behind my anger?” Her answer was that she feared that her son would not graduate from high school and his dream to attend college would never come true. Jane turned her fear statement into a want statement and it became “I want my son’s dream of attending college to become a reality.”
Next, Jane asked herself, “What can I do or say right now to express that want for my child?” Immediately several statements came to mind that she could say to describe her want for her son.
When her son returned home later that day, Jane said, “I want your dream to attend college to become a reality.” Her son replied, “Me, too.” Jane asked, “What can I do to help you get to college?” The conversation continued in a cooperative and civil fashion and resulted in Jane and her son coming up with several ways that they could work together to make sure that he had the opportunity to attend college. Afterward, Jane felt great about how she had handled the situation. She was able to keep her focus on what she wanted for her son rather than on her anger.
Tools to use when your anger comes from your intense love for your child and your fear that everything will not be okay for your child
Step 1: Ask yourself, “What fear is behind my anger?”
Step 2: Turn your fear statement into a want statement.
Step 3: Ask yourself, “What can I do or say right now to express that want for my child?”
As your parenting situation continues, you can repeat step 3 over and over to continue to find words to use and actions to take that express your positive wants for your child rather than your anger.
Sometimes it is the long, drawn-out situations that test our cool and lead us to resort to yelling simply because we’ve run out of ideas for handling the situation. When you find yourself in this spot, keep asking yourself, “What else can I do or say right now to express that want for my child?” Do this before each word or action you take. This will help keep your words and actions focused on your positive feelings for your child rather than on your anger.
Our hot buttons
Another factor in intense anger is our own hot buttons; those behaviors that really get our blood boiling quickly. Sometimes we have strong feelings about these behaviors because of something that happened in our own childhood, because of something that we did or others did to us, or because of the way our parents reacted when we were children. Often, the reasons behind our hot buttons have nothing to do with our children and everything to do with us. Realizing the reasons behind our strong feelings about hot button behaviors can help us to focus our words and actions around those reasons rather than around our anger.
When you find yourself getting very angry very quickly because your child just exhibited one of those hot button behaviors, ask yourself, “What is my child doing that is making me so angry?” Then turn your “My child is…” statement into an “I like it when..” statement. For example, “My child is lying to me.”, can be turned into, “I like it when people tell me the truth.” “My child is hurting his sister.”, can be turned into, “I like it when brothers and sisters take care of each other.”
You can find ways to respond to your child in that situation by asking yourself, “What words or actions could I use right now that would help my child know what kind of behavior I like?” This will help you find things to do or say that express your feelings in a positive way rather than in an angry way.
Jane described a recent situation with her 10-year-old daughter that really made her angry. Her daughter had been playing in the living room and had accidentally knocked over a vase of flowers. Jane saw the event happen and quickly walked into the living room to help clean up. When Jane entered the room, her daughter immediately said that it wasn’t her fault and that maybe her younger brother had knocked over the vase.
Jane found herself getting angry very quickly, not about the vase being knocked over, but about her daughter’s lie. In this type of situation, Jane would typically begin yelling about how she saw what had happened and knew her daughter was lying. A situation such as this would usually end in her daughter being angrily sent to her room and Jane cleaning up the mess. Jane always felt that the importance of telling the truth was lost in all of the anger in these situations. In these types of situations, Jane felt that her daughter only heard and remembered her anger. Jane wanted her daughter to remember the importance of telling the truth.
This time, Jane decided to use a Coach-Parenting™ tool to help her choose words and actions that she could feel good about. Jane asked herself, “What is my child doing that is making me so angry?” Her answer was that her child was lying. Jane changed her “My child is…” statement into an “I like it when…” statement and it became, “I like it when people tell me the truth.”
Jane asked herself, “What words or actions could I use right now that would help my child know that I like it when people tell the truth?” Several ideas immediately came to mind, such as talking about how it is much easier to help someone with a problem when they are telling the truth and showing her daughter how her lie hurt her younger brother’s feelings.
Jane turned to her daughter and said, “I like it when people tell me the truth. That way I can help them when they have a problem.” Jane’s daughter replied, “I knocked over the vase with my doll. It was an accident.” Jane said, “Thank you for telling me the truth. Let’s clean it up together.” As they cleaned, they talked about telling the truth and about how a lie can hurt other people. Afterward, Jane felt really good about not losing her composure and about the fact that her daughter really heard her message about telling the truth, rather than just hearing her anger.
Tools you can use when your anger is caused by a behavior that is a hot button for you
Step 1: Ask yourself, “What is my child doing that is making me so angry?”
Step 2: Turn the “My child is…” statement into a “I like it when…” statement.
Step 3: Ask yourself, “What words or actions could I use right now that would help my
child know what kind of behavior I like?”
When you’ve run out of ideas
Oftentimes we get angry as parents simply because we’re frustrated with the situation and we’ve run out of ideas. How many times have you been told by a parent educator or read in a book about parenting techniques that work, but take time? These parenting resources say that you have to be patient and wait for the technique to work in the long run. What they don’t tell you is how to cope in the meantime. They don’t tell you how to get through those situations before the technique begins to work without losing your cool. Sometimes all you need is more ideas.
A simple way to find more ways to respond in those long, drawn-out situations that are frustrating you is to ask yourself, “What do I want my child to remember from this situation?” Then ask yourself, “What could I do or say right now to express that one thing I want my child to remember?”
As the situation continues, keep asking yourself, “What else could I do or say right now to express that one thing I want my child to remember from this?” This helps to keep you focused on what you want to teach your child rather than on your frustration, your anger, or how long this is taking. Most likely, you won’t answer that the one thing you want your child to remember is your anger.
When you use these two steps, over and over in a single situation, you’ll be able to continue to find ways to express what is important to you, no matter how long the situation lasts.
Jane reported that her six-year-old son really tries her patience. Jane said that her son is really creative and can keep an argument going so long that she runs out of responses, gets very angry, and begins yelling. She described a recent situation at the dinner table when her son wanted to eat candy for dinner. She had used up all of her explanations and tricks and had found herself getting tired and angry. Jane didn’t want to resort to, “Because I told you so!” followed by an angrily demanding that her son eat his food.
Instead Jane chose to use a Coach-Parenting™ tool. Jane asked herself, “What do I want my child to remember from this situation?” Jane wanted her son to remember that healthy food was important for his body to grow. Jane then asked herself, “What could I do or say right now to express that one thing I want my son to remember?”
Immediately, Jane thought of several ways to tell her son about the importance of healthy food for his body. As her son continued to argue and ask questions, Jane found it easy to respond by first asking herself, “What could I do or say right now that would express the importance of healthy food?” New ideas sprang to mind each time!
Rather than becoming frustrated or angry, Jane calmly found herself responding to her child with remarks about healthy food until her son became frustrated and ran out of ideas. Afterward, she said that she thought that the game wasn’t any fun for her son when she didn’t get angry so he had stopped trying. Jane felt very good about how she handled the situation and thought that her son had even learned a few things about the importance of eating healthy food.
Tools you can use when you’re angry and you’ve run out of ideas
Step 1: Ask yourself, “What do I want my child to remember from this situation?”
Step 2: Ask yourself, “What could I do or say right now to express that one thing I want my child to remember?”
Continue to follow step 2, over and over, for as long as the situation lasts. You’ll find more and more ways to express what is important to you.
If the situation changes, and you feel that another lesson or idea is important, great. Simply start at step 1, ask yourself what you want your child to remember, then go to step 2 and ask yourself what you can do or say to express that right then. By using these two steps over and over, you’ll be able to continue to come up with ideas for responding to your child, even when the situation drags on and on.
In this article, I’ve discussed different tools you can use to focus your words and actions on something positive rather than on your anger. When you’re interacting with your child, it can be helpful to you and to your child to express something that you want to teach your child, something that is important to you, or something that you want your child to remember, rather than centering all your words and actions on your anger. However, this does not mean that your anger and your feelings are not important. They are important! You will need a safe place to express your anger and all of your feelings. This can be with a spouse, partner, friend, family member, coach, counselor, therapist, or other support person. Find someone who will listen to you and support you as you talk about how you’re feeling. Make sure that you receive the support that you need as a parent. The better supported you are, the easier it will be to be the parent you want to be, everyday.
The three sources of parenting anger discussed in this article certainly don’t encompass everything that contributes to anger as a parent. It will be important for you to discover what causes your anger and find an appropriate way to get through your tough situations. If you find that you cannot control your anger, that your anger is causing you to hurt yourself, your children, your property, or others, that your anger scares you and/or your children, that you want help with your anger, or that these tools don’t help in your angry situations, seek the help of a professional such as a counselor, therapist, or anger management specialist.
The details of the examples used in this article have been altered.
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