In families with angry children there are always angry, stressed-out, irritated and over-burdened parents, as well. The point of this approach is to teach children and adults how to appropriately express their anger, rather than try to teach a child how not to be angry.
One problem is that the very people who are modeling for the child how to feel, label and express their anger appropriately, are losing it themselves. Parents must first learn how to control their own anger, frustration and annoyance. The child needs a parent - a mature individual who can show him proper expression - the most, instead of an out-of-control parent.
First, one must realize that no one - especially a child - is responsible for your anger. Anger is a choice. We choose how angry to feel, and we choose when to feel angry. We often think, "People make us angry." If you can't learn to take responsibility for, and control of, your anger and reactions, then you can't expect the child to.
Sometimes, it's the little things a child does that sets us off. Angry, out-of-control parents teach their child how to escalate the rage and pain and anger, and how to justify it as a reaction, instead of expressing it properly, and getting over it and moving on. There is no justification for blowing up and being out of control because the child provoked you.
If we model for our children that, "Others make us angry. YOU make me angry," the child is immediately "in charge" of the family. That's one of the problems very angry children face - the adults in their lives aren't in control of themselves, and the children have to find ways to be in control.
Why would someone choose anger?
- It's easy - a lot easier than addressing the problems and staying in control.
- It's comfortable.
- It feels very powerful.
- It's very fast.
- It's one of the most effective pain reducers. Anger tightens down all the blood vessels and pain messages don't get through. It has an effect on anger blocks pain. There is no drug that affects the pain delivery system faster, and there's no drug that wears off as fast. As soon as you let go of that anger, your pain is back and it feels worse because it was gone for a while. So, in order to relieve the pain, you have to get angry again. Because anger is very effective as a temporary pain modifier, it's also very addictive. That addiction leads to the repetition of the cycle, as well as hopelessness and helplessness.
Fuel + Spark = Explosion
If you have fuel and you don't put a spark to it, nothing happens. If you have a spark and no fuel, the spark goes out. You need both fuel and a spark to have an explosion.
Stress is the fuel. The stress of, "I'm not being an effective parent to this child," the stress of, "the community doesn't understand, " the stress of, "Why isn't the therapy working?" Even normal, everyday stress can become fuel.
As long as there is no spark, the fuel will keep building. In that regard, it's important to work on stress reduction.
When your tank's about to top off, you need lower it with momentary stress reduction. Do 25 jumping jacks, shoot some baskets, vacuum the carpet - anything to quickly lower stress. Momentary stress reduction also means you're focusing on yourself, and not on the child's behavior. And right there, you've begun to change the pattern - it used to be screaming and hollering; now it's, "Excuse me, gotta do my jumping jacks!" Your child may think you're nuts, but they're going to be a lot more respectful of a nutty parent than of one who does nothing but yell at them.
Anger-triggering behaviors are what drive most episodes, but they're not the spark. These behaviors simply allow the trigger to move from safety to fire. For instance, when you're talking to your child and they start rolling their eyes - that can be an anger-triggering behavior.
Take time to discover what triggers your anger. Some triggers may be obvious - the child who calls you a name, who ignores you, who refuses to do his or her chores. They may, however, be more subtle, such as passive-aggressive behaviors.
But remember, these behaviors are not the spark. If you allow these behaviors to get to you, they're you're taking that safety catch off the trigger so the gun can fire. It's still your choice to get angry, but you can't really make the choice if you don't pay attention to what those triggers are.
Stress is the fuel; your triggering thoughts are the spark - what you think about what the other person does, says, is thinking. That realization can be frightening because it puts you in charge, and yet relieving because it puts you in charge - of how often and to what degree you get angry.
Shoulds and Blamers
Our triggering thoughts are shoulds (You should have; You should not have; That should have happened; That should not have happened) and blamers (You harmed me; You deliberately harmed me).
It is important to practice intervention strategies when you start thinking about shoulds and blamers. You need to reduce your stress and change the way you're thinking about what that angry child is or is not doing.
Blamers assume someone else is responsible for your pain; they give that person control over your emotions.
There are four critical blamers:
- The good/bad split. "I'm okay, you're not okay," or "I'm right, you're wrong." The minute you start thinking that you're right and they're wrong, that you're the good person and they're the bad person, that your way is good and their way is bad, their anger will escalate. However, because the best defense is a good offense, your anger with escalate, as well.
- Assuming intent. Assumes harm is someone's fault and is deliberately inflicted.
- Magnifying. "He always," and "She never." "He never does his chores; She's always late." The minute you use "always" and "never," you have taken away hope for progress - from the child, and from yourself. Instead, try, "99.98% of the time he does not complete his assignments." It's difficult to get enraged about that.
- Global labeling. "You're lazy," says to a child that they can't accomplish anything.
There are five critical shoulds.
- Myth of entitlement. "I want respect, I deserve respect, therefore I ought to have it." If you believe you ought to have something and you're not getting it, your anger is going to escalate. However, if someone validates your desire and that you deserve it, and then says, "but this child isn't capable of giving it," you can take your anger down.
- Myth of fairness. "That's not fair." Acknowledging the unfairness doesn't relieve the anger. Saying, "Life isn't fair," may be true, but doesn't help, either.
- Myth of change. "I can control and change others." You can change yourself, but not another person. Change can be effective when you work on changing yourself, instead of changing the child.
- Myth of assumptions. "If he loved me he would." Every child wants to belong, but that doesn't mean he or she can behave in appropriate ways to belong. Those who may need it the most are also most unable to act properly.
- Myth of letting go. "This kid is driving me crazy; I'm justified in blowing up!" There is never any justification for letting go. When you do, you're not communicating anymore, you're just yelling.
Stress Reduction
Anger is very energizing. You need a great deal of energy to tune everything out and argue and be angry. Anger turned inward is depression, and that is very de-energizing - the energy of anger sucks the energy out of a person's life and their soul.
If you think a triggering thought and begin to get angry you need to think to yourself, "What am I going to do with this energy? What are my thoughts? What am I thinking about this episode that may be increasing my anger? And what am I going to do with the energy?" It is important to come up with unique, individual stress-reducing techniques.
van Gulden relates the story of one of her clients, a mother who was a trained opera singer. The mother said, "One of the things that triggers a fear response in my child is a loud voice. But I can't be quiet - I've tried! I always start out softly, but in the end I'm yelling and screaming!" van Gulden suggested the mother try singing instead of yelling - as the volume and pitch of her voice began to escalate, she should break out into song.
van Gulden says that three weeks later a friend mentioned a scene she had witnessed in a department store. Standing at the top of the escalator, a mother was obviously very angry with her child but instead of yelling, she singing, "I'm so angry. Not because you should behave," she sang out, "It would be so much more pleasant if you would." Not only had this mother learned to control the tone and pitch of her voice so as not to escalate the anger with her child, but she had also changed an unhealthy should into a healthy would.
So I'll Always Be Happy?
van Gulden says it's impossible to never be angry. Parents must learn not to take their child's behavior personally. Anger is a healthy human emotion.
In fact, she says, parents should be aware of the struggle they're dealing with: not that you won't get angry, but rather pausing to think about what appropriate measures you're going to take when you find your anger rising.
When a parent loses it, it helps to go back to the child afterwards and say, "I would have preferred to have acted differently when you hit your brother yesterday." It's a wonderful way to model for your child that you're working on and learning to manage your anger.
van Gulden also points out that the longer you work on this, the more effective it becomes.
Sixty-nine percent of communication is nonverbal, so it's important to realize your body language can contribute to the escalation. The best position to be in - to calm yourself and appear non-threatening to the child - is to sit down, put your butt against the back of the seat, with both feet parallel and on the floor, and with your hands on your knees or in your lap where the child can see them.
"My Mom's Enraged!"
It took years, but one mother has learned to whisper when she's angry, instead of yelling. She relates a story about how she - and in turn, her family - deals with her anger. "We had some friends coming for Thanksgiving. At the last minute they called and said they had some unexpected company from out of town, people they had gone to college with. I said to bring them along, that we'd set two more places at the dinner table
"The gentleman sat down and proceeded to talk about drunk drivers, saying he thought Mothers Against Drunk Drivers were going too far. I said, 'Excuse me, I really need you not to have this conversation right now. We just lost a very dear friend who was killed by a man driving drunk, with five prior arrests for drunk driving. So this is not an appropriate discussion at our table, in our home, at this time.'
"About five minutes later this gentleman - whom we'd never met before - got on his soapbox and started again. I said, 'Excuse me, I asked you to stop.' He said, 'But it's an important subject, and you're wrong about this. I know you've had a loss, but you're wrong about this." And I said, very quietly, in a whisper, 'I need you to stop.' At which point, my 28-year-old son - the one I had to learn most of this for - stood up and said, 'Excuse me, you need to leave our house.' The gentleman just looked at him, and I'm thinking, 'He's kicking guests out of our house! I can't allow this!' Then I thought, 'Yes I can. This man has not respected me, so I don't need to be a good host.'
This couple looked very confused that they were being kicked out in the middle of turkey dinner. My son said, 'My mother's whispering - she is enraged.' I looked at our friends, whose out-of-town guests these were, and they said, 'Yes she is. You need to leave. We'll see you back at the house.' And they left.
Now, as a hostess, I'm thinking, 'Huh? What just happened here?' But as a mom, I'm thinking, 'They got it! My kids learned it! We can do this as a family!' Under the old system, we would have had an angry scene at the table - we would have blown up, or kept our anger in and stewed about it, and it would have ruined the day for everyone."
But because her son knew that she whispered when she got angry, he was able to stand up for her and help her appropriately express that anger.
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