Your Child's Anger | Darryl Sollerh

Hate the sin, love the sinner.

So scripture advises us, but as anyone who’s tried knows only too well, it ain’t easy.

Yet that is what mom and dad are called upon to do on a regular basis, even in the face of their child’s moodiness, recalcitrance, hostility, rage or meltdowns.

For parents who don’t like conflicts, it can be a particularly vexing voyage, testing their poise and patience beyond words.

So let’s begin by taking a step back, and first take a look at anger, as opposed to depression, which can sometimes be wrapped inside a child’s anger, and a depression hidden by their angry outbursts.

We are rather addressing all the feelings that can smolder or ignite when we don’t get what we want, feel out of control, or feel threatened or injured by circumstances or those around us.

For a Middle Schooler, struggling with the stresses and strains of their shifting worlds, and who are likewise also striving for an increased autonomy from the adults around them, their frustrations, aggravations and upsets can be easily triggered, especially if they perceive the reasons for their troubles as being “unfair.”

A timeless complaint at any age.

Likewise, a mom or dad can also feel unjustly punished by their child’s outburst, and retaliate with consequences that outweigh the offense, triggering even more feelings of unfairness in their child, not to mention all kinds of dangerous behaviors 

So it is important for a mom or dad to try to distinguish what exactly may be causing their child’s incendiary reactions, rather than quickly dismissing them as infantile rage, or responding too readily by denying their protests.

Why bother? Why try to look a little beyond the fireworks of the moment when your kid is behaving obnoxiously, or meeting your every parental directive with a defiant and snotty “no!”?

Because what can initially present as baseless, self-centered childish upset at not having their wishes met, a few moments of calmer contemplation may reveal a far deeper complaint—a complaint that may not only lead you to a better understanding of them, but also may help you to help them better understand and articulate what’s really at issue for them. Because when any one of us feels a surge of dire tension inside us, but can’t readily identify all the causes of the anxiety, we can become reactive, if not explosive. So it goes for your Middle Schooler, who has far less life experience to comprehend what might be truly driving their unwieldy emotional reactions.

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A moody Middle School girl, enduring the strains of her world, made a caustic remark to her mother. Her mom, incensed by what she received as an indignity, took the remark very personally and reacted the way one might to an adult. She let it be known to that it was up to her daughter to heal the relationship via a sharply-worded letter to her daughter and posted it to her door, stating that the daughter bore full responsibility for “fixing” the situation. In doing so, she apparently expected her 7th grade Middle Schooler to know how to do what many adults find difficult. For her daughter’s part, she not only hadn’t meant the remark, uttered in a fit of anxiety that had nothing really to do with her mother, but likewise didn’t have a clue as to how to “fix” the situation. She understandably asked, “How am I supposed to fix our family”?

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Indeed.

How could she fix anything, much less comprehend her mother’s expectations and reaction?

So even when they are snapping, or moody, the less you can take it personally, and the more you will see their prickliness as a response to stress, and the more you can appropriately correct HOW to communicate with you and others—civilly and respectfully—while not turning the moment into a trip-wire capable of damaging the relationship as a whole.

Similarly, demanding a level of understanding from a Middle School child they have not yet had time to develop, or requiring relationship skills of them they are only just beginning to learn, will only lead to strife and upset, spinning the interaction into a fight it need not become.

They’re Middle School children. Not adults in Middle School bodies.

As annoying, frustrating and maddening as it can be at times, mom and dad are the adults in the room, so they must try their absolute best to always remember that—or to take a step back until they can—before responding to their kid’s sometimes ornery and pointed provocations.

Have you ever snapped at a loved one because you were under stress? Do you remember how grateful you may have felt later when they were able to see it for what it was, rather than taking it personally? How many arguments and fights have we found ourselves in that were essentially beside the point?!

So when you can manage not to react, something surprising can happen. A kind of clarity can descend on a parent that supports them in giving their child useful lessons on respectful communication and boundaries, even as it allows for further communication when your Middle Schooler is ready.

And if your door is open, they will enter it again in need of your support, wisdom and encouragement.

Because anger doesn’t always know what it’s angry about.

Sometimes it’s just an alarm bell for deeper feelings of desperation that need to come out.

When we understand the feelings or can express them freely, without being instantly met with recriminations from those whom we open up to, even if by snapping, we can and may lose the need for further anger.

So parents who are looking for ways to help channel their child’s inevitable rounds of rage into opportunities for mutual insights and understanding, would do well to work on their own capacity to not react to the provocations of the moment. Learning to take a moment to listen, then give their response, will not only model for their child that one can, in life, choose to step back and take a moment to consider the complaints at hand, even in the midst of high-flying emotions, but that instantly reacting, however momentarily satisfying, usually leads to more upset and strife.

For parents wishing to reduce length and intensity of the inevitable angry outbursts or protracted moodiness they will surely face, the essential antidotes are better listening and more dialogue. And a few predictable and proportional boundaries.

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A Middle School boy, frustrated by events at school, snapped disrespectfully at his mother, telling her to “shut up” in front of others. His mom, as horrified by his insolence as she was humiliated in front of her friends, reacted by initially grounding him for 3 weeks, taking away his computer, and gave him the cold, hurt shoulder for days.

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Understandable? Yes.

Helpful? Not so much.

Because the son, rather than learning the lesson she intended about respectful and disrespectful ways of expressing anger, took to brooding, seeing his mother’s reaction as more about the fact that she wanted to look good to her friends, rather than to teach him anything.

While a response from her was indicated, a more measured set of consequences, coupled with a focus on the lesson, may have helped keep the communication lines open, and fostered a better understanding between mother and child. Instead, her approach ended up seeding resentments and misunderstandings, which only damaged their relationship in ways that took time to repair.

So by all means, teach them that it is not acceptable behavior to rant in front of others, but the less you can make this about your own embarrassment, or allow the moment to shift into an enraged reaction from you at having been humiliated in front of others, the more your message—your intended lesson about appropriately respectful and inappropriate, uncivil communication—can find a home in your child’s understanding.

Not the easiest thing in life to do.

Which is why you should also try to give yourself a break. Since your child, intuitively knowing your “buttons”, as they say, may be pressing them for all they’re worth. Best to give yourself some moments away from the fray, to take some deep breaths and calm down—because to not do so will likely only leave you less likely to contain your own upset, and create conditions by your response that will only lead to more confrontations and turf wars down the road.

Should you have someone who you can trust to watch over your Middle Schooler while you go somewhere to calm down, or talk with someone who can help you to calm down, by all means do so.

But don’t do so if it means leaving your child home alone.

Another key: try to return your household atmosphere and routines to normal as quickly as possible.

Should you need to ground your child for their behavior, sending them to their room indefinitely, as if to some Siberian gulag, can lead to even more troubles later, and thwart any post-outburst communication that may become possible.

And should you have been able to be clear-headed enough not to administer consequences that don’t make you feel like an angry prison guard on a 24/7 shift, try to find things you can do with your child.

Though they are grounded, swing by their room to see how they’re doing, signaling you still love them, even if they’ve misbehaved. As things calm, cooking or baking something together can be surprisingly helpful in restoring a more open communication with your Middle Schooler…or watching a movie on TV together…or going on a hike together, should that help to change the scenery, and ease both your bruised emotions.

But whatever it is, make it a time to be together, even if they are still sulking.

Your message—that you don’t like the way they’ve behaved, or what they’ve done—will only strike home when accompanied by the additional message that you can distinguish between them and what got them in trouble.

And that the consequences you are enforcing are to draw their attention to learning what you are trying to teach them, not to retaliate against them, or to cause them to suffer so you can somehow settle a score. Should they sense you are punishing them for punishment’s sake, that is the lesson they will take from your actions. And they will then look to retaliate harshly against any who they perceive as slighting or harming them, whether they have or not.

Not exactly a fruitful formula for life.

So as with all things parenting, raising a child asks a parent to not fall prey to the very reactions they are, in essence, admonishing their Middle Schooler to not indulge in, whether it stem from selfishness, short-sightedness, arrogance or thoughtlessness.

By actively keeping the lines of communication as open as possible, recognizing that your Middle Schooler may not always be able to express what’s going on in them, much less process all the changes in their world in a way that they can talk about them, mom and dad can nevertheless maintain an atmosphere that fosters a far more non-confrontational relationship with their child, and help to diffuse many stresses that would otherwise fester and lead to far worse.

Try to not take their protestations personally, but that doesn’t mean they get to be rude. Make it about them.

Since anger has always been a part of our human reaction to the world and others, creating alternatives asks us, as the adults, to address how we look to better understand and work with our own reactionary tendencies through understanding our own frustrations and angers. In doing so, however, we may not only improve our own lives and relationships, we can then offer children better choices when they feel that surge of adrenaline so common to human life.

“Loving the sinner” then may not seem so much an impossible chore as a welcome alternative and opportunity.

A path out of suffering.  ~ Darryl Sollerh with Leslie King. LCSW