In some homes, fighting is so constant that it feels normal: even without physical violence, there is shouting, insults and resentment. Many parents who are horrified by stories of child abuse experience a similar rage that can do lasting harm. It catches them by surprise and overwhelms their defenses. Afterward they are frightened by it, ashamed, and stand over their sleeping child full of tenderness and guilt.
A case. The author describes a gentle 35-year-old mother whose colicky seven-month-old cried whenever put down. Exhausted, with a two-year-old underfoot and an unhelpful husband, she had begun shaking and hitting the baby, then feeling overwhelming guilt. Religious remedies helped only briefly. In therapy, her rage traced back to a childhood with an alcoholic father who beat her mother, anger she had always had to swallow. Therapy helped her stay calm, her husband became an active partner in discipline, and they learned to set limits so the baby's crying didn't control them.
Verbal violence
Anger also comes out as yelling, insults, criticism, slammed doors or suddenly cancelling a promised outing. The harder parents try to suppress outbursts, the more violent they become. Some parents justify it ("He only listens when I yell"). The author's position: if a child doesn't obey, the problem is the parent's method of discipline, not the child, and parents should find ways to set limits without harming the child, through workshops or books if needed. She notes that anger habits spread through a family by imitation; a mother says her son "is just like his father" when he breaks things in frustration.
Kinds of anger
- Displaced anger: aimed at someone who didn't cause it, such as a woman angry at her boss who takes it out on her family. Anger unleashed on children often has nothing to do with them.
- Accumulated anger: common in people who can't express their wishes and feelings clearly, so frustration builds until something trivial sets it off. Parents who can't be firm often swing between explosions and letting children do whatever they want.
- Anger from emotional imbalance: anxiety, lack of rest, money worries, insecurity and fear can all trigger outbursts.
If anger has persisted for a long time, you likely can't solve it alone. Seek professional help, because anger burns everyone around you, not just you.