Anger Management: A serious problem for adults, teens, and children.

Emotion is a natural part of life. They are our bodies way of letting us know that we are still alive, that we are capable of feeling, and they let us know when our internal self has gone a-rye. Throughout life we all experiences issues that create a gambit of emotions, but for some reason the one we tend to struggle with the most is anger and that can be said both with adults and adolescents. Anger is something that makes us feel helpless and out of control in turn forcing us to struggle with containing it, expressing it, and coping with it. Anger is something that occurs when we perceive that our person is being attacked, whether it is physically or verbally.  The fact is, perception is reality and when people have the perception they are being  attacked or mistreated in a situation can lead to anger building. As human beings, when we feel we have been wronged, those feelings can sometimes cloud our judgment, cause us to say things we might not normally, and/or completely override our total sense of logic.

Anger not only will create psychological changes, but we can also feel changes in our physical person and again, the changes are the same for an adult or adolescent. Your heart rate increases, your blood pressure goes up, and adrenaline races. Some people start to feel sick to their stomach, their head starts to hurt, and some start to feel tension all over their body. A person’s Inability to control their anger can lead to things like road rage, divorce, child abuse, violence in the workplace, and of course domestic violence and anger that is left uncontrolled for years can create chronic/long term health problems such as headaches, issues sleeping, high blood pressure. Some do make the choice to contain or hide their anger and not just once, but for long periods of time. This is just as unhealthy and unproductive. Emotions were meant to be expressed and that includes anger.

Anger management may not be something that people find to be beneficial or productive, but what’s the alternative? What benefits or rewards do we receive when we allow ourselves to become volatile, confrontational, irrational messes? More often than not, we find more consequences.  So how can you tell that you, your teenager, or someone you know might be struggling with their anger? Please take the list of questions below and apply them to yourself, your teen, and/or someone else in your life that you may have in mind: 

• Do you get into many physical fights?
• Do you engage in heated arguing, often with no resolution?
• Are you incapable of getting  over a past situation or occurrence?
• Are you always in a bad mood more often than not?
• Has your anger ever made you want to seek revenge on a person?
• Have you ever wanted to harm yourself or someone else?

If you answered yes more than no, chances are pretty high that some type of anger management is needed. So the next logical step is to begin learning and applying some basic anger management techniques. Below is a list of tips that can be utilized and can also be applied to adults and teenagers:

• If you are a person who needs to de-escalate through an aggressive activity you need to have access to your own personal space that will allow for things such as screaming, working out, hitting a punching bag, etc. Your personal space can simply be any area that is conducive to however you best vent your aggression without further agitating the situation.
• When you find yourself angry beyond the point of being reasonable, we tend to do things that are not beneficial to you, the person you are angry with, or the problem itself. When this happens, remove yourself from the situation all together. Go for a walk, read, take some quiet time, then you can come back with a clear, calm head.
• Examine how you spend most of your day. If you are someone who spends most your time indoors, maybe you need some time outside each day. If you experience a lot of noise during the day, then allow yourself some quiet, relaxing personal time.
• Never underestimate the power of deep breathing and/or counting to ten.
• Learn to accept that you cannot change everything regardless of what emotion you throw at it. Some things, some people, some situations just are what they are. Life is 10% what happens to us and 90% how we react to it so while we cannot change others we can change our reaction to them.
• We have to take better care of ourselves and spend more time working towards overall balance in life. There has to be time each day allotted for only us and our self-preservation. Also try to leave your work/school problems at work/school. Don’t make others pay for a situation someone else has created.
• The most valuable tool any person has is self-control. No one can control us but us and we cannot hold others accountability for the actions we choose or the words we say. Self-control can also keep you from saying or doing something extremely harmful that an apology might not fix later on.

While it is true, anger management tips can help us avoid reaching total eruption, the ultimate goal is to avoid complete escalation all together.  Everyone has certain triggers that will cause them to become agitated (things that are said or actions that are taken that will automatically enrage them). The key is to identify your triggers so you can avoid them or change your environment so they can be avoided. You can also communicate with those around you, like a spouse,  and educate them about your triggers so they can also help to avoid “trigger” moments. However, if you are unable to completely avoid them, then as stated previously, anger management skills can help you control yourself  and the situation when and/if a trigger does arise.  It must also be noted that if you are someone who feels you stay angry all the time and your inability to manage your anger is affecting your relationships, your job, and/or your health, then clearly larger steps need to be taken to bring peace to your life as well as those around you. These steps can include finding a counselor/therapist to help you work through what could be causing your anger and/or finding some type of a support group.

Anger management not only needs to be a priority in our teens, but also in raising our younger children. Behavioral issues resulting from lack of anger control that occur during childhood, should be clear omens to parents and caregivers of problems to come in adolescence/adulthood. Such problems could include partner violence, severe/extremely harsh punishments for their own children (punishments that could border on or directly be abuse), difficulties at work/school in regards to their interactions with others, and difficulties maintaining friendships. The most effective strategy a parent has for controlling anger in their children is being a good role model. Parents need to be familiar with and utilize anger management  techniques themselves so they can teach their children to cope with daily stress/anger. We ultimately want to teach our children to respond instead of react. It also best to implement these skills is prior to adolescents.  The older a person gets, the more concrete their learning/thinking patterns become which obviously makes changing those patterns more difficult, but if the anger management foundation is already laid, it is something that will help through adulthood.

As parents we think nothing of teaching our children responsibility, kindness, and compassion so teaching them about feeling/expression their emotions should be a priority too. Children need to understand that feeling angry is perfectly okay, but it has to be expressed in a constructive/productive manner. When children are able to better manage their anger, it not only increases their overall self-control, but also helps to increase their self-respect which will help others gain respect for them in return. The really great part is that anger management for children is really the same as it is for teens and adults.

When dealing with the anger displayed by younger children, try using these anger management tips:

• The first thing is to try to help them calm down and refocus. Have them take a deep breath and count to ten. If you feel they are still angry, have them count further or count backwards from ten to one.
• Teach them alternatives to anger. For example, if someone at school is bothering them, teach them to avoid them or get help from an adult. Teach them that in life we deal with all sorts of people we will not get along with.
• If your child cannot put their anger into words, have them draw you a picture. Have them let you know what anger looks like for them. That way in the future when they are feeling angry, they can again draw it, you will recognize it, and can then address it.
• If your child needs to work off their anger, buy them a punching doll or bag. Let them go for a walk or ride a bike. There is one caution to parents though, NEVER SEND AN ANGRY CHILD OUT ALONE! If your child cannot correctly manage their anger, sending them out unsupervised to deal with the unpredictability of the world would not be in your best interest or theirs.
• When your child does manage their anger well, make sure you take notice and reward them.

It's also important to remember in your attempts at positive anger management role modeling, that your child knows even you are susceptible to anger and at times, even you have to exercise the same tools. Children need to see even their parents get angry at times. Don’t try to hide your anger from your children, it will actually do more harm than good.

Teaching Your Children About Good Touch V. Bad Touch

In our society today we are all aware of the enormous numbers of children who are molested and/or mistreated by adults. So as parents we all know how important it is to discuss the topic of “good touch/bad touch” with our younger children. We all know it’s imperative for them to understand what is inappropriate where their bodies are concerned. We all know they need to understand how to communicate to an adult when they feel uncomfortable. The issue we have is HOW do we approach this subject in a way that will not only make them comfortable, but us as well. An effective way in which parents can talk with their children is by “teachable moments”. This is a time at which a person, especially a child, is likely to be particularly disposed to learn something or particularly responsive to being taught or made aware of something.

Often you will find children are naturally curious about their own bodies and this will lead to them touching themselves. This presents a perfect opportunity for parents to begin discussing “good touch/bad touch”. Explain to your child that no one, including mommy, daddy, and other relatives, should be touching them in certain areas unless they are cleaning them or if the doctor needs to look at them. A simple tool you can use is your child’s toys. Using a male or female doll, explain to your child using the doll that no one should ever touch them where a bathing suit would cover them. Most importantly, encourage them to feel completely comfortable and safe coming to you anytime someone has touched them inappropriately or in a way that made them uncomfortable and this includes hurting them physically. There are mixed opinions on whether adults should use proper terminology when teaching children about their private parts or whether it’s okay to use other words the parent and child are comfortable with. My opinion is that you have to do what is best for you. What I will say is that if a parent chooses to use alternative words to make sure there is a CLEAR understanding of the areas those words represent and avoid using them to represent anything else in order to avoid confusion. Also avoid using any ridiculous or childish words because this may give the child the sense that you don't take it seriously and God forbid they are harmed, using insanely immature words could make it difficult for them to communicate when necessary. If you do make the choice to not use proper terminology because your feel your child is still too young, which can very well be the case, make sure when the child is older, you begin to introduce the proper terminology to your child.

We all know there are times when small children will touch one another. As I stated, children are naturally curious, but that curiosity is not and will not be towards their own body alone. This is because there are so many ways in which a child can be exposed to the differences in body types. It’s perfectly normal for them to wonder why they look different. Kids will often play games that include exploration and do not realize they are doing anything wrong. This is why it’s a great opportunity to open communication between you and your child. When situations such as these arise, simply explain to them that it’s not okay for others to touch one another in that way, in those areas, even if they are friends.

There are tons of news stories out there about adults molesting children, in broad daylight, in stores, parks, bathrooms etc. A sad fact of life is that our children often see and/or hear these same stories and in essence it presents another teachable moment. Due to these stories, parents often teach their children to find someone in a uniform if they get separated. This is a good idea, but I ask this question, what if there is no way for your child to identify a safe person? What if you are in a place where identifying a “safe” uniform is not really an option for your child? A good alternative to teach your child is if they ever get separated from you, to start yelling for help, very loudly, wherever they are. Sounds odd right? Well, we always tell our children if they get lost to go to an adult. Well, as I stated the monsters of today blend right in. You don’t know if the adult they ask for help could be a child molester and/or kidnapper. If a child simply starts yelling for help, not only does it draw too much attention for anyone to try and take them, but clearly you are much more likely to find the child yourself. Make sure, however, you are specific with your children. Yelling is not the same thing as yelling "help". Most people may not give too much though to a small child in a store simply yelling, but someone yelling "help" is odd and people will take notice. Another trick for your child should they get separated and/or approached by someone who is not in a uniform (the child needs to understand this could be a policeman's uniform, store employee uniform, etc) start yelling "fire". Again, a child simply yelling, especially in any place full of children, may not cause people to take notice, but anyone yelling fire, is something people will notice. For the adults, we need to remember that it is in our nature to want to help a lost child, however, if you approach one who is alone, you might find yourself in the midst of a child who is going to be drawing attention to you by screaming. To avoid giving others the impression that you are trying to harm the child, simply ask someone you might be with to keep an eye on the child while you go to find a policeman or store employee or if you are alone, you keep an eye on the child while asking someone else to go find someone in a uniform. The reason I say, you keep an eye on the child is because you know your intentions, but you do not know the intentions of someone who is a stranger to you.  

Another thing we are accustomed to doing in our society is forcing our children to say hello to strangers or even family members they don't know and/or forcing them to give hugs and kisses. Then we turn around and put the same expectation on our children to know the difference between what we are forcing them to do that makes them uncomfortable and another adult forcing them to do what makes them uncomfortable. Really?!?!? Children do not have the mental capabilities to process these two situations and consistency is key with children. If a child is not comfortable with an adult, REGARDLESS OF WHO THEY ARE, do not force that adult on your child or vice versa and if this makes the adult upset, well, I guess that is just something they will have to get over!

We simply live in a world where there are too many real life monsters and those monsters don’t have fangs or red eyes like in the movies. One of the worse things that happen to our nation was “stranger danger” because it taught children the only bad people are the ones who hid in the shadows, wear dark, long coats, and were always a stranger to them. It’s unfortunate that there are so many stories our there about children being molested and/or hurt physically.  Another unfortunate fact is that the majority of the time, it is a family member or someone close to the child committing these acts. Therefore our children need to feel they can come to us anytime, with anything, but they also need to feel they will be believed, no matter what! Never dismiss your child's feeling of discomfort or complaints of an adult. Some adults may play around or say things while never intending to make the child feel harmed or scared, but if it has happened, you need to address it. Make your child feel safe and that you are on their side. This may result in some adults feeling insulted or having their ego wounded. As much as we never want to be rude or hurtful to others we care about, our children come first and anyone we truly want in our child's life, will understand that anyway.

We simply cannot protect them from knowing all the ugliness of the world no matter how much we would like to. We also don’t want them to fear the world and those who live in it either, but we can do our best to make sure our children are prepared. Discussing “good touch/bad touch” with your child will never be a onetime event. We need to utilize all the teachable moments we can to ensure our child have enough information to protect themselves.