One thing that parenting has taught me is just how angry I could get. I never understood child abuse until I had children. No, I never abused my children, but I could understand the feelings.
Letting out your angers and frustrations on your children is wrong and unfair. Just recall for a moment how you felt when your parents screamed at you. Your children feel the same way and maybe worse.
Here are a few ideas that might help you keep a better handle on your anger when you feel it getting away from you:
• Take a time-out for yourself. Make yourself leave the room, and let your child know where you’re going and why, but go.
• Take your anger out on some nitty gritty activity like cleaning the closets or scrubbing the bathroom floor.
• Go into the bathroom, the closet, the basement and scream or slam a door or several doors. Vent your anger, but not on your children.
• And when the guilt sets in as your children look at you, wide eyed, wondering if Mommy or Daddy has flipped out, explain to them that you were getting out your feelings, and that it’s okay to express anger, just not at other people.
Vicki Lansky’s practical, common sense approach to parenting is familiar to millions throughout the world. Vicki’s first book, Feed Me, I’m Yours, published in 1974, and still one of the most popular baby/toddler food cookbooks in the country, was followed by The Taming of the C.A.N.D.Y. Monster, a #1 New York Times bestseller. Her other titles include: Toilet Training, Birthday Parties Best Party Tips & Ideas For Ages 1-8, Dear Babysitter Handbook, Welcoming Your Second Baby, Getting Your Child to Sleep … and Back to Sleep, Trouble-free Travel with Children, Baby Proofing Basics and Games Babies Play From Birth to Twelve Months, Koko Bear’s New Potty, A New Baby at Koko Bear’s House, Koko Bear and the New Babysitter, and Koko Bear’s Big Earache. Vicki Lansky’s Divorce Book for Parents: Helping Children Cope with Divorce and Its Aftermath
