Page 44 - How Changing Your Anger Can Help You Be a Better Parent book

How to Stop Yelling at Your Child

I'm working with a mom named Tanya, who has a daughter Nicole; I think Nicole's maybe ten or
eleven years old and one of the areas of responsibility for Nicole is the kitchen.

So, Tanya and Nicole have talked a lot about how it's Nicole's responsibility to clean up after
dinner, breakfast and other times her family uses the kitchen. Nicole also likes to use the kitchen
other than mealtimes to cook and bake with her mom and her brother, so it was really important
for Tanya to help Nicole understand that it wasn't only about using the kitchen and enjoying the
benefits of using the kitchen, but also cleaning up and the consequences of not doing what they
had agreed.

One evening, when Nicole had not cleaned up the kitchen, Tanya got really, really frustrated and
she got angry with Nicole.

In Tanya's mind, she and Nicole had talked about this several times before and Tanya felt that
Nicole should already know what her responsibility is and wasn't able to live up to the agreement
that they had made about the chore.

It seems that many times Nicole got distracted, as she had other things to do. Sometimes the
family would eat the meals at slightly different times adjusting to family schedules, especially her
brother would eat dinner late after sports practice.

On certain nights and in certain instances, Nicole would get distracted and do something else.
Tanya would interpret that as Nicole neglecting her responsibilities and not being able to meet the
expectations of what they had talked about.

It was clearly discussed that this was Nicole's responsibility and Tanya felt very vulnerable, and a
bit confused on to how to react.
She realized that her yelling was not holding Nicole accountable and changing her behavior.

It was also causing some extra challenges in their relationship. Nicole was becoming somewhat
resentful at her mom’s out of control yelling. At Nicole’s age and stage of development, she's
starting to pull away from her mom and try to be independent in many ways.
Tanya is trying to really focus on having healthier anger responses. She doesn’t want to excuse
Nicole's behavior and wants to hold her accountable, but also wants to maintain the close
relationship she has with Nicole. Tanya is also tired of feeling bad after the yelling episodes.

Tanya and I worked together to understand the situation in a somewhat different way.
It was helpful for Tanya to try to understand Nicole's perspective and how easily it is to get
distracted when you’re eleven years old and it's unclear whether some members of the family are
done eating or not.

Tanya was trying to change her angry thinking, show more empathy for her daughter and try to
have a different response - a healthy response - other than yelling.

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