Every parent at one time or another finds themselves yelling. Parenting isn’t always easy and your children will challenge you. Everyday life can be overwhelming and stressful and our ability to stay in control becomes difficult. When you find your children are controlling you, instead of you having the control, the result is anger, frustration, agitation, irritation. Any display of anger is saying you are loosing your ability to self-regulate. This occurs when there has been an accumulation of stress and you have lost your ability to stay present. Often parents have never really learned to self-regulate there emotions and when life’s stress gets to you and you loose your ability to stay present, you will react without thinking, resulting in a display of your frustration…yelling.
Other reasons for yelling
1. Your parents were yellers and this is a learned behavior
2. Fear of failure as a parent: The more you feel you need control, the more insecure you are in your parenting
3. Taking your children’s “bad” behavior personally
4. You have difficulty processing thoughts before reacting
5. Feeling trapped in the addictive response of yelling
6. Lack of patience and taking the time to make parenting a priority
7. Need for control to cover insecurities
8. Inability to make appropriate and consistent boundaries and limits for your child
9. Inability to follow through with appropriate consequences
10. Difficulty understanding the needs of your child when they are acting out.
Affects of Yelling on children
1. Yelling neglects your child’s expression of their needs
2. Yelling stops a child from expressing their feelings
3. Yelling prohibits the parent from showing empathy
4. Yelling results in sadness, resentment and fears
5. Yelling results in the child being responsible for the yelling parents emotions
6. Yelling manifests guilt in your child that their behavior has caused the yelling
7. Yelling is mistaken for an appropriate response to anger.
8. Yelling takes away a feeling of safety and security
9. Yelling doesn’t teach, it only produces fear
10. Eventually, your child will tune you out and not hear you.
WHAT YOU CAN DO DIFFERENTLY
1. Ask yourself why you are yelling: The more you understand the underlining reasons the more you develop control over your emotions
2. Understand the triggers and the meaning you are putting to the triggers:
The more you understand the meaning YOU are creating the better you are able to recreate another meaning that will reduce the yelling.
3. Improve self esteem and confidence as a parent: The better you feel about yourself as a parent the less you feel the need to yell.
4. Be present to your children’s behaviors and what they are telling you about their needs.
5. Learn relaxation techniques to calm your inner self.
6. Be aware of how you allow little frustrations build to big frustrations: Be more assertive in speaking your needs and feelings
7. Practice healthy and appropriate communication techniques: Read, research and role play before reacting
8. Learn from your mistakes: Each moment is a moment you can start fresh
9. Be willing to say you are sorry and to discuss the incident allowing your children to express their feelings
10. Remember, at any point you can give yourself permission to stop yelling. It doesn’t matter if the yelling has been going on for 10 minutes, just started you can walk away from your behavior. When you step away you are stopping the cycle.
