Dealing with anger
Anger is a strong passion or emotion of displeasure or antagonism, excited by a real or supposed injury or insult to one's self or others, or by the intent to do such injury. Everyone gets angry but not everyone handles it properly.
If your child's behavior has been found to be cause by the emotion of anger, the child will need to be taught new methods of anger management.
- taking deep breaths
- doing a stretch or yoga pose
- counting to ten
- saying "oh man"
- walking away from a situation
- tell an adult
- remember his behavior contract
Example: Model your own thought process. You may feel silly at first and you may get strange looks from people who don't know what you are doing, but this is very effective. A situation arises that makes you angry, such as someone is rude to you, and you happen to be with Johnny. Say to Johnny in an angry voice (overacting gets attention), "I feel angry because that person was rude! I feel like screaming but I'm not going to make a bad choice, a good choice would be to take a deep breath." Then take a deep breath. If Johnny is high functioning, you could ask for his help about what to do.
Example: Johnny knows it upsets his parents when they see him hit himself or bite himself, so he does it when he is sent to timeout. You must not make eye contact or talk to him. Remain nearby and watch him from the corner of your eye. It is very likely that he will NOT cause himself serious harm. This can be painful to watch and ignore because he might scream that it hurts. If he draws blood or it seems too serious to ignore, you should step in quietly and restrain him without giving him eye contact or talking to him. In most case you shouldn't have to step in and restrain him. After he sees that you are unaffected by him hurting himself he will stop.
Once you have a behavioral plan set up at home, both parents need to follow it and you should let your child's teacher know how you handle different situations so when they occur at school they can be handled in the same manner. The consistency will help your child learn how to make the right choices faster. Some of these behavior suggestions might sound cold or uncaring, but it does your child more harm to not discipline them and not teach them how to make good choices. They already have a disadvantage socially, you need to help them understand how to behave so other children will be able to play with them and enjoy their company.
