We all have feelings and emotions. Just because we are parents we are no different. When you start I get frustrated, upset, irritated etc. share that with your kids. You can say " I am feeling a little frustrated and I need to take some time to calm down."
It's important to always teach from a calm mindset. When you are calm it helps to avoid yelling, snapping, hitting, name calling etc. You are also able to better engage your top brain (where logic and reasoning hang out) and access the necessary tools to handle the given situation. It's the same when your kids flip their lid… all they want to do is scream, cry, yell, throw and hit things… That's because they are only using their lower brain where the flight, fight or freeze responses are stored.
When we model how to handle big emotions in front of our kids they see:
- That you can get upset too and that is okay, all emotions are normal to have!
- How to handle their big emotions in a healthy manner.
Feelings come and go… they do not make us who we are. We have the power to change how we are feeling at any given time by changing what we think! That is a skill that we need to teach our kids… how do we do that you may ask? That's where I come in! I am here to help provide you with the skills and tools you need to better equip yourselves as well as your kids.
Being working parents is tough enough, the stress level that we encounter on a day to day basis that is effort even more important. Just know that it is okay to let you kids know that you have had a rough day and that your patience is running extremely low. And when you feel like you are going to pop (and you will) just make sure to "use your words" don't wait until you have so much built up stress, frustration and anger that you lash out in physical harm (hitting, popping) or verbal harm (name calling and yelling). Be the example that you kids need, something that put you in situations so see what you will do, not because they are trying to be manipulative, but because they are actually curious in how to you will handle the situation.
We are their number one teacher, so let's be a better model on how to handle big emotions the correct way.