Anger Management: A Crash Course

Everyone experiences anger, but not everyone shows it in the same way. Some hold it in until it is impossible to do so any longer. Some immediately let the feeling out because they cannot hold onto it. I am somewhere in the middle- it depends on the situation.

Orange Is Not My Color

If I feel attacked or if you’re messing with my kids, it’s pretty much an immediate thing. One of Matthew’s aunts discovered this when she made the mistake of yelling at Julian once. If he hadn’t pulled us apart, I might have ended up in jail.

After Jake died, I was angry at the whole world, especially those who turned on me for no reason. I almost attacked Jordan’s (then) girlfriend.

Thankfully, while in therapy, I worked on my anger issues. If not, I would probably have at least one assault charge by now. This is another reason that Rachel is a rockstar.

The women’s jail uniform around here is yellow, and that’s an even worse color for me.

Just because I went to therapy doesn’t mean my mouth has calmed down entirely- I’m still ready to yell at people. I’ll probably do so until I can’t anymore.

It does mean that I am more likely to think a bit more before I do anything else. Sara once nicknamed me the #QueenOfPetty and even my kids agreed with that one.

It beats jail, right? I’ll take petty with sides of snark and humor.

How Does Anger Affect You?

Anger doesn’t do so well for your body. Over time, if you stay constantly angry (which, honestly, isn’t a lot of fun), it can cause strain on your heart, muscles and other parts of your body. You remain stressed most of the time and generally not happy.

Some other effects:

• Anger becomes a faster response to situations instead of other emotions.
• Coping skills become harder to use
• Higher blood pressure, anxiety, and risk of headaches
• Higher risk of stroke

How Can You Manage Your Anger?

There are ways to try to manage your anger before it takes over your life. At some point, it may be time to call in a professional. That point is different for everyone, but in general, if it is interfering with your work, family and other aspects of life, it might be time.

Tips for Anger Management:

• Try to think before you speak. This is a hard one, seeing as I have major issues with this myself. I try my hardest, but sometimes… things just fly out.
• Get some exercise. Yoga does help with calming my mind, so does walking. Exercise helps with taking your mind off whatever it is that has made you angry.
• Come up with a possible solution. If the issue has an easy solution, work on it. It will save you from blowing up over something that didn’t require it.
• Don’t hold a grudge. I had to do major work on this one, but life really is too short for grudges.
• Use “I” statements- these minimize blame and lessen tension in an argument. Who needs more blame?
• Break out some humor. This can help break up a tense situation.
• Try some relaxation skills. Meditation is awesome and I highly recommend it.

This information was found at Mayo Clinic

It takes time to change the way you look at and respond to anger. It was one of the topics I worked on in therapy. I still have some work to do on that first tip.

Do you have issues with your anger? Do you have tips to share? Leave them in the comments!

New or Old? You Decide

These posts are old to me but new to some. Enjoy!

The Reality Check (for Domestic Violence Awareness month)

Song Lyric Saturday with Kendrick Lamar

Parenting Pet Peeves

Rebuilding Trust in Others

Broken Wings Part 4

Broken Wings Part 3: What Your Child Thinks About Your Divorce

by Wrae Meredith Sanders and Bonnie Harris Price

We all know the hard truth; divorces affect kids. Even when they say they’re okay, you must know something in them breaks when a couple decides to call it quits. Kids may withdraw, eat or sleep too much.

They may even get fed up and tell you how much they hate you.

However, your special needs children may be unable to put it into words, but they know their lives have changed. Children with special needs feel loss, sadness, and pain just like the rest of us.

Most parents don’t split into friendly terms. Even when you try your best to keep it civil, kids feel the tension between you. Sooner or later, the signs of their stress begin to show.

Verbal and non-verbal cues

Anxiety and Fear

Kids can become very anxious about not knowing what is coming next, where they will be living, going to school, etc. They may fear to lose the other parent, friends, and the home if they have to move, and more. This may lead to problems sleeping, eating and withdrawing from friends. This can also cause issues with concentrating in school, which may be picked up on by teachers.

Sadness and Depression

Kids can feel as if they are losing their family. This can leave kids very sad, which is normal. They may feel sad at having to move, missing the other parent not being in the home daily, the changes in daily life, seeing their parent sad, etc. If the sadness is not addressed, or if it is under an extreme situation, this can become depression and the child may need to see a professional.

Anger and Aggression

Some kids are angry about their parents splitting up and may become aggressive towards them, siblings or other family members. They may become aggressive towards others. This may be a big change in a usually non-aggressive child or may not be in a child that has had issues with aggression in the past. Some kids have issues with saying what they feel and this is their way of saying that they are angry with their lives. Either way, this should be addressed immediately to prevent further issues.

In non-verbal children, aggressive behavior can become a big issue. They can also regress any recently learned behaviors and need extra help and reinforcements to get back on track with positive behaviors. They may also need help with expressing their feelings in positive ways- art and music therapies can be helpful.

How to Help When Divorces Affect Kids

Help your child through this trying time

Just as your divorce wasn’t easy, the road to building emotionally healthy children isn’t either. If all it took was love, you’d already be there. However, to make sure that your children adjust, take a look at some of these suggestions.

Acknowledge your child’s feelings

This is important for all children. Let them express themselves, and for non-verbal kids, this can be difficult. They can draw, write or try other ways to express their feelings. Some kids cry, yell or scream. Some kids withdraw and become quiet, and that may become a cause for concern. Let them ask questions– it’s normal and they do need to know what will be happening. It’s also okay for them to be angry. It’s a big change, and many children are not happy that their parents are divorcing.

Give age-appropriate responses to conflict

Younger kids need fewer details because they may not be able to grasp as much about the situation, but older kids may want to know more.

Parental conflict can damage kids, so try not to fight in front of the kids if possible. Also, try not to make them feel like they have to choose between their parents or criticize the other parent in front of them.

Provide as much structure as possible throughout the separation and divorce. This gives kids a sense of stability. One day, they may seem to “get it” and one day, be a bit unsure. Remain patient– it’s a big change.

Be consistent with the other parent

Try your best to work out a way to “co-parent” with your ex. Parenting peacefully is easier for everyone involved.

Take care of yourself. This means physically and emotionally. If you need therapy to deal with the split, see someone. Furthermore, keep yourself physically healthy so that you are able to deal with the strain of a divorce.

Incidentally, allow the kids to give input on visitation, but remind them you and your ex-partner remain responsible for the final decision.

Conclusion

Going through a divorce is like going through the grieving process. After everyone deals with the shock and denial, then here come the emotions. Anger, sadness, and depression will be a part of your special needs child processing.

In an ideal situation, both parents should work together to help kids through the transition. On the contrary, if you find yourself dealing with it on your own, by all means, please seek help. There are free and paid resources to help you make it through.

Comments?

What about you? Are you or did you go through a tough divorce? How did your child seem during the transition? Please share your stories with us below.

This five-part series will continue for the month of June if you haven’t already we invite you to read parts one and two. Please share with friends or family that may be going through this difficult time. We want them to know they’re not alone.

Broken Wings Part

Broken Wings Part 2

Broken Wings Part 2: Divorce Preparations

Broken Wings, Part 2: Divorce Preparations for Your Special Needs Family

by Bonnie Harris Price & Wrae Meredith Sanders

Special needs and divorce; these two words shouldn’t be in the same sentence. Yet more and more families split up because the demands are overwhelming.

Counseling didn’t work. The long vacation meant to help your family reset didn’t work either. It may even seem like your prayers to reconcile went unanswered too.

Then, the inevitable happens. You and your significant other decide to divorce.

Ending your marriage is hard particularly if you have children. Yet when your child has special needs, the task is even more difficult.

The transition to a single parent household won’t be easy. There will be feelings of anger, doubt, fear, frustration, and even betrayal. After all, the two of you took vows to work things out.

But sometimes things don’t work out

It’s important that you know it’s not your fault. And your child’s disability isn’t to blame either. As Iyanla Vanzant says, it’s time to do the work to get your lives on track.

Going through a divorce is like going to war. You don’t want to show up for battle without your protective gear. Don’t confuse this post for a lesson to destroy your soon to be ex, instead, treat this as a blueprint to prepare you for the tough days ahead.

Divorce Action Plan

How much child support should you ask for? What if your child requires special care beyond the age of eighteen? Am I doing the right thing?

These are legitimate questions and at the same time, they don’t even scratch the surface of what’s involved in a special needs divorce case.

Here are some suggestions of what to do when preparing for divorce.

Special Needs Divorce Checklist

• Find a divorce mediator
• Find a special needs attorney or an attorney who specializes in family law
• Bring your child’s records
• Prepare an after divorce budget
• Custody arrangements
• Living arrangements
• After the divorce

Mediator

In the heat of the moment you might want to run straight to an attorney, but first, try a mediator. A mediator can help you arrange an acceptable divorce agreement. A mediator should be experienced and willing to let an attorney sit in without any hassle.

Your mediator should remain neutral and help keep the peace. Mediators aren’t free but some will offer a free consultation. Check Yelp reviews or get a recommendation from a friend who’s been through a divorce.

Special needs attorney

Next, you want to find a divorce attorney who specializes in this area. Custody, insurance, medical and counseling appointments are areas that must be addressed as soon as possible. Efforts to continue your child’s care takes priority over who gets the house.

The goal is to prevent dumping the burden on one person. Lack of support probably plays a huge role in breakups. To make sure you don’t get overwhelmed after the divorce, address this issue first.

Records

If you haven’t already been doing it, document everything about your child including the relationship with the other parent. Family court is also known as the mother’s court, but fathers have rights too.

You want to record all interactions, including the not so good days. Again, this is not to make the other person look bad, but this is to show the court what the child needs. Documentation is especially helpful in abuse cases.

Budget

Your income will definitely change. Income for divorced women is a not so surprising fifty percent. Another ugly statistic shows men tend to get richer after divorce.

Either way, you must prepare your after our divorce budget now. You need to figure out what your expenses will be if you’re going to have any kind of future.

Some things to consider are:

Can you afford to keep the house once the divorce is final?

How much money will I have to make in case I don’t get the child support I need?

What services can my child do without if I need to make ends meet?

Custody and Visitation

Other than the divorce itself, this is the most painful process. What happens to the kids? In Texas and Tennessee, one parent gets custody and the other gets visitation.

If you’re lucky, the two of you can agree to co-parent. Sometimes this is just isn’t case. Worst-case scenario one parent ends up abandoned despite a court order for regular visits.

Understand the court will decide what’s in the best interest of the child. Mothers tend to have more rights than dads, but if you find yourself on the wrong side of the decision be prepared to fight. If you know in your heart you’re the better parent, don’t give up.

Living Arrangements

Once you have decided who and where please make sure the place is suitable for your child’s needs. New divorcees are plagued with the task of finding somewhere affordable, but it has to be right.

New homes should reasonably accommodate the child. If your child has physical limitations, the other parent should move to a place that is handicap accessible. You should also know if the neighborhood is child-friendly.

Another thing you want to consider is to make sure in your divorce decree that you have permission to move. For example, if there is a doctor or facility two hours away that would be beneficial for your child and you wanted to move closer, your ex could stop you if it isn’t in the paperwork.

You want to put that card on the table because as Dr. Phil said, the person you married is different from the person you divorce. For your child’s sake be prepared.

When It’s Over

The ink is dry. Maybe it was an amicable split. A new chapter for you and your child begins.

Ideally, it would be great if you could seek counseling during this trying time. Most people I know don’t seek counseling until years later. Don’t wait years, get help as soon as it’s over.

Don’t be under the impression that life is going to be grand because the pain is in the past. The pain doesn’t heal until you deal with it. It didn’t work out and you’re left to pick up the pieces.

But Guess What?

You got this. Your child is going to need you more than ever. Despite your child’s emotional and/or physical challenges, they are resilient.

And so are you. Thomas Edison failed over two-thousand times when he tried to invent the light bulb. When asked, he said he didn’t fail, he found over two thousand ways it wouldn’t work.

You will get through this. I have faith in you as a parent.

Comments

What’s your story? Are you going through a divorce and have special needs children? Leave a comment below.

bonnie@adhdhomeschooled.com

ADHDhomeschool@Pinterest

ADHDhomeschooled @Facebook

wraemeredithblogs.wordpress.com

Rebuilding Trust in Others

Life Is Full of Changes

Everyone changes over time- this is just a part of life. We go through puberty, early and middle adulthood, then late adulthood. Throughout these years, we learn a lot about ourselves and the people around us. If we are lucky, we don’t lose a lot of people along the way. If we are even luckier, we find people that we can trust and that trust is never broken.

In a previous post, The Day After I describe the pain of losing not only someone I loved deeply, but also touch on losing people that I thought were my friends. It’s a crushing blow to lose people that you partied, laughed and cried with. I thought they would be with me when I really needed them the most. Instead, I got nasty text messages, and flat out told that it was not about me after being asked how I was doing. That was just the beginning.

Great friends, right?

The Black Hole

While I was in the black hole of grief, I barely left my house. I can count on both hands how many people I talked to regularly, on one hand I talked to daily. I was so crushed by people turning their backs on me I wouldn’t let anyone else in. I blocked everyone I’d worked with (except a very select few) and their friends on my Facebook. I changed my privacy settings to the tightest settings there are. I just wanted to be left alone. I didn’t trust anyone at this point.

Thanks to therapy, I have been able to work on this. I still don’t trust easily, and I don’t think I will ever trust others as I did before this happened. My Facebook settings are still the way I set them two years ago, but a few people got unblocked. One was unblocked when her husband died about a year after Jake. I felt awful about her husband’s death and I sent her a message.

Working Out the Tangles

My mind was pretty tangled at this point. How was I supposed to trust anyone? I couldn’t even trust my own husband, much less anyone else near me.

I talked a lot and went through one person or situation at a time. Otherwise I got overwhelmed. Lots of tears were involved and I went through quite a bit of candy. The biggest part of the tangle, of course, was Matthew.

My biggest fear was that he would go back to being the jerk that drove me to where I was years ago. I wasn’t about to go back there. This has not happened, but I am equipped with the tools I need if he ever does. I don’t think I will ever get rid of that fear, it will always stay in the back of my mind. I learned that this is okay, but to not let it cloud the good times. There are so many of those.

I’ve also learned how to communicate better, even though it can be really hard. This remains a work in progress and probably will be for a very long time. I also had to learn to just let Matthew be nice to me without ulterior motives. This was a tough one for me to tackle, and even now, can be a struggle, but I use a lot of self-talk to get through it.

Friends? That’s a funny one. If I wasn’t already talking to you, you could forget talking to me and everyone that was talking to me was pretty much sworn to secrecy about me. A few of my friends still worked with those that turned on me. I couldn’t do much about this, obviously, but I asked them to not say a single word about me to anyone if asked. My thought was, if they cared that much, they shouldn’t have turned on me. (I know, the pettiness was real, but I didn’t care.) My friends respected this. New friends? One. That’s really about it. I picked up a couple of acquaintances at places I worked at afterwards, but true friendships? I struggled. I didn’t want to open up to people because I didn’t want to have people turn on me again, and quite honestly, I was content with the friends I had.

The one friend I made is Sara. I’ve talked about her before in a few different posts, but if you missed those, here’s the short version: she is one of Jake’s cousins and we met at his visitation. We have talked just about everyday since and she’s amazing. Our daughters are best friends.

One of my bigger issues is trusting people with my feelings, because by losing those friends, I had all my trust thrown back in my face and that hurts. I tend to not talk a lot when I’m having a bad day but I’ll joke all day long. Rachel gave me a very good tool on this one: If I’m thinking I should talk to someone about it, then do it. It’s probably important enough to talk about.

The Bigger Things

I decided to keep my circle small and I’m okay with this. It’s comforting and I know who I can trust. I kicked everyone else to the curb.

How can you rebuild trust in others?

1. Be patient with yourself. This is not an overnight thing.
2. Surround yourself with supportive people.
3. Cut out those who you know you can’t trust- the super negative, all-out flaky, and anyone who has seriously hurt you previously.
4. Give people a chance. This is different for everyone, but let people in- just not all in at once.
5. Deal with and let go of the anger towards those that you can’t trust. Moving forward will feel a lot better.

Trust is a very important thing in life. Some people just don’t get how fragile it is.

Have you had to rebuild trust in others? How did it go?

Pics courtesy of Unsplash