It’s not just what you say—it’s how you say it that makes all the difference in the world. The very same message or request can take on a completely different message when someone changes their tone of voice and body language. And parents should know better than to shout at children, whether they’re their own or not.
Redditor u/throwaway-xmasmess opened up about a sensitive issue with her family over the holidays. She shared how her stepsister’s husband was banned from celebrating Christmas with all of them after he shouted at his niece, the OP’s daughter, for waking him up. You’ll find the full story as you read on.
Meanwhile, Bored Panda wanted to learn about how chronic anger can affect us, as well as at what point someone should seek professional help, so we reached out to Rodney Luster, Ph.D. He was kind enough to shed some light on these issues. Dr. Luster is a licensed professional counselor, the host of the 'More Than a Feeling' blog on Psychology Today, and the founder of 'Inspirethought.' You'll find the insights he shared with us below.
Nobody should be shouting at kids for being a bit noisy during the holiday season
Image credits: nd3000 / envato (not the actual photo)
One woman went viral after sharing how she dealt with brother-in-law who yelled at her daughter
Image credits: Prostock-studio / envato (not the actual photo)
Imae credits: amenic181 / envato (not the actual photo)
Image credits: throwaway-xmasmess
Chronic anger can affect our physical and mental health in very negative ways
We asked Dr. Luster about the effects that chronic anger has on our physical, as well as our mental health. The therapist noted that anger is typically an emotional response to injustice in people's lives and can be a healthy element in our lives. However, an excess of it can have negative repercussions.
"Chronic anger has been associated with things like avoidance, guilt, irritability, rumination, depression, a lessening in life satisfaction and one's well-being, potential harm to self and others, broken relationships, issues with the law and more," he explained to Bored Panda via email.
According to the professional counselor, chronic anger can be "devastating" to our bodies. It can cause gastrointestinal issues, elevate our blood pressure, increase the risk of diabetes and coronary heart disease, compromise our immune systems, and cause various cardiovascular problems.
"Chronic anger may serve to discharge stress hormones, which open the door to some pretty drastic consequences such as metabolic modifications in the body that may lead to vascular impairments, cholesterol, blockages, and other implications in cardiac functioning. Behaviorally, such anger issues may lead people to adopt more maladaptive habits such as smoking, drug use, caffeine consumption, and more." And that's just the impact on our physical health.
Where our mental health is concerned, Dr. Luster noted that more research is finding links between anger and depression, "especially irritability as a precursor to anger and its linkages to depression." The host of the 'More Than a Feeling' blog also drew our attention to the fact that chronic anger "takes up a lot of cortical real estate," lighting up the limbic system of the brain linked to our behavioral and emotional responses, as well as drastically reducing our executive functions. Namely, logic and reason.
According to the therapist, this creates so-called 'intentional blindness.' This "excludes important environmental components in elevated anger states, leaving out important logical items. Much of this can be seen in road rage incidents."
Constant yelling can mean that the person is chronically exhausted or that they have deep-seated issues that need to be resolved
There is a world of difference between someone who's assertive or gently raises their voice for impact and someone who shouts, screams, and yells to scare others. Spreading fear and causing tears won’t get you far in life—probably only to the front door after you’re kindly asked to leave.
The long and short of it is that all parents ought to strive to handle misbehaving kids in healthy ways, instead of resorting to threats. However, in the case of redditor u/throwaway-xmasmess’ story, her daughter didn’t really do anything wrong.
It’s not the little girl’s fault that her uncle is tired and needs sleep. It’s not her fault that his chosen career path is so exhausting. It’s not her fault that he works odd hours. And it’s certainly not her fault that he seems to have anger issues. You cannot blame kids for ‘ruining’ your sleep when they’re playing and having fun during the holiday season.
When you get to the core of things, the OP’s brother-in-law seems to have some deep-seated issues that he needs to address. He may need to start taking better care of his basic needs if he’s constantly on edge and snapping at everyone else due to his exhaustion and burnout.
If you want to solve your anger issues, you need to be prepared to make some changes in your life, both big and small
That means getting proper sleep, fixing his diet, and getting lots of movement… and not attending family functions if he’s feeling ‘cranky.’ That means taking more walks in nature to destress and taking up meditation to work through all of those uncomfortable feelings.
However, if the OP’s brother-in-law has serious anger issues, whether he’s tired or not, he may need to take some more serious steps to address these problems. That might mean signing up for therapy or anger management courses. That way, the next time someone ‘dares’ to wake him up, he’ll be able to respond in a calm, cool, and collected manner.
Aside from therapy, he may need to consider changing his relationship with his job as well. For instance, he may want to talk to his boss about changing his work hours if he can’t take it anymore and his bad mood is breaking his family apart.
Or, as a last resort, if he’s constantly on edge and taking his frustration out on his loved ones, he might want to go down a different career path. One where he’s happier, more in control, and able to handle the pressure.
Learning to control your impulse to snap at someone, even if just for a moment, is a good first step
The fact is that we all get angry at times. It’s natural. Though we might not be able to fully control the impulse, we can affect how we express it. The University of Rochester Medical Center suggests stepping back for a bit and taking deep, long breaths, whenever you get really mad.
What also helps is forcing yourself to look at the situation extremely rationally, and asking yourself whether the situation is genuinely worth getting angry about. Consider the consequences, both for yourself, as well as for the people around you.
If that doesn’t work, try the reverse: try to see the humor and absurdity in the situation. Humor is anathema to rage.
Aside from all of these changes, if the brother-in-law feels that he wants to reconnect with the author’s family again, it’ll mean putting in a lot of genuine effort on his part. He probably won’t be forgiven straight away, even if he apologizes a few times.
In short, he needs to show everyone that he’s got a handle on his temper and that he’s changed. Rebuilding trust takes a lot of time. And, at the end of the day, he may not be forgiven. But whether or not that happens, it’s in his best interest to do what he can. Namely, getting his anger under control and setting things right with his own spouse and child.
Anger can be a healthy part of our lives, but an excess of it is something to avoid at all costs
Bored Panda also wanted to find out how someone can tell if they may need to seek professional counseling for their anger issues. "Anger, of course, can also be a healthy element in our life, and is part of our self-agency. It serves a valuable purpose as a 'signaling device' to help us avoid injury, and protection from external threats or harm, alongside other important elements. It can also be ventilating, moving us away from suppression of emotional content," Dr. Luster explained to us that anger can play important roles in our lives.
"But when anger becomes chronic, or excessive, it may lead to habituating responses to all environmental contexts, as well as misaligned outbursts, and become a constant go-to for handling all situations," the founder of 'Inspirethought' said.
"Chronic anger becomes a problem when it threatens others in any way either emotionally or physically, creates impairments in our health, and disrupts the ability to live our days harmoniously. Most anger issues, and the anger behind those issues, have derivation points usually found in childhood," Dr. Luster said.
"Exploring anger and its disruption to one's life with a therapist can be a productive and healthy way to begin to understand how we relate to the emotion, and ways to better regulate our internal environment rather than consistently push the button of anger."
The professional counselor added that practicing SIRO (aka 'self in relation to others') can be an important first step in acknowledging the issue. It also helps people become more mindful of how they affect those around them, as well as learn to "understand and control the 'enlarged sense of self' when we escalate to anger." According to Dr. Luster, chronic anger can be modified through practice and with the guidance of a trained therapist—specifically one who deals with anger issues.
Most internet users thought that the author was right to react the way that she did to her brother-in-law's behavior
However, some people thought the situation was far more nuanced. They thought that everyone messed up
