The Rational Basis® of Happiness Podcast

The Selfish Path to Romance. Download chapter one for free at DoctorKenner.com and Amazon.com

Cassidy, is that your name?

Yes.

You’re having problems with your three-year-old?

Yes, I have a three-year-old that is raging and just very… like, a lot of anger problems and like, says, “I hate you,” and is being mean to kids at daycare.

Okay, and is this a new problem, or is this a boy or a girl?

It's a boy.

It's a boy. And give me a brief summary of the history.

Well, I think he has a dad that's kind of in and out of his life due to addiction, and so I'm kind of wondering if it's from that, and what I can do to, like, I don't know, help him work through the anger.

Okay? Anger is the emotion that says, "It's not fair. It's not fair." So when you have a three-year-old, they don't have the ability that an adult has to fully express what's not fair, but they still can say, "Joey took my toy," or "Daddy's not here. Where's daddy? It's not fair." Or, "The kids are teasing me at school. It's not fair." So what do you suspect is going on? What do you think might be going through your son's mind that is triggering not just a mild “It’s not fair,” but a huge, a huge “It’s not fair.”

Maybe just, I don't know, being left out. I don't know. I just see it a lot being because of, you know, his dad was around for the first two years of his life, consistently, and about the last year he's been… it's gone from seeing him all the time to…

…to seeing him once a month maybe.

Okay, what does he say? What does your son say about that?

What does he—

Does he… yeah, does he express anything about that? Does he say, "Where's daddy? Can't I see daddy?"

Yes, “Where’s daddy?” And it seems to me like he's always looking for reassurance, like, “I love you. I love you.” Like, telling me, “I love you a lot.” And saying, “Daddy—"

Say it again. He says what?

“Where’s daddy?” He asks for that. And he tells me he loves me a lot. I think he's, like, just looking for a lot of reassurance. I just don't know, like, what to do with the anger because it's really not even controllable.

Okay, tell me what he does. Well, first, let’s talk about the reassurance. I think that’s a really important point. When any of us feel insecure—when you feel insecure, maybe at work, or maybe even with parenting—it’s nice to have somebody just pat you on the back and recognize the good things you’re doing. So, if you can work with him and help him develop his mind, whether it’s with reading or just play… you know, just playing with him. If he gets that attentiveness from you, he may not need to… he may be able to break that pattern a little bit, or at least put a beginning dent in it, so that he isn't being heavy on you. Meaning, "Mom, do you love me? Do you love me? Do you love me?" When kids do that, the parents want to push them away. "Of course, I love you! What are you doing? You know, don’t keep… don’t be so needy." But it sounds like he could use extra hugs. Go ahead.

No, go ahead.

Oh, and the second part, what triggers his rage? Because that’s the word you used, that he was raging.

Just anything… like, when we take him to daycare in the morning, he screams. And she informed me today that he's saying the F-word to her, and "I hate you." And he does this little intimidating… moves his head in a really intimidating way at you, and makes his eyes big… like tries to get you to flinch when he does it. Yeah, you tell him no, he just goes over the edge and starts, like, screaming, “I hate you!”

So the "no" is the trigger. He’s got something that’s going on, and he’ll start screaming, he’ll start swearing, he’ll push people away. Is he doing this to the teacher or to other kids?

He’s been taking toys away from other kids at daycare. He’s been doing this to the daycare lady the last few days. She thought maybe it was just a phase, but it’s getting really bad.

Yeah, you want to be careful with that phrase, “It’s just a phase.” I’m not saying you—because she’s the one that said it to you—you want to deal with the actual cause. And if he's screaming, the first thing that I would wonder is, where’s he learning this? Where did he learn the F-word? You know? He’s a three-year-old kid.

I know.

And what about this “I hate you”? Where is he hearing it from? Are other kids in the daycare bringing this in? Are they taunting him? Is this something that you're not seeing at daycare? Is it possible that he was hurt, or even physically or sexually abused? I mean, you want to rule that out. Is that a possibility at all?

Okay, I don’t think it’s a possibility.

Okay, if you don’t suspect it, I don’t want you to go hunting for it. It’s just that when you get a lot of anger and rage, and the F-word, I want to find the source. I might just sit with him and inquire. It’s very hard for the parent to do this, but you know, if you can do this at all—“Where did you learn that word? I’m curious,” as opposed to, “I never want to hear you say that again.” Then you’ll never find out where he learned it. But yeah, “Where’d you learn this word?”

Like a lot of kids. I have older kids too, so there's, like, a lot of kids.

Oh, how many kids? I should have asked you that at the beginning. How many kids in the house?

Three.

Three. How old are the others?

Eleven and nine, and then him. And he’s three.

Okay, so he could have picked it up from them. So you also want to look at the dynamics with the other kids. Is their father in their life, or is it the same dad?

It's the same dad.

Same dad. So they all might be struggling. You may ask them what they've observed in terms of skills because… we’re down to the last 20 seconds here. I would get the book How to Talk So Kids Will Listen and Listen So Kids Will Talk. I consider that the gold standard. You can go to my website, DrKenner.com, and it will teach you methods of how to draw him out so he’ll talk more, how to tell him to express his anger in a drawing instead of screaming. You know, “When you’re really angry, talk to your sister if you’re angry with her. Tell me what’s bothering you in words rather than screaming.” And you help give him the skills. Thank you so much for your call.

I'm Dr. Ellen Kenner on The Rational Basis of Happiness.

For more Dr. Kenner podcasts, go to DrKenner.com.

Here’s an excerpt from The Selfish Path to Romance: A Serious Romance Guidebook by Drs. Kenner and Locke.

Sometimes partners feel that one or the other is being unfair, but often, neither is intentionally trying to provoke or take advantage of the other. For example, Doug feels that Marcy is being unfair when she leaves clothes and boxes scattered all over the house. Doug is neat and organized, and due to his sense of order, he thinks she should just know better. He feels put upon as he picks up after her. Marcy has no idea that such behavior bothers him and resents that he is irritably intruding on her method of unpacking. Such perceived unfairness can be resolved with better communication. Partners should not keep an accounting ledger to make sure there's fairness—that’s far too mechanical. Goodwill and a sense of fairness will often do the job.

You can download chapter one for free by going to DrKenner.com and you can buy the book at Amazon.com.