Go Back to All Parenting Resources A sad mom is seated on the floor in a bedroom at the end of the bed, as she looks toward the window with her hand to her face, supporting her head at her cheek and chin, while displaying a look of deep concern mixed with sadness and anger.

Parenting

Janel Breitenstein

Parent Anger: 5 Hot Tips

Helen Keller once spoke of the need to “look the world straight in the face.” And God asks that we worship him in truth, delighting “in truth in the inward being . . . in the secret heart” (John 4:24, Psalm 51:6).

That’s what I’ve found my anger problem required: The courage to look at things as they are, not as I wish they were. Nor to look at my children, relatives, spouse, friends, or self as the people I wish we were.

My methods of dealing with my anger, including my expectations of others, were straight- up sinful, interfering with my relationship with God. There were vertical implications of my horizontal relationships’ brokenness: “So if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go. First be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift” (Matthew 5:23-24). God longed for my reconciliation with these little image-bearers of his as part of my worship.

Need some hot tips to cool down? Consider starting here.

1. Change the scenery.

Help yourself move out of fight/flight/freeze by turning on some music and dancing. Getting a glass of water. Going on a walk (may need to grab the stroller!). Going into a dark room to settle your sense of overstimulation. Changing your location—even moving to a different room, or standing if you’ve been sitting.

2. Come prepared.

I mentioned in my book, Permanent Markers: Spiritual Life Skills to Write on Your Kids’ Hearts, that you can post (maybe in a cupboard) a list of infractions alongside their preplanned consequences. I really like the emotional distance this approach creates from reactive parenting.

But sometimes it’s valuable to consider whether a child has had an exceptionally hard day, is being bullied at school, or whether we kept them up too late the night before. First Thessalonians 5:14 highlights the need for different responses to weakness: “Admonish the idle, encourage the fainthearted, help the weak, be patient with them all.”

Yes, kids still need to behave when stressed, as we all do. And we can’t fail to train our kids at those times. But we can maintain a view of the whole child, the whole situation, when we parent.

3. Identify the emotion beneath.

It’s one of the first questions I ask parents (and my own kids and myself) dealing with anger: What feeling is underneath?

Isolating the primary emotion can be key to addressing your triggers and desires and learning to cut off anger at its source. Dr. Carla Naumburg helpfully defines anger triggers as “anything that revs up your nervous system and makes your buttons bigger, brighter, more sensitive, and way easier for your kids to push. . . Most folks . . . need to learn how, exactly, to make their buttons as small and dim and pushproof as possible.”

Anger is known to be a secondary emotion. If you picture an iceberg, anger is the part you can see. But beneath the waterline might be the primary emotions like the ones listed below; in studies, for example, women admit to difficulty in differentiating anger from hurt.

Consider which of these most frequently undergird your anger.

Rejection
Disappointment
Injustice
Hurt
Embarrassment
Sadness
Helplessness
Jealousy
Guilt
Shame
Depression
Isolation
Fear

It bears noting that my not-atypical exhaustion makes me far more prone to all those emotions and therefore shortens what could be a four-foot anger-fuse to about four inches—or centimeters, depending on the day. The exhausted version of myself simply isn’t the most holy version—but it may be the most triggered and angry.

Smush this onto the snowball of reasons for parents to look at themselves with humble, sober judgment (Romans 12:3) about what commitments and activities they can actually handle, to vigilantly care for their own souls, and to (kindly) ask for the help they need rather than attempting to be superhuman. Repeat after me: I’m saying no to the right things to say yes to the vital things.

Overcommitment, overachieving, and overfunctioning affect what version of Jesus our kids see in us.

As my mom is fond of saying, “God promises green pastures and still waters. It’s not your job to mow the grass and swim laps.”

4. Tease out your motivations.

I’ve learned that when I’m stewing, I need to ask some key questions. Here’s the first: What part of my anger is about God’s kingdom, and which part is about my own?

Paul David Tripp wisely points out that God doesn’t want us to ignore our kids’ sin. We may need to overlook or simply wait for the right time (Proverbs 19:11; Ephesians 4:29). But so often in our hearts, our personal laws being broken matters so much more to us than God’s.

Consider James 3:17: “But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy and good fruits, impartial and sincere.” I don’t know about you, but this doesn’t always describe me when a child is lipping off.

But rather than knee-jerk emotion, righteous anger, Tripp points out, displays self-control. Instruction. Hope. Grace. So it’s a goal of mine to rarely, if ever, discipline out of the fight/flight/freeze version of my anger—which can exalt the wrong kingdom. Let’s be proactive and thoughtful in our instruction of our kids, rather than reactive.

5. Get your story straight.

Examine the story you’re telling yourself in your anger—and then consider which parts of the story might have a different explanation.

Maybe you believe a child is acting a certain way because they’re manipulative, or you’re convinced your husband responds a certain way because he’s selfish and thoughtless. Maybe a child seems too picky.

God does give us discernment and intuition to help us address the sin of others, including manipulation and deception that grant power to evil.

But I’ve also met people claiming the “gift of discernment,” which at times looked a lot more like being judgmental and stark in their sweeping statements and conclusions. This “discernment” might pose an obstacle to charitable judgments—believing the best about someone, in the way we’d want them to believe the best about us (Matthew 22:39; 1 Corinthians 13:7 NIV).

In her research of the habits of highly happy couples, social scientist Shaunti Feldhahn has found that when hurt, these couples tend to believe their spouse didn’t intend to hurt them. And statistically, that wasn’t wishful thinking! Literally 99 percent of all spouses surveyed (not just happy ones) sincerely wanted the best for their mates. Yet looking at the statistics, Feldhahn observes, “Some spouses believe that nearly universal reality, but many don’t—and this is one of the main causes for the difference in their level of happiness.”

So when you’re examining the “evidence,” remember that while much truth is black and white, most wisdom is found in complexity. Think of it as discerning an old pixelated photo in a newspaper, picking out the minute pixels of light, medium, or dark gray.

In whatever situation at home, have you asked that child pointed questions regarding their possible manipulation? Could you be expecting your spouse to read your mind? Could you be interpreting your child’s pickiness as your own failure, which, from your experience, seems to shout that you’re inadequate or worthless?

Ask God to reveal broken narratives misdirecting your anger.

Let’s get messy

Maybe, like my own family, you’re a family who does not . . . never . . . fight.

But there’s wisdom in Sean Connery’s line in First Knight. “There’s a peace only to be found on the other side of war.” As I’ve been told, don’t confuse harmony for intimacy.

No, I’m not encouraging you to argue or storm the castle for the sake of it. But I’m also not implying that peaceful families should withhold from engaging in messy situations. Let’s not run from chances to make our relationships more real.

We don’t need more “sweep it under the rug” families who fail to engage with one another to a level where everyone pretends to be happy and learns to function by a set of elaborate, unspoken rules so no one upends the apple cart.

God offers his blessing not specifically to the peacefakers or peacebreakers, but peacemakers. Those running hard after true peace are the ones who show themselves to be children of God, the ultimate Peacemaker.

Adapted from How to Stop Yelling Up the Stairs: Keeping Your Cool while Raising Your Kids. Copyright © 2026 by Janel Breitenstein. Published by Kregel Publications. Used with permission. All Rights Reserved.

Janel Breitenstein has spent six years in youth ministry, five years overseas, and far more years writing and speaking to parents. She has over twenty published works and more than a decade of publishing and marketing experience. Mom to her own messy family of six, Janel writes with an authentic, intimate style that connects with readers around the globe. You can find her having uncomfortable, important conversations at janelbreitenstein.com.