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Small children can be loving, rewarding and adorable. But there are bad days where everything goes wrong, your temper begins to rise and crisis threatens.
For some parents, it is hard to even own up to the fact that they feel inadequate, can't cope or actually feel quite murderous towards their young children. Aren't we supposed to be ecstatically happy with our bundles of joy?
The truth is that no matter how much we enjoy being parents, small children have an amazing power to bring out in us strong feelings, both positive and negative. Anger is often brought on by the combination of the ordinary stresses of bringing up a child and by build-up of circumstances.
Most parents will recognise the scene: The baby is acting quite normally for her by crying persistently for food or attention by refusing to use the potty or by throwing another tantrum. You feel the tension rising. Perhaps you have other things that are worrying you - someone ill in your family, anther child needing particular attention, a jobless husband. Suddenly you can't cope any longer.
Down to basics
One mother described it as though she had come down to the same level as her son: "I screamed back at her, threw her toys across the room and finally burst into tears myself. My child looked startled, then afraid and then came close for comfort. But I wanted to be comforted. I even tried to push her away. But she persisted and only then did the adult part of me take charge again. We just sat and rocked each other for comfort."
According to child psychologists, the difficulty with little children is they can't tell you how they feel. They have a way of communicating directly-they sort of plug into your own emotional circuits. And you get totally bound up with the emotions of the child. It's as though you're in there with them on a purely feelings level; as if there is no separation.
As a mother, you feel it's your job to contain your child's feelings but sometimes you can't. You get filled up and then everything overflows.
The trigger
But why can we cope with some types of behaviour when others seem to trigger off dangerous reactions? It seems that when a baby is expressing her feelings of fear, loneliness, frustration, need, pain or whatever, this connects with some feeling in the mother's own experience - perhaps her first panic about being a mother of a newborn baby or even some inexpressible feeling of fear and loneliness from her own childhood.
Counseling services are there when mother feels something more serious has begun to go wrong between her and her child. She can go for counselling on her own, with the child or with the whole family over a period of time.
Six ways to stop yourself harming your child
*Put your crying baby in her cot or bed. She may go on howling but she'll be safe. Go right away into another room where you can't hear her. Force yourself to go away and make yourself some tea or coffee.
*Bigger children can be taken out for a walk - even if it's at night! Go and see someone if you can but just a short walk can take the heat out of the moment.
*Phone a friend and ask them to come round or get in the car and go and see them. Remember most parents have felt the same way at some point and nothing seems half as bad with another adult present.
*Take the child next door to a neighbour and ask if they can mind her for half and hour in an emergency.
*Older children often calm down if you deliberately force yourself to behave differently. Ignore whatever the row is about get both of you something nice to eat or drink and sit down with them and watch television together.
*Try and change the mood by changing baby's clothes and giving her a warm bath - get in too if you feel like it!
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