Juanita Lepage MSW, RSW, BHP

Counselling & Energy Healing (289) 812-8089 Hamilton, Ontario

Conscious Parenting

A Podcast & 3 Books To Stir Up Some Conversation

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It’s winter time, and while I’m working, it also feels a little bit like hibernation time. In southern Ontario the temperature can fluctuate 40 degrees Celsius in the span of a few days. Just last week it was -30 and then we had 3 balmy days of 10 degrees. And then an ice storm. During my free time I’ve been doing a lot of reading and listening to podcasts. Here is a glimpse into what I’ve been into for the past 2 months. There’s Russell Brand‘s podcast Under The Skin, Tara Westover‘s memoir Educated, Daemon Fairless‘ book Mad Blood Stirring, and Dan Siegel & Tina Payne Bryson‘s parenting book The Yes Brain.

Podcasts

Under The Skin by Russell Brand

I’ve been a fan of Russell Brand since the movie, Forgetting Sarah Marshall. Russell Brand’s podcast Under The Skin Podcast mixes three things I enjoy: spirituality, irreverance, and humour. Or any serious topic with a splash of irreverence and curiosity. I’ve listened to his interviews with Tony Robbins, Kehinde Andrews, and Gabor Maté. Gabor Maté’s interview (#053) has been my favourite so far – Damaged Leaders Rule An Addicted World. 
Next on my list is an interview with Marianne Williamson.

3 Books

Educated by Tara Westover. As a woman who grew up in a conservative Christian church, this book touched a lot of my edges. This is a memoir of her life growing up in rural Idaho in a Mormon household, with a father who had an undiagnosed mental illness, and never attending school. Through many acts of grace she gets her PhD. The mormon upbringing, like many religions is very patriarchal. She shares her journey of how she survived when the head of her household could not make a lot of rational decisions when he was in the manic phase of his mental illness. Her education through most of her childhood is of a different sort than her school-attending peers. 

Mad Blood Stirring: The Inner Lives of Violent Men by Daemon Fairless. I recently saw an Osteopath, and one of his questions was whether I’d been in any bar fights. I laughed and said no. He said I’d be surprised at how many people say yes to that question. I was reading this book at the time, and I could believe that fact.  

Try this: Ask yourself (whichever gender you are) and also ask a man in your life whether they think about the safety of those they cherish and what they’d do to protect them on any given basis (being at home, walking the streets, being near people fighting on the subway) .  I was talking with a group of women who asked their male partners this question and we were all a little surprised about their responses. Many men, even if they have not grown up in dangerous or violent situations, think about this all the time according the book and according to the men our lives, but it is not something that gets talked about.

Take one look at this cover and you’ll either be drawn to read it or repelled. Daemon is a Canadian author who takes the reader on a personal journey reflecting on his own desire to be violent while adding research and interviews with men who are in prison for their violence. This book is all over the place, yet it’s worth persisting if anything to learn more about his own personal journey.

The Yes Brain by Daniel J. Siegel, M.D., and Tina Payne Bryson falls into the my favourite category of parenting – conscious parenting.  In a nutshell, conscious parenting is being curious about when you are triggered by your child’s actions or emotions, and then doing your own work on why you were triggered instead of taking it out on your child. 

Hitting never works in the long run, even if you rationalize that you grew up with it and turned out fine.  Yelling is about you and less about your child. Conscious parenting does not mean that boundaries are not set or that your child will always be happy. Not setting boundaries sends a message to our children as well. If we have an anxious child and never have our children do anything uncomfortable, we send a message that we don’t believe they can do it either. 

Like any book in the realm of conscious parenting, the journey is about being compassionate to yourself, because EVERY parent is triggered by their children (yes, me too).  If you’ve yelled, hit, or have difficulty setting boundaries, get curious and consider that there are different approaches.  There is NO such thing as a perfect parent. Here’s a link to my previous post The Myth of Perfect Parenting, which includes tips if you’re curious about the conscious parenting approach. 

I liked how this book gives practical tips of teaching our children about self-soothing and identifying when they could make a different choice. The authors give guidance about teaching children about entering the red zone (anger/tantrums/bullying)  and blue zones (anxiety, hiding, sadness).  The tips include breathing methods, compassion, validation, and courage to make a different choice.

Sometimes when reading these types of books I get annoyed at very “therapyesque” conversations with children. This book has some of that too. I rarely speak like this with my kids either – it’s more important to take the essence of what the authors suggest and say it in your own words, otherwise it can come across as annoying and patronizing to our kids.

Summary

Russell Brand’s podcast and each of these books are pivot points to our own self-reflection about religion, education, parenting, politics, spirituality, violence & masculinity and more. They’re also great in discussion with friends, family, or peers. Let me know which one piques your interest the most or whether you’ve already listened to Russell Brand’s podcast or read any of the books. I’d love to hear your thoughts. Until next time….

The Epidemic Of Parent Shaming

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I’ll admit, when the latest parent shaming article came out, I clicked on it and read it. Have you heard about lawnmower parents who “mow” all the obstacles away for their children?

After reading it part of me basked in the pleasure of, “I wouldn’t drive a water bottle to school for my teen” and part of me judged myself where I may have indulged my children, when I “should” have let my kids figure out their own problems. Later I judged myself for judging that mom who brought the water bottle for her teen.  I thought, “I don’t know the story behind this.  I’m sure that lots of kids who grew up with the opposite of lawnmower parents wish they had a lawnmower mom or dad.”

Do you see what’s happening here?

The good ol’ parent shame factory is in full-tilt with September coming in strong.

I could continue this article by shaming all the people who re-posted the lawnmower parenting article. But I might as well point the finger at myself. It can feel really good when you find a post about some aspect of parenting that preaches what you’re already doing as a parent.  That negative pleasure about feeling smug about one of my parenting choices can feeling really good.

So, I thought it was a good time to re-post my article The Myth of Perfect Parenting. That’s right – the idea that there is a best parenting style is a myth. This truth is ridiculously easy to forget.

From Judgment to Empathy

Unless we see a parent physically or emotionally abusing their child or neglecting them to the point of it being unsafe, I wonder what it would be like to shift to compassionate curiousity when some one’s parenting style hits a nerve inside of us.  Often we are triggered by a parent who is “too soft” or “too strict” or “too wishy-washy”.  What parenting style triggers you?

Judging other Parents is also Judging ourselves

When we judge other parents, we are in a weird way actually judging our own insecurities about parenting.  When we judge other parents, we are inviting an opportunity to judge ourselves when we don’t meet our own standards of parenting.  We can make it harder to forgive ourselves when we don’t “practice what we preach”. Moms are particularly hard on themselves and each other. As parents, we can benefit from giving ourselves an empathic voice when our judging voice kicks in to keep us down.

The Unsaid Pressure placed on our Children

We place a lot of pressure on our kids to “turn out fine” because we did our best at parenting and  having been given so many privileges and opportunities compared to another kid.  As a psychotherapist mother who works with parents I can feel that self-induced pressure on myself and my children.  If we take that pressure off of our children, we may find a way to be more compassionate about our own parenting styles and just be ourselves.

Our parenting style impacts our children and at the same-time, it does not guarantee our children a problem-free future.

If our kids are struggling, then it’s a good time to reflect on whether a change in our parenting style may help them, and at the same time, our kids problems may not be related to our parenting choices.

Humour & Healing

To add a little light & lightness to this topic, here’s a couple of videos to all the lawnmower, helicopter, free-range, zen, competitive, and every other type of parent category out there. Yes, the videos are all women.  If you have a great one about types of fathers, please share!

The first is created by women who clearly aren’t parents.  It can be humbling to have an outside lens.

Cat and Nat, some hilarious moms talking about mom-shaming.

Brené Brown digs deep in this heart-felt Ted Talk about Shame.

The last five minutes she delves into the realities of shame for men and women.

I’ll leave you with Brené Brown’s words, “Empathy is the antidote to shame”.

Consciously Parenting A Child With Anxiety: Part 1

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Consciously parenting a child with anxiety is both rewarding and tough.  Our first reaction may be to get someone else to “fix” our child’s problem.  This has been the first step in supporting children for a long time in the therapy world.  As a parent it can feel overwhelming and intimidating to put the lens on ourselves instead of our children.  More research is showing that if parents makes shifts in their lives and also learn different ways to support their child that the outcomes are better for your child.  Read anything by the physician and author Gabor Maté and this will become clear.  I will explore this more in Part 2.

That being said, there are still some basics in supporting a child with anxiety and it’s helpful for parents to understand the framework.

Today will focus on the moment you wonder if your child has an anxiety disorder and how to support them.  Here is a breakdown of future posts.

Part 1: I have a child with anxiety and don’t know what to do

Part 2: I have a child with anxiety and they’ve been in therapy, but I need help supporting them

Part 3: I have tried the regular approach to supporting my child with anxiety but I’m searching for alternative methods to help them

Part 4: I want to understand what is going on in my family from a spiritual lens

Part 1: I have a child with anxiety and don’t know what to do

Supporting an anxious child can be tough.  Maybe you have a child that acts out or maybe you have a child that has stomachaches, headaches or panic.  Anxiety manifests in different ways.

Today I’m going to give you a brief break-down of conventional ways to support an anxious child.  I won’t lie, there are TONS of resources online to learn about anxiety and how to support your child. Cognitive Behavior Therapy (CBT) is the GO-TO starting point for supporting a child with anxiety.  It provides a framework for understanding anxiety and practical approaches to helping your child.

In summary, CBT helps you connect your emotions, behaviors, & thoughts.  It will give you tools to help you shift your thoughts or your behaviors so that your emotions can shift too.

The following is a combination of things I have used with my clients and recommendations from experts. Let’s start with the cheat-sheet to give you an overview of supporting your child.

Cheat-Sheet:

  1. Identifying if your Child has an Anxiety Disorder
  2. Understanding Anxious Thoughts
  3. Connecting with Your Child (aka validation)
  4. Shifting
  5. Encourage Connection to The Wise Brain
  6. Action: Taking Steps to Overcome Fears

Step 1: Identifying if your child has an anxiety disorder

Worry & anxiety is normal.  It’s when it starts interfering with life that a person can be diagnosed with an anxiety disorder. It could be an intense fear about something specific (e.g. dogs), it could be extensive worries about everything, it could be acting out behaviors that look like anger and tantrums when going to school, or it could show itself with physical symptoms like headaches, stomachaches, nausea, or panic.  The main clue is that something is interfering with day-to-day life.

Example:

If you have a child who’s afraid of snakes and you live in Ontario – that fear is unlikely going to be a problem because snakes are fairly easy to avoid. However, if the intensity of that fear stops a person from doing things they enjoy such as camping, going outside, or on playdates – then it has become problematic.

  • When in doubt go to your doctor and they can help you determine if it’s diagnosable.
  • If you first want to research it yourself, the book– Freeing Your Child From Anxiety by Tamar E. Chansky is an excellent resource for summarizing each type of anxiety disorder and helping you assess if your child fits into one of them.

Step 2: Understanding Anxious Thoughts Yourself

Before supporting your child, it’s important to have some understanding – especially if your child’s anxiety seems ridiculous and frustrating.  If you want the anatomical understanding about anxiety and the brain, google it.  There’s a lot out there.  Today, I’m going to put it into kid language.

The brain has different parts and one of them is the worry part of the brain. We all have a worry part in our brain, and the worry brain is an important part.  Imagine you were in the jungle and you heard the grass start to rustle.  It could be something small or it could be a lion.  The worry brain will tell you to find a safe spot.  Without the worry brain you might get eaten by a lion.

Sometimes the worry brain starts over-acting.  You have other parts of your brain, but the worry brain is the loudest.  If a person is afraid of dogs, then with every dog or even pictures of dogs, the worry brain tells you that it’s dangerous and you need to get away.  The other part of your brain – the wise brain helps you pause and listen to all parts before deciding about whether a dog is dangerous or not.

As a parent you can name the parts of the brain whatever you want – the important part is using kid language.  I don’t know about you, but even as an adult – as soon as people start describing structural parts of the brain and their function, I start falling asleep.

Prefer a video explanation?  Here is simple explanation of what the world can be like for a person with anxiety.

Step 3: Connection to your child (aka Validation)

Any parent of an anxious child has said things that are unhelpful – how could you not?  You have a million things going on in your life and now your child is needing more attention and interfering with your routine.   Don’t be hard on yourself.  Take a deep breath and try again.  Connection with your child is the MOST helpful thing for your child.  They need to know that you’ve got their back no matter what happens in their life.  As much as you want to rush them out the door and drop them off at school, (or keep them at home and never let them face their anxieties), connection is key. 

Think of 3 reasons why your child might be scared/worried/anxious and then fill in the blanks.

“I can understand why you would be worried about ________  because ________  because _______ and because __________.  This is from Emotion Focused Family Therapy.  With each because you use, the nervous system relaxes more.  See how many reasons you can come up with.

Example:

“I can understand why you would be scared to go to school when your worry brain is pointing out all the things that could go wrong BECAUSE Your worry brain is saying, “it’s not safe to go to school”, BECAUSE your worry brain is pointing all the things that could go wrong, BECAUSE your worry brain is thinking about all the bad things that might happen.”

Remember: You CAN’T reason with emotions.  You need to connect with the person first. See my blog post: How to support your children and spouse when you really don’t want to

Step 4: Shift

Your child is stuck in their head and in their thoughts, and their body is quite likely to be tense.  When we are tense it’s hard to make a shift in thoughts.  Here are 2 ways to help your child shift – there are many ways – you can be creative.

Activity One

Clench your fists really tight, then let go. Now let’s take 3 deep breaths (in through the nose and out through the mouth), lift our hands up to the sky and then to the ground, rub your hands together while counting to 3, rub your thighs while counting to 3 and then think about a couple of things that make you happy – petting the cat, playing Minecraft, sitting with mom.

This shift is taken from the book When My Worries Get Too Big! A relaxation Book for Children Who Live With Anxiety by Kari Dunn Buron.

Activity Two

3 things – Say aloud 3 things you see, 3 things you hear and 3 things you feel (by touching), then you reduce that to 2 things you see, hear, & feel.  Then 1 things.  You can make this activity 5 things or 7 things – it’s whatever works.

Step 5: Encourage Connection to the Wise Brain

Once emotions have settled, then you can engage the part of brain that looks at reason.  Emotion does not care about reason.  If you’re having a tough day, and I try to use reason and tell you to relax and that your problems are no big deal, i’m doubtful that you will relax.

  1. Explain to your child about different parts of the brain that you learned about in step 2. You can give the names worry brain and wise brain if you want, or your child can give them a name (e.g. scaredy squirrel brain and batman brain).

If you want, you can use a book to guide you both.

  • When My Worries Get Too Big! A Relaxation Book for Children Who Live With Anxiety by Kari Dunn Buron
  1. Now let’s say your child is fearful about school. Ask your child, ‘your “worry brain” has a lot to say today, and what does the “wise brain” have to say about going to school?’  Perhaps wise brain will tell your child that school is safe, my teacher is nice, I like my friend Haley, it’s hard for the first little while at school but then it gets better, today I have gym – I like gym.

(NOTE: If there’s bullying involved you’ve entered a different territory – then we need to listen to the worry mind and do some problem-solving with teachers and coach our children for those situations.)

  1. What thoughts make you feel better? The worry thoughts or the wise thoughts? Remember that worry is a choice – imagine that worry is in one hand and wise/calm thoughts are in the other. Remember we need to bring BOTH into each situation, not just the worry thoughts.

There are numerous creative strategies to engage the wise brain.  If you like lots of examples, get the book:

  • Freeing Your Child From Anxiety

Step 6: Action – Taking Steps to Overcome Fears

If your child sees a therapist, they will help you create a ladder or scale of steps for your child to overcome their fears.  If I’m afraid of dogs, the worst thing you can do is bring a dog and put it next to me.  That is traumatizing and overwhelming.

Start small – you might find that the first step is reading a positive story about dogs or looking at a video of a dog doing adorable things.  Your child will guide you.  This is what a therapist will call Exposure.  You need to stay on each step of the ladder long enough for anxiety to both rise and calm.

What About Medication?

Sometimes medication is necessary to help a child.  A lot of research has shown the benefits of medication and therapy used together.  Not everyone agrees with medication and not everyone benefits from medication, but many people do.  You don’t need to start with medication, but it’s important to consider it if therapy isn’t working on its own.

These steps may look like they will take a long time.  Like trying any new things, it will take longer at the beginning, but after some practice it can be done in a few minutes.

Resource List:

  • Scaredy Squirrel by Melanie Watt (great for kids who are scared to go places)
  • When My Worries Get Too Big! A Relaxation Book for Children Who Live With Anxiety by Kari Dunn Buron
  • Freeing Your Child from Anxiety by Tamar E. Chansky

Validation: How To Support Your Children And Spouse When You Really Don’t Want To

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Your child rolls his eyes at you.

Your partner complains about her work for the 400th time and doesn’t take any of your advice.

What is your feeling in each of these situations?  Anger, irritation, or annoyance is quite likely.

The First Reaction: Defensiveness

It can be easy to get defensive in these situations – you probably feel disrespected and angry that your child rolled his eyes when you asked him to set the table because you work so hard to provide for that child, you do so much work around the house, and your child doesn’t seem to appreciate your hard work.

You may feel a simmering rage that your partner isn’t taking any of your advice after talking about her frustrations over and over and over. You may want to shout, “Just make a decision!” Or “Stop Complaining!”

The Shift To Validation

Validation is about looking at these situations with a different lens.  The lens I’ve described so far is the one where we look at the situation personally and make it about ourselves.  “My child is disrespecting ME” or “My partner doesn’t value MY opinion”.

Validation is a choice to shift the lens from ourselves to the other person.  Acknowledge your reaction and then take a breath and ask yourself, “What is this person feeling underneath the eye roll or complaining?”

Your son could be feeling angry and annoyed to have to shift from doing something fun to something so incredibly boring such as setting the table. That’s normal behavior for a kid.  You are the adult and get to make many decisions for your children. They are the child and must do things you ask them to even if they don’t want to do it.  That can be annoying.

Your partner could be really frustrated with work and may just want someone to say, “That sounds really tough, I can imagine how frustrated you are that you are being asked to work more hours/being treated so poorly/working hard and getting zero credit/fill-in-the-blank”.

The goal of validation is to help a person deepen into their emotions about a situation and feel heard.  Once these things happen, there can be space for problem solving IF needed.

Believe me, I love to give advice to my family – I don’t want to see them in pain or struggling!  I can see possible solutions that maybe they can’t. Yet, if I stop and validate instead, I often don’t have to give any unwanted advice – they can see it for themselves.  We often think people are asking for advice, but really, they just want to be heard.

Often, we are uncomfortable with someone else’s emotions and attempt to change their emotion, so that we can feel better.

Connection

Validation is about connection with the heart instead of the mind. I see you. I hear you.  We slow down and be more present with that person instead of seeing that the act of dealing with their emotions is another “to do” on our never-ending list. If we stop and take 2 minutes to really be there it can make a world of difference.

When Do I Get To Give My Advice?

After the other person appears to deepen into their emotion or relaxes after feeling heard, then we can ask them if they want our advice or want help solving the problem.

With the child who rolls his eyes, there may be zero advice-giving – sometimes just acknowledging that it’s frustrating can be enough.  If there’s more going on in the situation (e.g. swearing at you every time you ask) you can set a boundary AFTER validating them. “You have the right to be annoyed for being asked to do something you don’t like, but it’s not okay to swear me at me”.

With the partner who’s complaining about work all the time, after validating the person you can ask if they want your advice.  If you’re too tired to hear about your partner’s work woes, try saying, “I really want to give you my full attention right now, but I just can’t because I’m so exhausted. I’m a crappy listener when I’m exhausted. Can you tell me more when the kids are watching tv after dinner?” And then remember to ask them about their day when the kids are watching tv.

Want to see it in action? 

Validation, Movie Style!

This is an enjoyable video to watch.  Even if you just watch the first 3 minutes of this video, you will get a feel for what validation can be. The actor TJ Thyne conveys deep connection as he validates others.  His words are not as deep (he doesn’t really know the people he’s validating), yet his connection is strong.  The rest of the video is more of a short story – interesting but more Hollywood than reality.  You don’t need to have this depth of connection to do validation, it’s more important to be authentically you in your connection with your child.

Advanced Skills in Validation

If you have a list in your head of situations or words that are challenging to validate, then consider watching the video by a fellow Social Worker, Natasha Files from Mental Health Foundations. She takes 90 minutes to break it down in the one of the best explanations I have seen.  She teaches viewers how to validate phrases like, ‘I’m fat”, or “I give up”, or “It’s too hard”.  If you feel stuck and confused about validating, this is a great investment of your time that will help you deepen your connection with family members and save hours of time in frustration with them.

Validation Cheat Sheet (adapted from Emotion-Focused Family Therapy)

  1. Take a breath, acknowledge & notice your urge to be defensive – now shift your lens to them instead of you
  2. Attend to the emotion – be present with the person and notice what could be going on
  3. Label the emotion the other person is feeling (take a guess! It’s okay to be wrong)
    • You’re mad at me or
    • You’re frustrated with everything going on at work
  4. Validate the emotion
    • I can understand why you would feel angry, because you’re being asked to do something you don’t want to do, and that it can be annoying that adults tell you what to do at home and at school all the time
    • I can see why you would be frustrated at work because you’re being undervalued, your boss keeps treating you with disrespect, and you’re giving your 100%.
  5. Meet the emotional need
    • Give your son space to feel what he needs to feel – let him be annoyed while he sets the table. You can tell him that he still needs to set table (if he isn’t doing it) and you could let him know that you appreciate the help
    • Let your spouse know that you’re there for them
  6. Fix/Problem-Solve – ask if they want help solving their problem

Like talking about issues of morality with others, emotions are very similar.  We cannot use reason to shift someone’s moral views just as we cannot use reason to shift someone’s emotions. (See my blog post Controversial Conversations With Family & Friends to learn more). Connection is the most powerful tool and validation is great way to connect.

Want to learn more about supporting a child or adult with anxiety?  Stay tuned for a post in February.

 

Anger, What Is It Good For?

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My kids and I have been reading a lot of Calvin and Hobbes comic books these days.  My kids laugh away at all of Calvin’s silly antics and vivid imagination.  They think that his club, Getting Rid of Sliming girlS (GROSS), is hilarious.  As a parent I notice that Calvin is angry a lot.  My kids notice that there isn’t one adult who really gets Calvin. When Calvin shows anger, no one listens to him and he often gets punished.

Do you remember what you were taught about anger as a child?

Who was allowed to be angry in your home?

Who wasn’t allowed to be angry in your home?

What were the repercussions for showing your anger?

Now fast-forward to your current relationship with your partner and/or children and answer the same questions.

Who is allowed to be angry in your home?

Who isn’t allowed to be angry in your home?

What are the repercussions in your home for showing anger?

The unwritten rules about anger

Many of the rules about anger expression are unwritten in our families and in our cultures.  We don’t have to be told what the rules are, but we all know them even if they have not been said.

Some common unsaid rules are:

  • You’re not supposed to be angry because anger means you are not grateful
  • Only parents (or one parent) are allowed to be angry
  • Only my children are allowed to be angry, but not me. As an adult I should know better.
  • Anger is only for people who had have something “really bad” happen to them.
  • If you show your anger, you are bad in some way.
  • If your child shows anger, they are bad in some way.
  • Anger needs to be controlled and managed.
  • Showing anger means you’re out of control

What are the unsaid rules about anger in your home?

Anger’s makeover

My inbox has received a variety of advertising for courses and webinars about anger.  The trend right now is a shift from anger management to acknowledging anger, feeling anger in your body, validating anger, and transforming anger.

Emotion-focused family therapy is a great tool for exploring a family’s expression of anger and its impact on child and youth mental health.  A child who never expresses anger may demonstrate depression.  A child who always expresses anger but never feels heard may show more behavioural problems.  A child who is angry about going to school may have anxiety.  A powerful way to help children with mental health issues is to explore ways to support our children’s anger and our own anger too.

We don’t need to be comfortable with anger or resolve all of our own issues with anger to support our children with their anger.  Small changes can make big impacts.

Anger needs to be met with curiosity.  Often there are many other emotions underneath anger, but anger is the emotion being expressed.  Anger in ourselves and others needs to be met with a lot of compassion and validation in combination with boundary setting.

The next time you get angry at someone, first acknowledge you have a right to be angry, and then ask yourself what expectation has not been met?  What is it about the situation that makes you angry?  What other emotions are you feeling? Working with a counsellor or therapist can be a great way to explore this in more depth.  If you notice that you have been feeling a lot of anger towards a partner, your kids, or others, then counselling can help you transform anger, shift your outlook, or make changes if needed.

If you are a person who is interested in exploring your own journey with anger as a parent, there is a new movement in conscious parenting.  Anger is being understood to be a feeling that emerges when an expectation has not been met.  It is an emotion that can be fuel in making changes in our society and within ourselves.

If you are a fan of Dr. Shefali (author of  both The Awakened Parent and Conscious Parenting), she has an excellent course for parents about the anatomy of anger and how to transform it in a conscious way.  It is called Anger Transformed.

Anger has had a very bad reputation. The good news is that its’ reputation is on the edge of being transformed.