My child makes it hard for me to control my anger

sounds like you've given complete control to her. Do you discipline her?

You are modelling aggressive behaviour to your daughter.

Seek some third party help so that you can break the vicious circle that has been set up: as you become more stressed and aggressive as a response to your daughter's behaviour, so you provide reinforcement and a model for her pattern of aggressive behaviour.

She will need firm but calm guidance inorder to bring her back to a better behaviour pattern, such as sanctions rather than smacking or yelling, which will only serve to confirm to her that what she is doing is ok.

If she is hitting you then stop her by gently but firmly by holding her while telling her calmly that it's not ok. Hold her for a minute or two while quietly telling her to calm down. Then give her a constructive task to do, or maybe say "hey we have to get on with doing xyz" and say you need her to help you - say it firmly so it sounds like an instruction rather than a request. Be sure to tell her how well she is doing when her behaviour is constructive.

Obviously you have to stop her being cruel to animals. Using toy animals, stories and pictures of animals could be a creative way of changing her attitude toward animals. Also trips to the zoo or a park where animals are looked after combined with explanations of how animals are cared for could help a lot. Watching TV programs with her that show how animals are trained and looked after would also be great. Watching a sheepdog working with a flock of sheep shows how an animal can respond to just a whistle or some other special signal - but do explain to her that a great deal of patient and careful training went into getting the dog to respond that way - so she will need to do more than just learn to whistle.

Try some of the relaxation exercises on this site to see if they help you control your sense of stress. If your daughter is 5 then I would think she is at school during weekdays? Use some of that time to work on relaxing yourself. If you have friends or relatives that will have your daughter for some periods of time, perhaps a couple of times a week, set up some visits.
Make sure you have periods of time that are 'your time' and that you do something that you enjoy.

Also, do your own assessment to look further into why you are getting so angry: have you lost someone important recently - could this anger be part of working through some loss process? Are you feeling run down or depressed? Are you sleeping and eating ok? Have your doctor check for any physical basis that might underlie your anger.

The problem with venting anger is that it tends to give temporary release rather than reducing the overall tendency to get angry. Try looking at times when you deal with testing issues without getting angry, or perhaps less angry than usual for such events, what is different? Use your observations to help you take more control.

Remind yourself that you are not driven by your environment: how you perceive what is happening around you is the basis of your experience. When we are stressed our perception can become narrow and it is easy to miss the more positive things that surround us.

Personally, I don't think of anger as a negative emotion because I believe it can be useful at times. But if we slip into a pattern of 'over using' it we can feel ruled by it. If you feel it might have become a routine way of reacting to testing situations, try cutting short your thought processes as the tension builds up and literally take a few minutes to focus on your breathing and tense and relax your shoulders. If you can do that regularly you will be reducing the level of your anger and you will feel more in control.

I know the above is easier said than done, but you do need to change things for your daughter's sake.

i dont want to make assumptions on you as a mother but i think you might be causing this yourself do you realise how scary it is for a child to have a parent screaming and yelling, you say you do that because she makes you angry but thats no excuse you say the child has problems are these behavioural and does she get anything from the doctor or therapy for these things? you get out what you put in and for the child to see you behaving this way does nothing to instill a good pattern of behaviour if you yell at a child then they gonna yell back because if its ok for you to do it then why not for her, your getting in a catch 22 situation and you need to break this cycle get some help for yourself and your own issues before you start working on hers once your more controlled then you have more control but without that this is gonna spiral out of control and your gonna end up hurting someone if not your child then yourself

dont be offended by the things i say i have a problem communicating what i mean so i sometimes sound harsh

Thank you guys for your responses. I know I have lost control of my daughter a long time ago, I didn't know that yelling at her was telling her it was okay to yell at me, oh the main problem could be that I really don't get away from her at all . I am a stay at home mom and I never really go anywhere or do anything except with her.

I want more than anything to stop yelling, but nothing else works, if I put her in time out she just tells me she hates me and then keeps getting back up . Sometimes making her sit in her bedroom for about 5-10 min works and she will come out all calm and quiet.

You are probally right that if I got time alone from her that I could reduce some of my stress. Yes she is in school but only for half a day and I use that time to get house work done. so maybe I could stop doing the house work while she's at school and just relax.

Thank you again for your responses.

*hugs* I re-read my post and it sounds kind of cold. I was half asleep. I forget how dificult it can be raising a litle one. Mine are teens, though they aren't easy.

Time-outs are good. I think the general rule is 1 minute per year? Though if they could handle more then of course more. My niece told me every time she was sent to her room she thought, yay I didn't want to see you anyways and now I get my toys. So my children's time-outs were somewhere boring- or a boring task.

I noticed when my frustration over the kids went away I had a larger perspective. I realized whatever I was having a fit about didn't necessarily mean they were going to end up a certain way. For instance, I'd get mad that my kids would incessantly argue. So I thought that my son wouldn't grow up kind and gentle, or my daughter would grow up picking jerks for boyfriends. That's not necessarily the case. In fact, when I look back at how often any of my predictions came true my results really aren't that great.

Perhaps more father time will also help her balance out more?

oh the main problem could be that I really don't get away from her at all . I am a stay at home mom and I never really go anywhere or do anything except with her.

It probably is a major factor

I want more than anything to stop yelling, but nothing else works, if I put her in time out she just tells me she hates me and then keeps getting back up . Sometimes making her sit in her bedroom for about 5-10 min works and she will come out all calm and quiet.

When she says she hates you, I would suggest hearing it as: I really RESENT IT when you take charge!!

It sounds like the 'time-out' does work if you persist. Could you structure some time where she plays in her room at certain times during the day? Not as a punishment, but never-the-less to give you some personal space?

Does she have toys in her room she could get into playing with regularly? Kids always seem to love boxes, the bigger the better, could you get some very large cardboard boxes and make a play house in her room maybe?

If she seems always to be on the go and doesn't settle to anything much, it might be worth looking to see if anything she is eating or drinking is affecting her behaviour - they put some real junk in even the simpleist foods nowadays. Highly coloured drinks and foods can sometimes contain a load of chemicals that are really unecessary and undesirable. Maybe worth trying her with fruit juices or fruit based squashes and just basic home made stuff for a week just to see if it makes any difference. It may be that if she seems calmer when not taking certain drinks/foods that when you reintroduce whatever the offending item is she will have a strong reaction to it which is seen in her behaviour again as being even more intense.

Can you do a deal with any other mums whereby you take it in turns to look after each others kids while in turn you take some time off?

and just one more practical thing that I found helpful when my kids were small - dont give the bad behaviour attention (unless of course she is harming herself or anyone else), but when you do see her playing nicely or speaking nicely, give her a hug and talk to her, even reward her, say "you have been such a good girl today I'm going to give you a treat" - maybe get a chart and give her stars that she can put on herself or take her out to the park or something similar.

Her bad behaviour is gaining attention from you - even a negative, yelling response is gaining your focus and attention. Ignore it if at all possible but give her lots of good responses when she is good.

It seems also that your needs arent being met, get someone to babysit once in a while and go out or just spoil yourself, you need time to recharge your batteries once in a while. We all (adults included) have an inner child that we need to love and care for!

Thank all of you for your responses, I am planning on trying alot of your suggestions. They are all really good suggestions.
Thanks again

hi again im sure once you get a plan of action going either with a reward chart or even just a this is what happens when your good/bad plan then you will find it makes it much easier i know how tiring all the yelling can get and your probably wearing yourself out with doing that so better to just relax and try keep your voice level when your disciplining her, i think small children still follow the way that a new baby does where if your tense and all stressed the baby can tell and so reacts in the same manner ie crying screaming etc so its just the same but an older version really glad your feeling more positive about the way you can cope with her keep us posted im sure your advice on how you got past this stage will be extremely useful to others