Connected Families Podcast What Works When "Calm Down!" Doesn't: How to Help Your Angry Child
Sep 15, 2025
Join Julie Maas, a Board Certified Nurse Coach and Connected Families Certified Parent Coach, as she shares powerful insights on managing children's intense anger. She discusses the importance of recognizing deeper emotional needs and offers brain science explaining how fight-or-flight responses can hinder regulation. Julie emphasizes leading with compassion to create connection before correction and gives rapid de-escalation tactics. Learn about practicing emotional skills during calm moments to help kids choose better responses to frustration!
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Anger Reflects Hidden Needs
- Children’s anger often masks deeper needs like sensory overload, exhaustion, or emotional pain.
- Julie Maas urges parents to view outbursts as signs they’re having a hard time, not giving you a hard time.
Lead With Compassion First
- Lead with compassion to reduce fear and the parent's urge to control the moment.
- Compassion creates emotional safety and makes children more likely to calm than mirrored outbursts do.
Brain Science Explains Meltdowns
- The prefrontal cortex — the brain’s logic center — goes offline during intense anger.
- That shutdown explains why lectures or "calm down" commands fail when a child is dysregulated.
