We've all been there. No matter if you are a single parent or with your partner. It's that moment you boil up inside and suddenly have no control over the level of your voice, because no has listened to you all day, and they won't stop fighting, and they are yelling rudely to you because you can't fix everything!! Oh and dinner is burning on the stove. Humph!
Well, if that sounds familiar then you understand how it feels. It used to be when I got to that boiling point I could tag team my ex in (when he was home) and I could walk away and cool down. Now I don't have that and I've found myself yelling too much and then crying in the bathroom because I feel awful. I ALWAYS apologise to them when I overly lose my temper. And that has also taught them to be very good at apologising and owning their mistakes. But that doesn't mean that the guilt I feel, when my child looks at me crying and I know I did that, goes away.
It has really made me look inside and figure out my triggers and how to diffuse on my own. One thing I started doing was to be very honest with them when I'm about to explode. I tell them" I need to cool down because mommy is upset right now and I don't want to yell at you." As I've said before, I have no idea if this is the right thing to do but it has saved some explosive moments from happening where all of us are upset. Just being honest. I don't have answers for any of this I don't claim to.
I just don't want them to look back at this already trying time and remember me as angry all the time. Does anyone else have this fear? What do you do to manage this?