by Paul Jacobson , dad, husband, lawyer, geek, blogger, evangelist, maven. He blogs at Paul Jacobson and Web. Tech. Law

I have become acutely aware of how my stress impairs my ability to relate to my family and to our son, in particular, in a constructive or even meaningful way.  My law firm has seen a number of changes over the years since I founded it.  One thing that hasn’t really changed all that much is the amount of stress I am under almost all the time, particularly about financial matters.

It is usually around month-end and the beginning of the next month (“that time of month” for me) that I notice my patience wearing really thin in general and my personality shifts to the Dark Side (with a side order or Super Grouch).  Despite my hope that I can keep the stress to myself and deal with it in some way (still looking for that magic wand to turn the stress into euphoria and bliss …), it leaks out and taints everything and everyone near me.  I get angrier quicker and lose my temper when pushed.  In short, I behave terribly and a big part of my anxiety is watching how my stress affects Aaron, in real-time.  Sure he has his moments (he had a doozie this morning) but he is still a child.  I mentioned before that I have started to see him begin to withdraw a little and me getting angry doesn’t help at all.  Then, after the anger has passed and the tears are drying as he sits on my lap apologising to me, the guilt and depression sink in.  My worldview just shifts from red to deep blue and that isn’t much fun either.

I think what I am slowly getting to is this: we all get stressed out and we take it out on people around us in varying degrees.  Although it often makes me feel worse, becoming more aware of the causes of my stress and the reasons why I am such an ass at certain times of the month is essential to dealing with the stress a little better.  At the very least I am slowly getting better at recognising that it isn’t our son’s tantrum that sparked my anger but something wholly outside his control or even his little universe.  It isn’t his fault that a client is 10 days late on a big fee and all my debit orders have bounced.  He’s upset because he had a bad dream or because we can’t rewind Peppa Pig for him.

We all know we shouldn’t take our stress out on other people but are we all as aware of the causes of our stress as we could be?  Perhaps if we were more aware of those causes we’d recognise the triggers sooner and behave a little better next time our children start pressing buttons.

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