Dear Therapist:

As someone who has recently began mentoring struggling teens, I had a question that I hope you can shed light on. There is one very angry kid who comes from a difficult background, and he is not only tough in how he talks to others but also gets angry if someone talks to him in a nice and calm way. It is surprising that the kid seems to react better when someone talks down to him and is very direct, over someone who talks to him nicely. He actually told me I am a "softie" and should be tougher on him. You would think that he would appreciate someone being nice to him! He seemingly is wired in a way, probably because of what he went through, that only anger reaches him. I am wondering if you as therapists have this dilemma and how you deal with it. Am I really too much of a softie and need to be tougher? or is that only what he thinks he needs?

Response:

As you mention, it is likely past experiences and relationships that have caused this teenager to react “better” to anger than to calm discussion. We all develop communication and socialization skills, and coping mechanisms, based on our experiences and the ways in which we internalize them. Some of these skills are adaptive and appropriate, while others are maladaptive. From an externalized perspective, the difference between an adaptive skill and a maladaptive one is the way in which others respond to our use of these skills.

You wonder whether you need to accede to this boy’s demand that you react in a tougher fashion, or whether his need for anger is unhealthy. There are many possible reasons for his apparent “need” for anger (both in himself and in others). Some are rather simplex, while others speak to deeper, more underlying emotional needs.

Speaking to the simpler side, within this teenager’s family or other social system emphasis may have been placed on toughness as a value. Anger may have been conflated with toughness, due to toughness having been expressed as anger (or understood by him as emerging from anger). If the role models on whom he bases at least this aspect of his value system act tough (read angry), this could easily have led to his sense that anger is an important value.

We all experience, and react to, things differently. The same experience for two people can be traumatic for only one of them. Similarly, different styles of speech, inflection, and word usage can mean entirely different things for different people. Perhaps this teenager experiences anger simply as toughness, without recognizing its negative aspect and the impact that it has on others. He may not even define his way of reacting as “angry.”

If this is the case, helping him to understand both toughness and anger from others’ perspective can help him to redefine his needs. If in the past he has typically looked up to role models who he perceived as angry/tough, a relationship with a positive role model who is tough without being angry can be very beneficial to him. He can learn to understand both anger and toughness differently, while gradually separating one from the another.

There may be deeper emotional needs that cause this boy to seemingly crave anger or negative attention. These can include the need for drama, a bid for attention, feelings of depression, a sense of invalidation, and the effects of abuse or other trauma. At the core of many of these and other causes is the very human need to develop a sense of self. In these instances, giving in to his demand that you react in a tougher fashion will likely only reinforce any problematic beliefs and emotional needs. If you believe that there is a complex underlying need that significantly contributes to his anger issues, you may want to recommend therapy to help him to address these.

-Yehuda Lieberman, LCSW

 psychotherapist in private practice

 Woodmere, NY

 author of Self-Esteem: A Primer

 www.ylcsw.com / 516-218-4200

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