Why You Still Yell, Even When You Know Better

I hear a version of this all the time, in comments, in messages, even from moms in my own life. Someone gets the authoritative parenting piece, the warmth and the boundaries together, and still asks me the same question.

Why is it so hard to actually do in the moment? Why do I still want to yell?

I ask myself the same thing.

That's exactly why this conversation with Dr. Cassidy Freitas, a therapist and the author of Mom Needs a Moment, felt so important to have.

Even I still do this

During our conversation, I shared a moment that still comes to mind. I'd had a troll on Instagram, nothing major, just one of those comments that gets under your skin. I put my phone down, still stewing, and my son Ryaan asked me for something simple. I yelled at him. It wasn't anything he did. I was just still carrying that other moment into this one.

I caught it fast, because of a lot of therapy and a lot of practice. I apologized, I asked him what he needed, and he said, I was just asking. But for a second, my reaction had nothing to do with him and everything to do with something else that got dropped into that moment.

Cassidy calls this a rulebook. Somewhere back in childhood, we all learned what to do when things got chaotic, loud, or unsafe. Some of us learned to shut down when things got loud or chaotic. Others learned to get loud right back. Whatever kept you closest to the people raising you back then becomes the default your body reaches for now, especially when you're tired, touched out, or already stretched thin. That reaction makes sense as a default. It's your nervous system just doing the job it was built for, protecting you the only way it knew how.

The reaction still shows up in the moment either way. What changes is the shame around it, and shame was never going to be the thing that changed the pattern anyway.

The real fix is margins

Here's what stuck with me most. Cassidy's whole framework centers on protecting margins, small pockets of space before, during, and after the hard moments.

I keep thinking about how margins would have changed that moment with Ryaan. If I'd had even fifteen quiet minutes away from my phone before he ever walked in, I probably wouldn't have still been carrying that troll comment around with me. In the moment itself, a margin can be as small as one breath, just enough space between his question and my response to actually choose what I did next instead of reacting on autopilot. And afterward, it's the space to sit with what happened long enough to see it clearly, which is exactly what let me go back and repair it with him.

Most of us are so busy taking in information that we never get the space to integrate any of it. That's the part nobody talks about. Parents already know enough. What's missing is room to actually use what they know.

Repair is the real skill

Cassidy told me a story from her own house that stuck with me. She'd snapped at her son over something small, and in the middle of it he looked at her and said, you're going to be saying sorry soon. He was right. When she went back and apologized, what struck her most was what it meant for his nervous system. He already trusted that she'd come back. That trust gets built one repair at a time, and it's teaching him what to expect from people who love him.

That's the part I keep coming back to. Our kids already know we're going to lose it sometimes. What matters is what happens next, whether we come back, own it, and show them how repair works. That's the whole game, long after the tantrums and the sibling fights are behind us.

Being a home base is what actually sticks with them.

If you've ever felt that gap between what you know and what you do in the moment, this conversation will meet you there. Cassidy walks through what's happening in your body, why insight alone isn't enough, and what margins actually look like for a parent who feels like they have zero extra time.

Listen to my full conversation with Dr. Cassidy Freitas wherever you get your podcasts.

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