Why is it that our children, the people we love the most in the world, can trigger us so easily?

We all have hot buttons—situations or events or even words our kids say to which we react strongly, or even overreact. One second, we feel calm and at peace. The next, we are flooded with emotions and spinning out of control.

Often, we feel ourselves behaving in a way that is irrational. The triggers might even seem absurd. We cannot pinpoint exactly why we feel so angry over seemingly trivial things that our children do or say, but nonetheless, our emotions are hot.

Other times, our triggers feel justified. We can support and justify our anger with example after example. Nonetheless, we dislike feeling so angry and out of control and would rather respond to our children calmly.

Why is this? Why can things our children say and do make us overreact? And what can we do about it?

Fortunately, when we understand why triggers occur, we can take steps to eliminate them so that we can...