When Anger Is a Language: Listening to What a Child Cannot Say

A clinician’s reflection

Trigger warning: This blog discusses child sexual abuse in a non-graphic, professional context. All identifying details have been changed to protect confidentiality.

Some children walk into the therapy room carrying far more than anger or defiance. They carry experiences they do not yet have words for.

This child was one of them.

She came to me with significant anger and behavioural concerns like frequent outbursts, impulsivity, and difficulty regulating emotions. In most spaces, people had labelled her a “difficult child.” On paper, the problem looked behavioural. In the therapy room, I experienced her anger as purposeful, it was less oppositional, but more protective.

As therapists, we listen not only to what children say, but to how they act. In moments when words feel unsafe or unavailable, language is expressed through behaviour.

The Moment That Shifted the Work

During a session, I offered her a doll, an ordinary therapeutic tool.

What followed was anything but ordinary.

She tore into the doll with intensity, repeatedly focusing on its genital area. She did not engage in casual or exploratory play. She acted with deliberateness, emotional charge, and specificity.

In that moment, I chose not to interpret. I responded with containment rather than questions, and with attunement instead of confrontation.

For children, play often gives the psyche its first voice.

Opening a Door Without Forcing It

A scene from the Bollywood film Kahaani 2 came to mind, where truth emerges through shared vulnerability rather than interrogation. I drew from that approach and spoke about myself.

I told her that I do not like it when people touch my private parts. She immediately agreed and said she didn’t like it either. I gently added that I knew this because I had experienced something similar.

She looked at me and asked, “How do you know?”

That question opened the door.

Soon after, she disclosed that one of her uncles had been sexually abusing her at home.

Understanding the Anger Differently

Protection, rather than pathology, characterised her anger. Her behaviour didn’t defy; it revealed an internal world shaped by repeated boundary violations. When harm comes from someone a child is expected to trust, anger often redirects itself toward safer targets: teachers, peers, or the self.

What others had labelled as misbehaviour was a child trying to survive an unsafe environment.

After Disclosure: The Weight of Responsibility

Disclosure does not mark a therapeutic triumph. It places a profound responsibility on the clinician.

From that moment, I shifted my focus to ensuring the child’s emotional and physical safety. I followed ethical and legal protocols and continued therapy through a trauma-informed lens that prioritised care over re-exposure. I also sought supervision and professional support, recognising the emotional weight these disclosures place on clinicians.

Reflections for Practice

This case left me with enduring reminders:

• Anger in children often carries grief, fear, or violation without language

• Children show the truth through play before they can speak it.

• Intuition matters, but ethics must hold it steady

• Children disclose when they feel safe, rather than in response to specific questions.

  
  

Most importantly, I learned that our role is not to fix “difficult” children. Our role is to listen deeply enough to hear what their behaviour is trying to protect.

If this reflection encourages even one professional to pause before applying that label, then this story has done its work.

About the Author:

Niyati Basrur is a Clinical Psychologist with experience working with children, adolescents, and families across emotional, behavioural, and trauma-related concerns. Her work is grounded in trauma-informed and developmentally sensitive approaches, with a strong emphasis on understanding behaviour as communication. In addition to clinical practice, she is actively involved in psychoeducation, writing, and training initiatives aimed at mental health professionals, parents, and educators. Her areas of interest include child and adolescent mental health, attachment, abuse and trauma, and ethical clinical practice.