I have a 10 year old boy (also 5 year old boy and 1 year old girl), and we had our most difficult year with him at age 7. He had a lot of pent up anger that would come out at home (mostly yelling at us, slamming doors, but also said "I wish I was dead"), and the issues mostly were the social issues at school. He was bullied for being different: he doesn't like sports, he has friends that are girls, and he is smart. He just hasn't always identified with kids his own age. He didn't know how to stand up for himself. Another school issue, was that he was bored. He just couldn't stand doing school/homework that he already knew ("this is stupid"). The other issue, was he was very jealous of his 2 year old brother at the time. He never physically hurt him, but he would say he hated him or he was stupid, etc (also, because he was being picked on at school, he picked on his brother). We ended up taking him to a psychologist during that summer. He helped give our son some tools to redirect his anger. It also helped us to change some of our behaviors (i.e. not reacting to his fits of anger). I don't know if these are any of your son's issues. Just to let you know, he has a fantastic teacher this year (someone who finally "gets" him) and he is starting to feel comfortable with himself. He was bullied at the beginning of the school year and for the first time he yelled at the kid "leave me alone!"He hasn't been picked on by that kid again. He has and a great year at school and at home. I remember thinking when he was 7 , if he's like this now, what are we going to do when he is a teenager! Not to say we're out of the woods yet, but he is turning into an amazing kid. One of the tools we used was a reward chart, he never cared if we took things away, and time-out never worked. He had to earn TV, computer, video games (the things that were important to him). We made things like "I had a good attitude doing my homework", "I was nice to my brother today", and easy chores like "throwing my clothes in the hamper". They were all things that he could easily accomplish each day. He had to earn a certain # of stickers to get his reward. Sometimes he could earn a reward of "a special date with mom or dad". We really try to talk with him a lot. He knows he can come to us. For a long time he would say "I don't want to tell you what's going on", But now, I think he's beginning to feel safe opening up to us. And, he hasn't really had an anger, yelling fit since last August. It all takes a lot of work, but its' so worth putting in the time now, when he's still young and you have still have some control over him. I hope some of this helped. I definitely would look into seeing a psychologist, ask your pediatrician or another parent for a good one. I think our son only saw him 6-8 visits. Summer is a nice time, because the school pressure is gone. You can e-mail me if you want any more advice. Good Luck!