I have an anger problem

[nept551]

I need help. I have an anger problem. Most of the time I can control myself, but every now and then I feel like Hyde, like a different person. I have tried writing notes to myself. But when the emotions overtake me they're useless. Because I feel like a different person, accessing the rational part of my brain which could say, "Hey, stop!" or "Count to 10," or "Look up all the things you could do instead of exploding," seems impossible (in past experience). At those times, I haven't been able to be an objective observer and offer myself $1 million to control my temper.

 

I grew up witnessing a lot of anger and yelling in my FOO. It's the default - of how I am "assertive" in the world. Of course that doesn't work. I have recently started seeing a therapist by Skype who suggested that in those moments I see how Little Me is hurt, and how Big Me steps in with anger to protect Little Me; and how I can choose to protect everyone rather than lashing out. I have hope that this might help, and I am doing this as an exercise multiple times a day to set a new pattern.

 

My partner is losing patience and thinks he is enabling my behavior by not leaving me. I understand what he is going through. However I wish he'd cut me some more slack, see how I have improved, and give me some support instead of calling me an "asshole" and ostracizing me. 

 

I am absolutely committed to changing this behavior, but that's the rational part of me talking. The hurt Little Me and the Big Me who reacts by lashing out aren't present right now, so to speak.

 

Suggestions would be appreciated.

[D.D.]

Here's some suggestions as you requested:

 

Anger and Forgiveness by Raymond Lloyd Richmond, Ph.D., a sample of the contents can be viewed @ http://www.guidetops...ogy.com/af3.htm

 

Pod-cast http://www.fdrpodcas...august-4th-2013 @ ~2:19:23 in which he says, "The anger against your abusers is perfectly healthy. The danger of the anger is that it can draw you back into wanting to fix, rage against, act against your abusers."

[Together-Whenever-Wherever]

Sorry to hear you're having difficulty. We all experience anger, and even rage, at times. And what I've found out about myself is it doesn't help to tell myself "I shouldn't be angry." I have three options for dealing with my anger: Suppress it, thereby letting it fester until a later date; act it out, which is not necessarily a bad thing as long as I'm not abusive about it; or tell myself that there's a part of me present who is experiencing a lot of anger at the moment, and then I'd ask that part why it's angry, etc.

 

This third way has been the most effective for me. It is an act of separation, while simultaneously being curious and connected with that angry part, and it's guaranteed to deescalate the situation. If you're around other people while this is occurring, and you're comfortable enough to talk about it, I'd relay to them what your angry part has to say. If you're not comfortable enough to talk, I'd let the other person know you're feeling angry, and then excuse yourself so you can have time alone with the angry part.

 

Either way, the goal is to learn about your angry part. To bring it into your inner-world, where compassion and curiosity can foster a healthy relationship to it. In the Internal Family Systems therapy model, we call this process 'unburdening.'

 

Now that I got that out of the way ... what events cause your anger to show up?

 

Here is a link to the Internal Family Systems Center website, if you're curious 

https://www.selfleadership.org/

[henderyjem]

This is my take on anger based on personal experience, a lot of analyzing, and my own knowledge in self-knowledge and psychology:

 

Anger is an emotion, and emotions are there to tell you something. It's not random. How could it be? In the case of the emotion of anger, it is there to signal that something is "wrong" in a specific situation, or in your life in general, right?

 

Example: If there's a painting on the wall that is not hanging right, it might bother me, and I would go and correct it. Now, what if that painting falls back down on its side the moment after I correct it, and the same thing keeps happening 10 times? That is quite frustrating, right? So the frustration and anger comes from wanting to change something but being unable to, so what things do you have in your situation that you want to change, but find yourself unable to?

 

One very important thing is to realize that there are things we actually cannot change, such as people, yet we often find ourselves thinking and telling ourselves that we can. For example, a few years ago, I was in touch with a girl. She was quite horrible -- she would always be late, and we're talking hours. Half the day could go by without hearing from her after we had already decided to meet the day before, so she would practically ruin my entire day, and I was raging red with anger. I was already very invested in this person and wasn't planning on getting out at that point. Now, this behavior drove me absolutely insane, because I could not change it, yet I expected her to magically stop doing it every time. This was absolutely unbearable, and I have since cut contact with this horrible girl for good almost to years ago now. Blocking her out from my life is, to this day, the best thing I have ever done in terms of personal relationships, and I will forever be grateful towards my past self for making the decision. All the anger I felt almost every time I talked to her was gone!

 

Now, what is there in a situation in which you become angry that you would like to change? Can you think of a few instances where you were angry? Would you be willing to provide an example?

 

In my experience, I become angry when there is something really wrong that I know is going to be hard to change, and so I "explode", just like you said, instead of me being at it dealing with the problem. It sounds like there were things in your childhood that you had no control over, such as your parents, who were 10 times larger than you, being cruel to you, or doing something to your environment that was impossible for you to change, since you were a child. We tend to recreate the dysfunction we experienced if what we went through is not processed. I am immediately thinking that there might be something you are recreating in your life situation and in your relationships which is what made you angry as a child.

 

Another very crucial and important thing I spot in your text is that you don't go to the problem; you talk about the anger itself, but the anger here is obviously a product of something else, which is why I ask if you can provide examples and describe the situations in which you find yourself coming across these immense feelings. What people are involved? What are their behavior like? How do they treat you? Or maybe it is things that you do that make you angry? Maybe you feel your performance is lacking or that you're not doing things properly?

 

Also, I actually think it is a bit cruel towards yourself to give yourself "exercises" to calm down if you aren't trying to figure out what the root issue is at the same time. I don't know that which is why I said if. But for me, it would only make me angrier doing these sort of exercises without adding the self-knowledge on top of it. And like I said above: Anger is just a way your body speaks to you regarding something not being the way it should, so listening to that voice, going to the root of the anger and figuring out what is going on, will in fact calm it down, if not entirely remove it, eventually speaking. This is just what I feel when I read what you said.

 

It is hard to say something helpful without knowing the circumstances in which the anger arises. Could you talk a little bit about it?

[rsidab]

Thanks for sharing your issues, nept551. Have you read The Drama Of The Gifted Child?

[nept551]

"The anger against your abusers is perfectly healthy. The danger of the anger is that it can draw you back into wanting to fix, rage against, act against your abusers."

 

Thanks for your comments, D.D. I think I am angry at how my parents, siblings and society treated me. (Note how I say “I think I am angry...” because I still don’t feel entirely in touch with it.)  I impose my past on present, sometimes unrelated situations, and get angry with past aggressors as I project them onto innocent people in my present. This resonates with what Alice Miller writes in The Drama Of The Gifted Child, and what Stef says in podcast #530 Anger Management.

 

For me to do: express anger at people in my past using the evidence I glean from present triggers. And remember to realize how I am projecting my past onto my present.

 

 

I have three options for dealing with my anger: Suppress it, thereby letting it fester until a later date; act it out, which is not necessarily a bad thing as long as I'm not abusive about it; or tell myself that there's a part of me present who is experiencing a lot of anger at the moment, and then I'd ask that part why it's angry, etc.

 

Thanks for your comments, Together-Whenever-Wherever. Yes, I do a lot of the first two options, and little of the third in the moment. That seems to be the way forward. Because I project such an enemy image onto people, even trusted friends, it is hard to relay how the angry part is feeling, even though my partner has asked to hear it. I’ve got to find a way to slow things down so I can stop reacting unconsciously and aggressively. I’m hoping that through conscious exploration and journaling, I’ll remind myself and build a muscle memory to do so. The enemy images and lack of trust are worth exploring because they seem rooted in childhood experiences. I see myself as the tantrum thrower in this blog post, 'Tantrums & Those Who Enable Them', by the Philosophical Therapist. I’m embarrassed and ashamed, and absolutely want to stop this behavior. I notice how I’ve treated people like this throughout my life and yes, I’ve been left with the enablers. Since embracing philosophy, letting go of a belief in god as an irrational superstition and realizing my mortality, I desperately want to make good choices so that I will surround myself with good people. I only have this one life. My partner is a good man. I want to be good enough for him. I’m also seeing how my daughter has been mimicking my behavior – rudeness, temper tantrums, negativity, apologizing and claiming she won’t do it again, rinse and repeat. I am an emotional woman. I say this not as an excuse, but to name my reality. But it’s more than just emotional. I have strong emotions and I never learned to manage them, to feel them, to accept them without thinking I had to justify them. I am angry at my parents, angry at my siblings, angry at society that reinforces this manipulative matriarchy. Thanks again for listening and responding. I'm going to ponder henderyjem's response and give examples of stimulating events later.

[nept551]

Thanks for your comments, henderyjem. I have replied to specific parts of your response below.

 

In the case of the emotion of anger, it is there to signal that something is "wrong" in a specific situation, or in your life in general, right?

 

I would say that I am reacting to trauma in my past, dumping it on my current situation.

 

 

what things do you have in your situation that you want to change, but find yourself unable to?

 

I want to heal my childhood wounds so that I stop projecting the aggression of my parents etc. onto my loved ones.

 

 

there are things we actually cannot change

 

I tend to react differently to these things, and instances of genuine aggression, for example, I might feel despondent before I feel empowered, but if I do feel anger, it feels healthy and in control. When I am having the tantrums or expressions of anger that afterwards seemed irrational or aggressive, I feel like a different person.

 

Here is an example:

My friend often asks me for tech help  of the quick 1min. type. I help him pretty much immediately. I ask him for some help which could take him about 5min. but I don’t communicate expectations clearly and it sounds like 15min. help. He says he’s busy. Next time I see him, I explode. I push him away. I tell him how mad I am at him when I help him so often. Later, I realize (as he has pointed out) that he didn’t say no, he just said he was busy then, and there was a big differential between what I was asking of him compared to what he has asked of me. At the time I had had an alcoholic drink. It probably lowered my inhibition. I jump to conclusions quickly. I’m angry at the person for not giving me the support I think I deserve. I don’t remember the physical sensations too well but I think heavy explosiveness in my chest, feeling disconnected. I was hurt, scared and disappointed. I felt angry that I couldn’t trust him. In a voluntary relationship, he is under no obligation to help me. A side note: he has probably helped me more than any of my friends, so all of this is especially irrational. And yet I think he should, that for some reason he owes me. Trust is a big issue for me. I often think people are trying to pull one over on me, that they can’t be trusted to pull their weight or reciprocate what I give them.

I don’t always respond aggressively. I might be emotionally dishonest – instead of telling my feelings of insecurity or disappointment, I might be passive-aggressive or indirect. I also find it hard to hear feedback. I would like to welcome the feedback as a perspective that helps me grow. But instead I get disappointed that I am not perfect and hear it as a withdrawal of love. The people involved are usually intimate men, which indicates that this could be about my father. Their behavior is usually fine and blameless, just a lack of thorough understanding that could have been cleared up if I’d stayed calm. My father was emotionally distant when I was growing up, though he was very angry and yelled a lot. I got close to him in later life and he apologized. He died a few years ago, though I wasn’t very close to him then. He had an ACE score of 10.

This seems to be more than just about me having an anger problem. I seem to have trouble managing my emotions, probably because expressing them was punished when I was young.

[Rventurelli]

Thanks for your comments, henderyjem. I have replied to specific parts of your response below.

 

 

I would say that I am reacting to trauma in my past, dumping it on my current situation.

 

 

 

I want to heal my childhood wounds so that I stop projecting the aggression of my parents etc. onto my loved ones.

 

 

 

I tend to react differently to these things, and instances of genuine aggression, for example, I might feel despondent before I feel empowered, but if I do feel anger, it feels healthy and in control. When I am having the tantrums or expressions of anger that afterwards seemed irrational or aggressive, I feel like a different person.

 

Here is an example:

 

My friend often asks me for tech help  of the quick 1min. type. I help him pretty much immediately. I ask him for some help which could take him about 5min. but I don’t communicate expectations clearly and it sounds like 15min. help. He says he’s busy. Next time I see him, I explode. I push him away. I tell him how mad I am at him when I help him so often. Later, I realize (as he has pointed out) that he didn’t say no, he just said he was busy then, and there was a big differential between what I was asking of him compared to what he has asked of me. At the time I had had an alcoholic drink. It probably lowered my inhibition. I jump to conclusions quickly. I’m angry at the person for not giving me the support I think I deserve. I don’t remember the physical sensations too well but I think heavy explosiveness in my chest, feeling disconnected. I was hurt, scared and disappointed. I felt angry that I couldn’t trust him. In a voluntary relationship, he is under no obligation to help me. A side note: he has probably helped me more than any of my friends, so all of this is especially irrational. And yet I think he should, that for some reason he owes me. Trust is a big issue for me. I often think people are trying to pull one over on me, that they can’t be trusted to pull their weight or reciprocate what I give them.

 

I don’t always respond aggressively. I might be emotionally dishonest – instead of telling my feelings of insecurity or disappointment, I might be passive-aggressive or indirect. I also find it hard to hear feedback. I would like to welcome the feedback as a perspective that helps me grow. But instead I get disappointed that I am not perfect and hear it as a withdrawal of love. The people involved are usually intimate men, which indicates that this could be about my father. Their behavior is usually fine and blameless, just a lack of thorough understanding that could have been cleared up if I’d stayed calm. My father was emotionally distant when I was growing up, though he was very angry and yelled a lot. I got close to him in later life and he apologized. He died a few years ago, though I wasn’t very close to him then. He had an ACE score of 10.

 

This seems to be more than just about me having an anger problem. I seem to have trouble managing my emotions, probably because expressing them was punished when I was young.

You have to be really careful about the way you act because that creates a vicious cycle -- if you act in a very aggressive way or use passive-aggressive methods to people for long enough, they slowly drift away from you, in the sense they start being afraid to ask you anything or appreciate your company. Their honesty and patience fades away. They become kind of "zombies", in the sense that they are just "there" but their facial expression and actions show that they really do not wish to be there but are due to circumstances or a respect they had for you in the past that has long gone away.

 

From personal experience, my ex-wife was ten years older than me and had been living alone for a decade. When we married, I had never lived alone before (I was 20, she was 30). Naturally, there were many things around the house that I did not know how to do, especially because I came from a upper middle-class household with maids and so on and so forth. Every single time I would ask her how to do anything, like for example, if there was any specific product she used to clean the cats' pee out of the carpet, she would yell, sometimes screaming "You useless, piece of sh**! You don't know how to clean cat piss?". Thing is, I was asking if because it is a carpet, if there was a need to use any specific cleaning products to remove the smell, however, in her cat lady head, everyone is born knowing all of those cat related things. Perhaps she thought that by acting like that it would encourage me to try to figure out things on my own, however, the effect was the opposite. I would in fact learn things and do it by myself when it was my interest to do so, however, any time that it was something non-essential or related to her, I would simply not talk to her at all and leave things be. It reached a point where we would not look into each other's faces anymore or speak to each other.

 

My theory is the reasoning she did it (and look inside yourself, it might be the same for you), was because of very low self-esteem. Getting angry and humiliating people was a way for her to feel better about herself -- I have never heard her telling good things about anyone, like saying someone is hard-working, honest, kind... No, they were always garbage, abusive, violent, lazy... Whatever. One particular case she humiliated someone for the sole reason of doing it and tried to brag about that to me got stuck on my head was this: she has a non-profit and in the non-profit page an older lady (65+) was saying that the site had a problem because she was not able to connect to it. The old lady had written the link wrong, literally, she forgot to write one letter. My ex-wife responded in the non-profit page: "Batimore? Seriously? Are you retarded? It is Baltimore!". Of course there was no justification to act like this, the poor woman probably was without her glasses or simply is not good at typing. But see? It gave my ex-wife the pleasure of knowing that she is at least better at something than someone else!

 

So... Do you have self-esteem issues? Do you notice a trend of you bad mouthing people on a regular base? I would watch out for those.

[Together-Whenever-Wherever]

Thanks for your comments, D.D. I think I am angry at how my parents, siblings and society treated me. (Note how I say “I think I am angry...” because I still don’t feel entirely in touch with it.)  I impose my past on present, sometimes unrelated situations, and get angry with past aggressors as I project them onto innocent people in my present. This resonates with what Alice Miller writes in The Drama Of The Gifted Child, and what Stef says in podcast #530 Anger Management.

 

For me to do: express anger at people in my past using the evidence I glean from present triggers. And remember to realize how I am projecting my past onto my present.

 

 

 

Thanks for your comments, Together-Whenever-Wherever. Yes, I do a lot of the first two options, and little of the third in the moment. That seems to be the way forward. Because I project such an enemy image onto people, even trusted friends, it is hard to relay how the angry part is feeling, even though my partner has asked to hear it. I’ve got to find a way to slow things down so I can stop reacting unconsciously and aggressively. I’m hoping that through conscious exploration and journaling, I’ll remind myself and build a muscle memory to do so. The enemy images and lack of trust are worth exploring because they seem rooted in childhood experiences. I see myself as the tantrum thrower in this blog post, 'Tantrums & Those Who Enable Them', by the Philosophical Therapist. I’m embarrassed and ashamed, and absolutely want to stop this behavior. I notice how I’ve treated people like this throughout my life and yes, I’ve been left with the enablers. Since embracing philosophy, letting go of a belief in god as an irrational superstition and realizing my mortality, I desperately want to make good choices so that I will surround myself with good people. I only have this one life. My partner is a good man. I want to be good enough for him. I’m also seeing how my daughter has been mimicking my behavior – rudeness, temper tantrums, negativity, apologizing and claiming she won’t do it again, rinse and repeat. I am an emotional woman. I say this not as an excuse, but to name my reality. But it’s more than just emotional. I have strong emotions and I never learned to manage them, to feel them, to accept them without thinking I had to justify them. I am angry at my parents, angry at my siblings, angry at society that reinforces this manipulative matriarchy. Thanks again for listening and responding. I'm going to ponder henderyjem's response and give examples of stimulating events later.

Thank you for expressing yourself so openly, nept. I can definitely relate to the image of the enemy. One such enemy of mine is the enemy that wants to get a rise out of me for the petty satisfaction of being in control of me. My parents not only used this to raise me, but would also do it for no other reasons than boredom and maliciousness. When my dad would get bored he would purposely annoy me until I got upset, and then he'd feign surprise and say "What? What? What?" in a taunting tone, like a child. My mom would bear hug me when she knew I didn't want to be touched, and when I squirmed and fought she would laugh at me. They are weird, crazy-making people, everything was a big joke to them, except their children was always the butt of it. They left a looming shadow in how I perceive threats in the world. I hear the echos of their mocking laughter down in the deep well of isolation and humiliation. And even to this day, when I perceive (mistakenly or correctly) that people are acting similarly, I feel as if I'm being shoved backwards, back, back, back to that time. I can see red quite quickly. 

 

What do your enemies look like?

[_LiveFree_]

Dealing with anger is like dealing with a flood. If you start working on defending against aggressively rising water as it happens you'll drown. You have to make preparations and have a plan for when it floods beforehand. Or you can use the analogy of a hurricane. People board up their homes and business days before the storm hits. It's impossible and incredibly dangerous to do it while the storm is there. 

 

The anger is there to protect the wounded child. You know this. Want to deal with the anger? Speak to the wounded child, and speak to him often.  Not sometimes when it's "self-knowledge time". But all the time. "You" go about your life understanding grown up things. The child does not. 

 

I rescued a feral cat once. She had lived in the wild for the first 8 months of her life. When i found her she had wounds on her and would not let me touch her at all. It took 2 months of sitting outside with her, throwing food bits at her, talking to her about anything for her to start to creep closer to me. Now I did have to trick her to catch her, but that's because she's a cat. No tricking the wounded child. Anyway, for the next four weeks when I wasn't at work I sat with her on the floor, playing with her, talking to her. Eventually, she began to trust me and would sleep on my bed. She would let me pet her and scratch her ears. And then she would want to sleep on my chest. It was a very slow progression and took an enormous amount of patience. 

 

 

See, these are things you should have received growing up in order to form an indestructible bond with your parents. As a baby you keep them up all night crying, you poop and pee all over them, you're always hungry. You completely change their lives and demand most of their time. They are supposed to love you anyway. And when you grow up, you do more stupid stuff, which they are supposed to take in stride and use to teach you better. Always dealing in good faith, trust, and gentleness. They maliciously and repeatedly violated that bond. Now it's up to you to do what they should have done. 

 

Face it bro, you're a parent to an abused child. You have a #1 priority right now. Regardless of what you choose, you will always have this part with you. So however you treat it --with fear, impatience, rage, or with love, tenderness, patience and understanding-- it will grow in that direction. 

 

Talk to that part, ask it questions. Be gentle and patient. Everything you're looking for will come out of this relationship.