PurpleWilder

As I am starting to get my head out of my a$$ about a lot of things I find myself getting very, very, VERY angry about a lot of things. Anger at my XAH (which I have already been advised to scream about in the nearest wooded area); anger at myself (for allowing said person to exploit me and for letting my kids see that about me), anger at my FOO, anger at other drivers, the state of my apartment....

It is like someone took the lid off a can titled "Pissed Off". I understand anger can be a healthy process. Sometimes you need to be angry to get past things. I don't wanna hate my XAH; I want to be indifferent. I don't wanna feel much of anything about him at all but not because I am numb or avoiding things but because I'm Just. Over. It.

So I guess what I am asking here is how to make anger a positive thing and not let it veer off into something self-destructive or harmful to my kids and the rest of my life. How to channel it? Keep it within boundaries? Not let it choke out everything else?

Thanks.

amy55

Anger !!!!!!!!!!!! I had that also. Not when I first left, I think I still had the hopes and dreams, but once I was out of it for awhile, the anger came.

The anger came on fast and hard. I would picture myself stabbing him, he of course never died, because I wanted to do it again and again and again. Not recommended. I was seeing a psychiatrist at the time, and he told me it was perfectly normal though, (LOL).

I needed to get past all of that anger, because it was killing me. I had to forgive him, so that I could forgive me for staying around and taking all of that. I will no longer take the poison.

So anger, good or bad. I think you need it for a short period of time. I think when used correctly, it allows you to open your eyes, and go into "acceptance". Then you can begin to let things go, but you also learn that you will no longer allow that kind of behavior towards yourself, because you deserve so much better.

lillamy

I could have written that post. I spent 20 years not expressing my emotions but keeping them under that lid. And golly gee when the lid flew off, boy was I angry!

I don't know what changed. I guess just letting the anger out helped. I was never angry at myself -- I think that would have been healthier -- just disappointed and filled with self-hatred. It has taken me four years to (almost) accept that I did the best I could with what I knew at the time and forgive myself for it.

But every time things pop up with the kids that reflect their childhood with an abusive alcoholic father, I'm right back in self-hatred for putting them through it again.

I'm hoping with time, and with them growing, and me growing and recovering, it will get better.

ladyscribbler

I've found that most, if not all of my inappropriately displaced anger was the anger at myself. Since I've been learning to forgive myself and cut myself some slack, those eruptions are few and far between, and I am usually able to catch them before I go all Mt. Vesuvius on some innocent bystander. Actually Carlotta's C2C reading for today touches on that topic- being gentle with yourself.
As for channeling, exercise works best for me. But a good purging of my household junk also helps. Something very cathartic about dumping a few bags of my old junk off at the Goodwill.

mdkathy62

Hi PurpleDurple,

Thank you for sharing. For me, after the breakup, I was on a mission to show him, to show everyone who saw my decline, and to show myself that I could turn my life around. I wasn't in a terrible place. I had a job, had an apartment and such, but was emotionally a wreck. They'd all seen me act completely crazy, cry my eyes out till they couldn't open, and lose all sense of who I was.

The anger initially started out to prove him and others wrong. I started working out. That for me was a positive way to channel my anger. The more I did it, however, the notion of proving people wrong disappeared. I didn't want to just look good to show him what he lost, but I started to enjoy how I felt when I worked out, how confident it made me feel, how eating healthier didn't make me drag my feet half as much, and I began to love myself.

I'm not saying it started off as an innocent way to channel anger. I was insecure and wanted to prove something. I found in time that I didn't care what anyone thought and the less I cared, the more people took notice. All this rambling is me saying: get lost in something you are really passionate about. Anger can turn into passion. Take care.

azbluesgal

I am old fart. sorry. I suffered from PSTD since 1960 (suicide of favorite sibling), grew up not knowing i had ADD/ASP, struggled all my life with self esteem. addicted to food in teens, alcohol big time in my 20's - and always had an explosive temper. Like really embarrassing crazy at times. Took cover for a while as nurse "Rachet" with all the other psycho nurses. Did not realize until I was 45 that my condition actually had a NAME and DSM. Big relief - but still angry as in "self centered alcoholic life is not fair mode". did my duty and took care of my mom for 25 years (best gig I ever had) after dad died in '83. Childless Orphan but not penniless - still angry? Well quitting alcohol for over 3 months helps, and losing 25 lbs..getting better... after taking up some Buddhist Study. Read Thich Nhat Hahn - ANGER - Wisdom for Cooling the Flames. After 50 years of being P.O'dat myself and the rest of the world my rageaholic has finally left me. It's worth a try. It's just hard to explain. namaste. zig

FireSprite

I found that anger got easier the more I worked it through. Like Ladyscribbler, a lot of my anger was at myself & qualifiers from my past in addition to RAH so it had a lot of layers that I needed to drill through.

By work I mean scream therapy, heaving rocks into lakes, boxing & any kind of exercise that mimicked throwing punches & kicks, etc. When I exhausted the anger, my thought processes were affected...... often I would have emotional AHA moments in the middle of whatever activity I was using to combat anger & those were/are always my biggest clues as to what the "real" problems are at the root of the anger. So I guess in a way anger also helped me to focus on myself in a different way than things like journaling, etc. which are more passive.

queenapple

I run. I'm old (63) still 10 pounds overweight after losing a bunch, and slower than molasses, but it helps me pound out my anger at everybody and everything--including myself.

NYCDoglvr

Taking anger out on others is no better than an alcoholic spewing vitriol over everyone he/she encounters. Pounding pillows helped me but not as much as going to Alanon and working it out there. It also helped to see my part in the disaster that was a relationship. Hey, I picked him, I stayed too long. Not to create guilt but taking responsibility for my own character defects really diffuses anger.

LifeRecovery

Purple-

I am in it right now also so I don't have any answers about working through it.

I have actually had to put down the good/bad black/white view of it and look at is as something I am gonig through. I tend to get stuck on it because I don't want to look/see so I stuff it away.

I have had a lot of support on that journey, support that anger is normal, encouragement to stay with it, help about how to express it that is not creating negative responses for anyone else.

I have had body work on it. Meditation work, energy work. It is all helping, but the biggest help has been that it is when I don't go through it that I act out towards others that has helped me stay with it the most.....for as long as I need to.

jacrazz

Me too!! I never knew how to express my anger, among other feelings... I'm reading a little book titled "Anger; Facing the fire within". I saw it at CVS while waiting for my Rx.. It talks about anger as a good thing and a bad thing. I have enjoyed it thus far.

PurpleWilder

I do the exercise thing by fast-walking 2.5 miles in the park every other day. But it seems to be a little too.....meditative? I need something a little more expressive - something that falls between walking and oh....say....learning hand-to-hand combat skills. Running is a no go because of a bad knee. Maybe light martial arts?

I did do the household purging thing this morning at about 3 AM. I am used to working overnights so on the nights when I am actually home, I am up at weird hours. Anyway, I tend to be a "pile it up" person - mounds of books, piles of paper, hills of laundry. So first I started on the books and came up with 4 boxes to trade/donate. then I went around the living room and picked up the small piles of debris (rubber bands, crumbs, socks, etc) that tend to accumulate in the corners.

OK, great but still mad.

Got kids up, showers, dressing, breakfast, buses and drop-offs. Still pissed. So then I started on the mountain of personal, financial and legal-type papers 2 inches deep under my desk. Floor now clean and garbage can is full.

Still mad.

Then a 2.5 mile walk in the park. Still mad about stuff and flipping off the world every time I start thinking about the XAH and the past. Walking harder and wearing out, feeling better.

Pick up DD from school and she tells me how much XAH's new GF wants to come to graduation. Sorry - only 4 tickets and the last one went to your grandma. She then tells me how much in common the new GF and I have and how she wants to meet me.

Yeah, have her sit by me - we'll have lots to talk about!

Now I'm both angry and hurting. Call my sister and talk it out.

Then I grab my notebook and markers and start making my own eecards type sketches. Now I am starting to make some progress. I made some real zingers but they are really, really raw and to the point (read: if you said some of them out loud, you would probably get punched). But that felt really good.

I don't know when I will get past this stage. I will keep attending CODA. I will finally work the steps. I will keep walking. Keep drawing. Keep crying. Keep going.

I want my life back.