Rage

[Kb3]

It happened again. My rage boiled over and I had a public temper tantrum. A f*cking gain. I have bruised or sprained my wrist and verbally abused both myself and a complete stranger. If I hadn't limited the destructiveness to mainly myself and my property, I could have been arrested.

My voice is hoarse from shouting, my shoulders are tight and painful and I am left wondering for the millionth time in three years if I am safe enough to be unleashed on the public. There seems to be no limit to the rage I hold inside myself, and one day it's going to get me into a lot of trouble. The fact that it hasn't already is a miracle.

I know what I have to do. Stop driving, make life simpler again and just try to breathe. Whatever triggered my mood leading up to what happened will pass and I will get a grip again. My therapist will come back from her three week holiday and I will keep at the business of slaying this beast inside me. I have no choice; if I don't kill it, it will kill me.

 

[Fireball]

Hi Eat0429!
Rage that you can't keep under controll is really bad. After this happened to me I asked myself whether I should be allowed to walk in the streets with "normal" people. It was really embarressing. I had to go to hospital because I got so often so angry. There I wrote down every situation that made me angry.
Questions:
1. What made me angry? What was exactly the situation?
2. What happened the whole day? Did I sleep well? Was there anything special? an so on
3. What were my thoughts like, when I was so angry?
4. What did I feel? Anger, fear?, helplessness?
5. What did my body feel like?
6. What did I do?
7. Short consequences?
8. Long consequences?
Taht really helps to find out, what really makes you angry. After a time you can understand the system!
When I did understand the system I changed the proceedure, because I knew why I got angry but couldn't change my behaviour. But I wanted to change my behaviour by behaving the opposite way.
Questions:
1. What is the situation?
2. What do I feel? How strong is the anger?
3. Is the anger appropriat to the situation?
4. Is there an old situation that makes me angry again, which refers to the situation now? Is there a persuation that makes me believe I should be angry now which does not belong to the situation now?
5. What would I like to to?
6. How can I act the opposite way? (smiling, breathe and calm down, paint a comic, write a satire, chop wood, run, ...)
7. What does it feel like now?
Those questions help me a lot when I am angry. I tried and tried and the more I try the more I succeed.
Take care of you
Fireball

 

[Kb3]

Hi Fireball, thank you so much for this great list and your empathy. I will give it all a try and hope that I can try to get a cap on this very negative behaviour.

 

[Srain]

((((((((Eat0429))))))))))

I can so relate to your fear of your rage and going into public. There have been times I have been completely out of control "out there" and my "it's you or me and believe me I'll be more than willing to go down with you!" attitude is seriously dangerous. It's red zone behaviour and something I have to keep an eye on for myself.

Example, I left the house one day, completely not paying attention to where my thoughts were when I got behind a woman who was in doing all her banking at an ATM drive through (unmanned). I sat with thoughts about things that were irritating me anyway and then noticed that she was doing this, I blew up at her, swore at her and she made the mistake of getting into it with me, it really fueled the fire within me. I went around her and parked to go to the walk-up and as I was walking up she drove up to calling me a bitch. That's about all it took to send me over the edge. I walked over to her and got straight up in her face, something I know she wasn't thinking would happen, I am small, older, and didn't look like I would do something like that. I ripped into her like I was going tear her face off, I wanted to! I could see her recoil, people started looking at us, I didn't care, I was beyond caring, everything was red! She finally gassed it and took off without saying anything. I looked around and people dipped their heads and moved along. It wasn't until I got to my tdoc's office that I realized what a nut I must have looked like but I felt totally justified at the time.

I have to look at what sets me off and where my thoughts had just been.

The black and white issues are my red zones. I tend to feel quite justified in being the honor keeper of those that step on other people, especially if I have been having thoughts about those that have been stepping on me. Letting my mind run free in a negative way is not a good idea for me. I have caught myself in rageful situations more than a few times, though I am quite good at finding a way saying it was for the "over all good". It is controllable. Grounding techniques are extremely useful with this for me.

You are really not alone in dealing with this symptom, good for you for starting to deal with it.

Rain

 

[Kb3]

Thanks so much Srain, especially for the hugs:). It's very, very kind of you to share your experiences with me - it makes me feel less alone with it.

I have always had a temper and it would sometimes come out when I would get frustrated, but NEVER like it has since I have been traumatised. I'll be honest, it terrifies me sometimes, and always, always embarrasses me.

Triggers tend to be around situations that make me feel helpless and then I lose all sense of perspective and FREAK OUT!! As hard as it is for me, I'm going to have to take some steps to get control of myself before I launch into a full blown episode because once it starts, it tends to feed on itself. Grounding techniques like you mentioned and asking myself questions like Fireball wrote about can only help. I owe it to myself and my family to try them. (((((hugs)))) back to you:).

 

[Fireball]

I wish you all the best. I think you will succeed! It's possible. And it is great if there is a family that can help you!

 

[Gamereign555]

Anger management, a form of psychotherapy is very useful. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy has been used to treat this.
Medications can also be used but its tricky, sometimes they will target whatever issues you have, like ADHD, bipolar, ect. By treating those problems sometimes the anger issues can be solved.

 

[Kb3]

Thanks game reign. I am on Seroquel which I think helps with these episodes. I am currently gradually reducing my dosage and will just have to see how my anger is managed on lower levels. I am working through my recent traumatic memories with somatic experiencing and will tackle the old stuff from growing up once I have successfully resolved my more active triggers.

It's very kind of you to make suggestions because this is the one symptom of PTSD that I think can get me into real trouble. Depression, intrusive thoughts and nightmares only affect me, whereas uncontrollable rage affects anyone who happens to be around me at the time. Not good.

 

[Sethe]

I can sympathize/empathize with Srain somewhat. I don't remember getting close enough to a person to yell (if I did, maybe I don't want to right now), but I have had some extreme road rage incidents with people who tailgated the hell out of me while we both yelled, screamed, flipped each other off, etc. Sort of comical when I look back on it now...

No close interaction though. I'm afraid that I might do something horrible and that I won't be able to control myself. I am also kind of short, mild-mannered, innocent-looking (so I've been told).

But, the rage boils up so, so quickly. One minute I'm fine and the next I'm raising Cain.

It's all encompassing. I can feel it in my body and I have to restrain myself from actually smashing another driver with my car.

I try very hard to keep my rage at home when nobody's here mainly due to the shame I feel about it (brainwashed to think I was my father who raged uncontrollably).

It's hard to do sometimes.

I try to be mindful of it. I know that it's a hodge podge of irrational emotions that flood me.

Maybe this is why I try to do a lot of physical labor outside. It's an outlet for me.

I am tempted to make some kind of pacifying object that I can carry with me and hold when I start to 'lose it.' Anyone else do this?

 

[Fireball]

For a longer time I had a card with sentences on it which said how you could do something for peace this say. I read one of them and then I tried to keep it in my mind for the whole day. Sometimes it worked, because the sentence was stronger. I said it in my mind to calm down. It is not an object but a very strong imagination. Perhaps this can help you?

 

[Gamereign555]

I see anger boiling up in me at times.. At first all I needed to do was to be aware of it and for a long time it went away after telling myself that I didn't want to be that way, especially around Amanda.
But sometimes I feel it coming back, and its a bit hard to keep out of my head.

 

[Venator]

Ahh yes, I too can relate to such terrible rage bubbling beneath the surface. Rarely do I act on it, though - I tend to push it back down into me where it just eats at me from the inside instead.

I've felt the same way Srain has, to be perfectly honest - even AT an ATM where someone was going too slow, I was already gurmpy and my mind had been straying to dark places... but instead of lashing out I just kept squeezing my arm, tensing my muscles, kicking my own leg etc. I usually get a headache from this and muscle aches, and it just fuels my negative inner feelings and thoughts. This is a large percentage of the terrible cycle I want to try to end. Sometimes I think the only thing that really holds me back is my mantra of "Defend, do not attack." but I also feel like part of me wants to bait them into attacking.

Let me tell you... this is why I'm terrible in customer service. I work retail right now and I actually get a fight or flight and anger type response every time someone comes into my door... It's awful... and I feel guilty for it.