Anger

I’ve been having a real problem containing my anger lately. I get angry about everything. Big things, little things. And I mean, I get into a huge rage. I just work myself into a thinky hole about “oh I should’ve said this and then punched them and then made them cry and then oh my god remember that time in 10th grade Algebra when the teacher said this and I should’ve cut her down like wa-cha.” That’s usually my cue for knowing when my anger has surpassed reasonable levels and is turning into something like a bad coding error that loops and loops a rotten script. I’m not quite insightful and together enough to notice that if I am pissed unto death because somebody interrupted me while typing, that means something is tweaking wrong; but I am insightful and experienced enough by now to realize that if it’s an hour or two later and all I’ve been thinking about in the interim is every wrong that’s ever been done by me, something is off.

And I can guess what it is. I mean, that’s the easy part. Why am I angry? Because I’ve had a really shitty year, during which I had to (I felt) suppress a lot of that anger in order to survive. And that really shitty year led to having to move in to a new apartment very quickly, which meant I didn’t notice all the things that were terribly wrong with the apartment. And now I’m angry because my apartment is shitty and my landlord is shitty and after a long year of horribleness, my reward was getting duped and taken advantage of. That’s why I’m angry.

I try not to let this bleed over into the people around me too much. If I demand that others respect my boundaries, I have to show the same respect to others, which means NOT pouring my anger onto them and across their boundaries without their consent. But regardless of the fact that I’ve managed to miraculously restrain myself from throttling a co-worker for looking over my shoulder at my computer or snapping at my bear for walking behind me when I didn’t expect it, I’ve gotta be sending off a bad vibe. And that’s a boundary crossing, too. Sure, sure, other people make the choice to respond to my bad vibe by maybe tiptoeing around me, and that’s their choice. But it’s a lot more difficult to respond to passive and hidden signals than it would be to respond to me saying outright, “I AM IN A BAD MOOD PLEASE GET AWAY FROM MY DESK.” It’s really crazymaking and disingenuous to send off vibes, because it forces others to respond without forcing you to admit that you’re doing something they feel a need to respond to. Anyway. It’s complicated, but it’s bad, is what I’m saying, and it’s not fair for me to do.

So, I have to work on this anger. Which is hard to do, for all sorts of reasons that shall be summarized briefly as :I have been raised to behave as a woman, and I have been abused frequently. But it’s also hard because of the totally irrational whammo anger puts on your brain. It’s a one-two punch; anger comes roaring up, telling you “YOU NEED TO TAKE CARE OF SOME SHIT LIKE RIGHT NOW BECAUSE IT’S IMPORTANT AND EGREGIOUS AND ALL THAT MATTERS IN THE WHOLE WHOLE WORLD”, and at the same time, anger shuts down all the parts of your brain that are like, “Let’s think calmly and carefully about this so we don’t do something stupid.” Actually, anger shuts down a lot more than that. It shuts down just about every single sensory input that isn’t directly related to maintaining your anger.  Anything that could possibly calm you down is stupid and obviously won’t work or solve the problem. Any memory or belief or idea that possibly indicates that your anger is irrational or short-lived is shunted out in favor of TOTAL HULKNESS FOREVER AND EVER. It’s a lot like depression.

Which made me start thinking. Part of my problem with anger is my inability to really define what it is and what it’s about. I often feel like it’s not an emotion on its own, but a mask for some other emotion that is much more vulnerable and much more frightening. So dealing with anger, coping with anger, letting anger go, has never really worked for me, because I know my anger isn’t the problem. It’s whatever my anger is hiding. I can try to cope with and work out and let go of my anger, but I don’t find those things actually work to diminish my anger. What they do, if I happen to be paying attention (hint: I never am), is show for me exactly what I’m hiding. If I assume my anger is operating to hide something else in my psyche, then I can pretty carefully follow the things my anger distorts in my brain to find what that hidden thing is.

For example:

Problem: The photo shop sold me a frame that I think is broken. ANGER

Possible solution: Inform them of the error, request a refund.

Why That Will Never Ever Work: If the photo shop is shitty enough to sell me a broken frame, they will be shitty enough to refuse me a refund, and they will probably be assholes about it. And then I’ll look like an idiot and won’t be able to do anything about it, and I’ll have wasted my money and time and been humiliated in public. I will break the photo frame in anger and then spend a day ruminating on why the universe is out to get me.

Why That Is Nonsensical: Shit gets broke on accident. The photo shop never gave me guff before. Businesses want to retain customers. If I am polite I am sure they will be polite, because it has never happened otherwise.

Why Did My Anger Refuse to Let Me See That?: Because it would open me up to the possibility of being told I have no recourse when i have been wronged, and I am very afraid of that happening, in any degree, in any way, and I suspect that I cannot handle that.

So, that’s what my anger is about. I am incredibly afraid. I am afraid of being hurt, I am afraid of being taken advantage of, I am afraid of being backed into a corner with no way out. These are all things that happened in the last year, and inevitably, I’m overly sensitive to them right now. But I think the last year also taught me that this is a soft spot for me, and my anger is drastically overcompensating. “Nobody will take advantage of me EVER AGAIN, because I will tear out their throat with my teeth,” my anger says, to hide the fact that I feel very certain somebody will try again someday and I feel very uncertain that I will be able to stop them.

This is a very reactive and passive way to think. Things will happen, I will have to stop them or take them. Things will happen to me. Not, “I will do things.” Things will happen.

All this made me think of the first of the Twelve Steps. “We admitted we were powerless over (enter your addiction here), that our lives had become unmanageable.” And that’s really what I’ve been fighting against. I feel so powerless over all the things that have been happening to me, and I don’t want to be powerless. I want to fix them. I want to change them. I want to destroy them. I want to turn back time and have it not happen. I want to have said the right words to restore my ego and destroy somebody else’s. I want to do the exact opposite. And my anger stems from that dysfunctional conflict; I am powerless over events in the outside world, but I refuse to believe that. I keep believing I can control the things outside my own body and mind, and keep being disappointed. That’s not the fault of the people I can’t control; that’s the fault of my crazy expectation that I can control them.

I started re-reading one of my Al-Anon books to try and seek some peace and quiet. Started taking some Higher Power stuff seriously, which is weird and difficult for me, because I am not religious, and I am not spiritual, and I have, in the past, scoffed on both things. I read a story in my Al-Anon book where a woman described the same problem. She said her sponsor told her to write down all the things she would want a Higher Power to have, if a Higher Power existed. She did, and showed him the list. He said, “There you go. There’s your Higher Power. It doesn’t need to be any more complicated than that.” I thought about that some, and realized that part of my problem with spirituality is the idea of seeking outside of oneself. I believe I have the ability to provide myself with everything I need. I just often don’t, because I refuse to trust myself, and I refuse to respect myself as having that ability.

So I’ve begun to think of my Higher Power as myself. Not me as I am now, but the me that shines through sometimes when I’m really in my groove. The me that can do all the dance steps right. The me that says the right words at the right time. The me that knows exactly what to do, when to do it, and how to make it flow. It’s the me that sits on a little lotus flower, at peace, content. And the me that sits on a little lotus flower really doesn’t get the me that wants to punch old ladies who make typos.

I find it easier to pray to a Higher Power that is something I can reach, something I can aspire to be, and something that I have sometimes felt. I know some people feel God. I don’t. But I feel the me that clicks, sometimes, when all the stars align just right. So I pray to my Higher Power now. I get angry, and then I grit my teeth, and I say, “Thank you for giving me patience. Thank you for giving me understanding. Thank you for giving me compassion. Thank you for giving me comfort.” And I imagine the me that can do all those things, and I know that version of me wants those things, and wants to give those things to others, even to the not-so-lotus-y version of me. It helps. The me on a little lotus flower doesn’t want to make my ex-roommates cry. The me on a little lotus flower understands that they do that pretty goddamn well themselves, and don’t need or want any help.

I read another story that I’ve been trying to keep in mind when I get crazy angry about all the unfair things. The story was about a woman whose husband no longer drank, but was still what they call a “dry drunk” — still exhibiting all the symptoms of alcoholism, just no longer drunk while doing it. And she began to exhibit the symptoms of a dry drunk’s wife, still trying to control him, make him behave the way she wanted, believing it was his behavior that caused their unhappiness, and if she could change it, everything would be better.

She decided that things would be better if he took more responsibility for household chores, so informed him that he would now be doing the dishes from now on (this is called: setting yourself up for disappointment). The first night he was supposed to do the dishes, he just got up and left the house after dinner. She called an Al-Anon friend in a rage, explained the situation. “And so now if I do the dishes, he’ll think he doesn’t have to!” she said. “So don’t do the dishes,” her friend said. “But then the dishes won’t be done!” “So do the dishes,” her friend said. “But then he won’t!” “So don’t do the dishes.” “But they have to get done!” “So do them!”

Eventually she realized that these were truly her only two options. Should they be the only two options? Were they fair options? Those questions don’t really matter, because they don’t change the fact that those are the only two options. The third option, “Fix my husband,” doesn’t actually exist, but putting all your energy into it provides a great distraction from reality, and a great scapegoat for your problems. “If only he would do the dishes,” instead of, “If only I would stop trying to force him to change in order to fix my unhappiness.”

I think about that story a lot, whenever I get into a rage. I try to simplify my options. My co-worker, for example. Goddamn, I hate her. I hate that she asks me questions. I hate that she does her job wrong. I hate that I have to clean up after her… hey, wait a second. I don’t have to clean up after her. But if I don’t, then the work won’t get done! Then clean up after her. But if I do clean up after her, then she just keeps getting away with it. Then don’t clean up after her.

Or my ex-roommates. I hate that they fucked up this last year of my life. I want them to know how fucked up they are. I want to hurt them as much as they hurt me (conveniently ignoring that I probably have). But I don’t want to take responsibility for the fact that I expected things out of them I knew they couldn’t deliver. And I kept expecting those things, and kept getting disappointed. And each successive disappointment, each successive wound, each successive day in Hell, was a direct result of my choice to refuse to change my expectations, and my choice to continue living with them. They were not responsible for keeping me there. I was. But I had to stay because we didn’t want to dick them on rent! Then stay. But they drive me fucking crazy! Then leave. But I can’t leave because we don’t know if the bear’s job is moving to another city. Then stay. But I don’t want to stay in a house where these people drive me nuts. Then leave.

And rather than take my two options, review them, and choose one to dedicate myself to for that day, that moment, I kept working the third option. “Change them until they stop doing things to me that I hate.” It never worked, but my choice to keep expecting it should work, that I deserved to have it work, that it was only right that it work, kept disappointing and hurting me. Until now I am a vulnerable mass of fear and hatred and anger. That fear and hatred and anger is a direct result of my choice. Sure, they’re crazy bugfucks, but it was my choice to expose myself to that bugfuckery, and every day wake up expecting that it wouldn’t be as bugfuckery, and every day get a little more bugfucked. I got something out of that, something unhealthy, but something fulfilling that kept me in their house. I wouldn’t stay in a place where my needs weren’t being met. And I have learned that I still have a need to be completely and obviously right. I can be right because I have a lot of confidence in myself, or I can be right because I’m comparing myself to some witless bugfucks, and obviously I’m right next to them and the terrible abuses they perpetrate on me. Both ways fulfill my need to be right, but only one fulfills my need to be healthy and happy. And I chose the other, because I do not respect the little me on a lotus flower’s plan for my life. I do not respect my need to be healthy and happy as overriding and necessary. And I would like to learn how to respect myself more.