emotion pot

ACoAs & Anger (Part 1)

dmtorbi 12-step, ACoAs, al-anon, Alcoholics Anonymous, alcoholism, mental health, Psychotherapy, recovery, self growth, self-help , , , , , ,

walled up angerI WALLED UP MY ANGER –  now I’m afraid to open it up

PREVIOUS:
Anger Triggers (#3)

SITEs: “8 reasons why we’re afraid of anger” (scroll down)

ACoAs: For those of us who grew up with physical or sexual abuse, &/ or others kinds of verbal & emotional cruelty – snide remarks, making fun of, insulting, dismissing…. most of us will do anything to not be like ‘them’.
Even as kids we figured that if we could just be a good enough “good-girl or boy” we could tame the troll (us), to get the love & safety every kid craves. But no matter how hard we tried, we never succeeded in assuaging the beast (them), never feeling truly safe.

CHART  –  a shorthand way to look at the range of possibilities – from the most frightening (chaotic) to the safest kind of parenting. For most of us it wasn’t just one parent causing all the problems, but some combination of many adults we were stuck with.(“Parenting styles”)

No matter what personality we were born with, all children need stability, to have a reliable base from with to experiment, learn & risk as they explore themselves & all the newness of the world.
BUT most of us lived in chaos, which was terrifying.

Terror inevitably creates anger, & if the scary, painful, unfair, crazy-making circumstances go on for years, the child’s anger at the abuse & neglect will eventually turn into rage. Living in chaos is always harmful to children, regardless of our family’s intention. 

Re. US – ACoAs BELIEVE THAT:
• all anger is bad / dangerous & inevitably leads to violent behavior
• being angry at anyone means we are bad
• our anger can kill others, even if we don’t express it – just by feeling it – so we can never be angry at our parents, no matter how hurt by or frustrated with them we feel
• we have to protect others from our rage, no matter the cost to us
• if ‘they’ knew how angry we were they’d never love us, & then we’d die, floating alone in the cold outer reaches of black space!

AND some of us have had the experience that expressing our anger at them got us beaten, hit, old-shouldered, verbally attacked (“How dare you ___! Don’t talk to your___like that!”)….. So we shut as much of our anger off as we could, & stuffed more hurt into the POT.

Re. OTHERS – We assume anger PROTECTS us IF WE:
• are angry all or most of the time (keeps people away)
• are angry first, to preempt anger from others
• retaliate with personal attacks
• cut ‘them’ out of our life completely
OR:
• play the victim to make others feel guilty
• tell others how awful this person is (for being angry at us)
• say it’s ok if someone’s angry & then punish them when they do
• are SO good that they can never find anything about us to be angry over (we think)
• insist /demand that others never get angry at us, because we’re too delicate / can’t handle anger / it’s un-spiritual (not pleasing to God) / we don’t deserve it…

IN CONVERSATION, when someone gets angry at us, ACoAs may:
• Completely ignore both the anger & the issues, & change the subject
• Respond stoically, logically, ‘deal with it’, placate (“I understand / Oh that’s OK….)
• Immediately feel guilty, take all the blame, apologize profusely & repeatedly. Try to make up for being ‘bad’ or hurting the other person
OR
• Feel such terror that we blank out & can’t think at all (dissociate), so don’t answer, but only think of something to say when it’s too late & then hate ourselves for being stupid or a wimp
• Feel terror but try to justify our position, thinking: “I know I’m too sensitive, I’d never do what you’re accusing me of, No one else feels this way about me”
OR
• Be defensive – over-explaining (most common ACoA response to criticism, anger, insults….)
❥ That’s not what I meant, it’s just that_____
❥ No, really, I tried to ______
❥ The reason I sangry dog chasing manaid that was because____
❥ I couldn’t because _____
❥ Well, you see _____
OR
• Be defensive – throwing it back on the other:
⚡️ Why didn’t you tell me before?
⚡️ You’re just jealous, selfish….
⚡️ Well – YOU did ______ to me
⚡️ You’ve been sitting on this for how long?
⚡️ You’re just confusing the issue
⚡️ You’re not making any sense

NEXT: ACoAs & Anger, #2

Anger – Triggers (Part 3)

dmtorbi 12-step, ACoAs, al-anon, Alcoholics Anonymous, alcoholism, mental health, Psychotherapy, recovery, self growth, self-help , , , , ,

angry robot

TOO MANY THINGS
can go wrong every day!

PREVIOUS: Anger Triggers  #2

SITE: “Anger: Moodjuice Self-help guide”

 

MORE Anger Triggers, set off by OTHER people or circumstances
🚹 Noise • construction work, babies crying, dogs barking
🚹 Overload • when too many stressors happen at the same time, so our coping capacity is exhausted (caregivers, working mothers….)

🚹 Pet Peeves • lazy, sloppy, dirty, chaotic people or places
• violation of personal rules/ values
• social irregularities, political issues
🚹 Powerlessness
• not able to fix or change someone/ thing that hurts us (so we don’t have to leave)

🚹 Stealing • lover or mate taking $$ or other things / ID theft / break-ins / business frauds
🚹 Stupidity • rules that make no sense
• not having or not using common sense
• government incompetence or deliberate harm
• favorite sports teams losing
🚹 Unfairness
• discrimination because of age, race, religion, gender, looks….
🚹 Unreliability
• broken promises, lateness, lies, repeated cancellations
• being let down when needing someone specific (disappointments)

STUFFING triggered EMOTIONS
Life is made up of energy ebb & flow, expressed, contained or withheld.
We take in – food, love, nature, beauty, affection….
We let out – art, exercise, emotions, sex, sports, talk…
…. a cycle of building & discharging vibrations, which only stops at death

🔻 Relaxed muscles are in low energy, but also anything that’s a road block keeps us tense
🔺 High energy that’s not moving tightens the muscles. People who are very afraid – will unconsciously hold their breath, so their lungs are always over-inflated, making them sigh a lot

When energy gets either too high or too low, people get more & more anxious. Then they try to find ways to dampen it or pump it up (over-eating, compulsive sex, fighting, smoking, drinking….)

• Our society (& unhealthy families) tell us what we’re allowed to express emotionally, & to ‘control’ how much to let out. We’ve been taught to be afraid of showing anger, loneliness, fear, mourning, insecurity – even too much joy or excitement (except @ sports or concerts)….. told to “calm down” & contain emotions rather than letting them out in healthy ways.

The energy of each unexpressed emotion gets stuffed into an imaginary POT. One way to tell how full it is – is by noticing the tension in our muscles – tight jaw or shoulders, having IBS, overall stiffness….

⬅️ Al Turtle’s CHARTS start by assigning each ‘provoking’ external event as 5 units, with a corresponding emotional response of 5 units, & then going up from there: trigger 50 = response 50, 500 = 500….
He calculates that by the time we’re age 20 most of us have at least 35,000 units of backed up energy in our body, which can use up tp 20 to 80% of our calorie intake – just to keep it all inside the POT.

No wonder we’re tired – suppressing emotions takes a great deal of effort, piling up until we implode (depression) or explode (rage)

Re. Anger – usually the amount of anger felt is in proportion to the provocation (trigger), so the larger the input (stressor), the larger the output (emotional intensity).
A child will explode as much as it needs to, then it’s over, & they stops. This is normal.
But adults have learned to cut too many of their feelings off. Then we end up with a very full POT,& it doesn’t take much of an external trigger (5 to 10 units worth) to set off a very big response (100 -1,000 units)! So a little thing that would “justify” a little anger often results in a huge amount of expressed rage.

RELIEF – The ONLY thing that relieves suppressed emotional energy is venting it appropriately – as a way of ‘completing’ / ending the emotion – so it does’t hang around. Nothing else works.

Regularly emptying the POT  – a little at a time, in small doses – actually gives us more energy because we’re releasing the tremendous effort needed to hold it in.
Many of us are not aware of how hard we’re working to sit on emotions, because consistently tight muscles become numb after a while. That’s why doing emotional-release body work is so important as part of Recovery.
SITE : Polyvagal Theory, a Ladder of  Nervous States – the mammalian autonomic nervous system provides the neurophysiological substrates for adaptive behavioral strategies.

BOOK: “The Body Keeps the Score” ˜~Bessel van der Kolk, M.D. (Overview & chapter summaries)

NEXT: Anger & ACoAs,  #1