Ms. Maybelle wrote about anger yesterday and how you can be grateful and angry at the same time- they're not mutually exclusive which intuitively seems wrong but which heartfully seems true and seems incredibly profound and has given me something to think about.
I wonder sometimes how angry I really am and what that might have to do with the depression I suffer. They used to say that depression is anger turned inward.
Now of course they say that depression is a chemical imbalance and who needs to sit there with a therapist and talk, talk, talk about your childhood and your anger when what you really need is simply a medication to correct the balance?
I can't believe this is entirely true. I think depression is probably a gray, mushy stew made up of anger, yes, and guilt over that anger and a genetic predisposition for the melancholy and all of this mess simmers and cooks and then perhaps the heat is turned up by some "precipitating event" until the brain can't keep up with it all and then that poor brain just shuts down in bad ways, thus the chemical imbalance.
At least, this is how it seems for me.
I know I'm an angry person. I call myself an old hippie but I am not now, nor ever was, a peace/love/hippie-dippie sort of hippie who ohmmmed her way into transcendence.
Nah, I was too busy raising kids and digging trenches in which to lay PVC for plumbing.
Not to say that I did not believe in peace and love. Well, I can't say for sure that I BELIEVE in peace because I've yet to see it but I sure do believe in love and have seen more than my undeserving share of THAT. And am always and eternally grateful for every ray of it that's ever struck my heart.
So- back to gratefulness.
See- I can talk about gratefulness but can I talk about anger? It seems so wrong to talk about anger when I have so much to be grateful for. But, but, but.
I know I have so much anger in me.
Last year I lost my voice. I literally could barely speak above a whisper. This had happened to me before, but this time it was the worst. And I knew in my heart that this was not a physical problem. It was a psychosomatic problem in that my mind was affecting my body. I think I had so much anger in me that I was afraid that if I could raise my voice I would bring down the walls of my very existence by "voicing" what I was really feeling.
And I don't think I resolved any of this anger. I just kept on with the medication and with my life and then I got into a play and I HAD to have a voice and so it came back.
It's not my way to confront, to voice anger. It's my way to simmer and shake and let it all bake and keep it inside and make myself ill with weird and undiagnosable and thus, untreatable physical problems and I really don't want to do that. I am not, like Miss Maybelle says she is, a bull on the rampage. I am a relatively meek woman who lets her anger out in little snippets of sarcasm, little barbs of sharp remarks. This blog is part of that and I think I'd be a lot healthier if I addressed the anger I have and actually plowed through it, telling the truth and fearing no man as they say, but I am not brave enough.
Because like I said, there's part of me that believes that if I did, my very world would crumble around me.
But I know that's not logical and not healthy and every human being on this earth (even the Dali Lama, sometimes, I'll wager) feels anger. And anger can be healthy. It can propel us into change and perhaps it is, after all, change that I am most afraid of. Which is ridiculous because there is nothing in this world that gets accomplished without it.
So once again, I have no answers and I'm just talking out loud and it's the most incredibly beautiful day here, warm and the birds are singing and the rooster next door is crowing and Miss Honeyluna is here because she has a bit of illness and so I wanted her home where I could make her sopa de lima and kiss her goodnight and see her in the morning and put my hand to her forehead to check for fever.
And my little neice and nephew are coming over because they, too, are a little too sick for school and mama and papa need to work and so it will be a sort of gentle-infirmary over here today and although I'm sorry they're all feeling poorly, I'm glad to have them all here to watch old Disney movies and go look at the goats.
Back to gratefulness. Which I can talk about.
Anger? Who me? What have I got to be angry about?
A lot, quite actually. And in the next day or two, I think I'll take out a piece of paper and start making a list. Look at the anger right there in black and white and see if there's not some of it I can deal with and thus, eventually let go of.
Because dammit, with so much to be grateful for, I am crippling myself by trying to only focus on that while on the back burner of my soul, there is such a toxic pot of anger simmering.
And you? Are you constantly swallowing anger? Have you felt this, but tried with all your heart to hide it? I'm curious to know.
Depending on the situation, I think I am more like the bull on a rampage. But there is anger I have had to swallow too. Sometimes it just seems so much easier to try and suck it up and forget it than to acutally confront it. But, you can get in a cycle of expressing your anger and that can go too far and make you feel worse than when you started. It's a balance, I guess, as with anything else.
ReplyDeleteAnd now and then you throw furniture.
ReplyDeleteI've worked through a few different angers during my life, including anger at my parents, who tried their level best with the skills and experience they had, but still weren't always the parents I wished for. And anger at my ex-. And anger sometimes at work situations or world situations.
ReplyDeleteI find that having a friend to vent to, who will listen without trying to FIX, who may understand what the anger is and where it's coming from, helps.
I find, too, that it's easier -- and more socially acceptable -- to express sadness than anger and I'm prone to subverting my anger and expressing it as sadness, which helps somewhat but isn't as authentic as I need to be.
There, my two cents is on the table.
Mary
Lady Lemon- we all have to swallow anger sometimes. That is the way of the world. But you're right. There has to be a balance.
ReplyDeleteSigh.
DTG- I haven't thrown so much as a tiny pillow in so long I can't even remember. Maybe that's my problem.
Mary- I think you're right. Sadness is so much more acceptable. Another thing to think about.
Throwing a chair or two might do you some good.
ReplyDeleteOH I have a story about throwing things in anger. My Dad used to vent frustration and anger by throwing a cup or ashtray at a wall - never at a person. The piece would smash, he'd sweep up the mess, he'd feel better. Of course I felt off and somewhat scared. Anyways I held onto the notion. In my 20s in a fit of being pissed off at something, I threw a small plate at a wall. THE DAMNED THING DIDN'T BREAK. Boy, I was so mad THEN that I saw red :)
ReplyDeleteMary
I've been working on my anger issues, because lord knows I have them too. Many of them I've gotten through by merely ADMITTING that I have a reason to be mad. Somehow that helps.
ReplyDeleteThe rest I take out on the garden or at the gym. Quiets my mind.
I mostly have anger toward my good ol' dad for not being a dad at all. I've been letting go of that a little bit at a time for many many years now. My husband paid the price more than anyone in the earliest years of our marriage when I didn't yet know how to trust anyone but my mother with my heart.
ReplyDeleteDTG- It doesn't seem like that sort of anger. It's the sort that has robbed me of the strength to throw a chair.
ReplyDeleteMary F- Oh yes. That would be very frustrating indeed.
Aunt Becky- I garden, I walk, I yoga. It all helps. You're right.
Steph- My husband has paid a huge price, too. I feel so guilty about that.
Unexpressed anger, depression, then actually losing your voice - I didn't know about that last bit.
ReplyDeleteWhat's the worst that could happen if you let your anger out?
Ever since my mom passed away I will have an anger fit. It may happen once a month or once every two months but I feel so angry about losing my mom and a whole bunch of other things. I think it is OK to be angry every now and then but you can't let it run your life otherwise you are not going to be a happy camper. I easily could focus on all the bad crap that has happened to me in the past 9 months and be a very angry person. But I have so much to be grateful for that it just would not be fair to me or my family. But I also am medicated for depression and do see a therapist.
ReplyDeleteMOB- That is exactly what my old (wise) therapist used to ask me.
ReplyDeleteMr. Shife- And you're smart to be doing both of those things.
I think that it is hard to express anger because it is such a passion and we do not express our passions in public, that would be bad manners. We feel uncomfortable when we see someone angry, or grief stricken, because it feels like they are doing something very private. Maybe it is private, but if we never see anyone experience it, or if we only see someone experience it violently, we don't know how to deal with it ourselves, and we feel ashamed for this big big feeling we cannot control. But people get angry, we get unmoored when loved ones die, to deny these desperate emotions is to deny what makes us sentient. I do not want to temper my passions too much, I am afraid that in doing so I may dumb down my grand passions as well.
ReplyDeleteI think you are wise, Miss Maybelle. I think you are very wise.
ReplyDeleteYes...constantly swallowing. I have a lot of bitterness that lies just below the surface. It is astonishing how much, really, that I suppress. Sometimes I dream of just leaving everything and starting fresh. New. But I know it would come with me.
ReplyDeleteI feel weird now because I've never really explored my anger. When I have been really emotional, it's always sadness that hits me the hardest. I don't usually feel anger in me, which kind of worries me a little. Maybe I am repressing my emotions? I know that when I was little, I would get so angry with things, mostly myself I think, that I would rip the artwork off the walls that I made, which would upset me further. Lately I've been randomly crying without any stimulus that I am aware of. Maybe it's anger, sadness, being scared, loneliness, stress, all of it mixed together. Anyway, anger has not been a huge part of my life, for which I am grateful.
ReplyDeleteSJ- I think you're right.
ReplyDeleteHoneyLuna- You have never, ever struck me as an angry person. I mean, you GET angry, but it is a passing thing.
Miss Moon,
ReplyDeleteI'm not going to get into specifics here, but I have been doing a LOT of research lately for myself... I have specifically been reading a lot about trauma and its effects on the developing child. You did experience a lot of trauma as a child, and my belief is that you don't need to relive any of that to feel better, but I feel certain that telling just the highlights to someone or writing it down and then physically getting it out, as dtg suggests, that may be helpful.
There's a lot online about long term effects of trauma and there are actual steps to becoming free of it as an adult. My heart breaks when I read some of your entries when I can clearly see that you are still suffering for the mistakes of your caretakers. Time to care for Miss Moon!
I love you so,
pf
PS
ReplyDeleteJust wanted to remind that last night was the full moon... I personally believe that it does things to us, the same as it does the tides. So it will be interesting to see how the week plays out for everyone.
Peace,
Hippie dippy friend
Thank-you, Petit Fleur. Thank-you for everything.
ReplyDeletei'm so fucking angry sometimes that i could just spit nails, but mostly it doesn't rear it's ugly head. mostly. and when it does it comes out in all the wrong ways, at all the wrong people and i feel horrible.
ReplyDeleteunca b
Unca B- Isn't it strange how we can get angry with the ones we love the most as a substitute for the ones we hate the most? Why do we do this? What are we afraid of?
ReplyDeleteI love you, by the way. You can always get angry with me. I will understand.
So, so much to say, espcailyl on the post about letting your kids go to their father's, and how that felt. Can I say without sounding all crazy that I adore you?. And think you kick some serious butt? And was just drying right along with you when I read htat post, for LOTS of reasons? Man.
ReplyDeleteI'm so proud of you. I think it's going to be the earliest anger you couldn't express that will set the tone for the anger later. You go girl! :)
ReplyDeleteKori- You are quite welcome to tell me that you adore me anytime. Seriously. You are.
ReplyDeleteQuiet Girl- You're right. You are perfectly right.
I bite my fingernails, Louise Hay says it's fear of affecting others with your anger, so you remove your claws. No damage.
ReplyDeleteJust remember, anger is fine. I'm learning about htis at the moment. It's when you instead react, not respond that you get aggression: sarcasm, shouting, blame, violence, passive aggression - not what other people will be able to hear because they're not anger, they're defensive techniques.
It's ok to be angry.
Get yourself some Rage Against the Machine. Turn it up loud.
Ms. Jo- I'm listening to Bruce Springsteen. Is that okay?
ReplyDeleteI don't know. He makes me feel... sort of twisted up and yearning somehow.
ReplyDeleteYou want something that'll purge the rage. AAAAAGHHHHHH!!!!!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fkuOAY-S6OY