@Alive99 Whatever we feel as emotions are genuine and natural. Something provoked us to feel them, and our feelings are a result. There’s a spectrum of how badly provoking something may be which will warrant a corresponding reaction.

If someone cuts in front of me in line, I may be a little put off for a minute and have no reaction. But, if something happens that shatters me, I may throw spaghetti against the wall!

We know to be in society, we can’t become violent or there will be bad consequences to us. So, we have had to hold ourselves back from acting out like we may want to if provoked badly enough.

Nobody’s going to tell me it’s not okay to feel anger, when I feel anger. I’ll get angry at them and likely tell them where to put their anger. . But, I am working on controlling my angry responses because they never get me anywhere good and only work against me. It is hard to control holding back anger when you feel it so intensely. I now try to walk away and cool off.

It sounds like something severely traumatic happened to you and you are trying to cope with how strongly it is making you feel. I understand you are working on getting to a place where you can feel free from the intense emotions that go with what happened, so you can lead a happy life.

Personally, my therapy experiences are that I cry hysterically in expressing my anger and frustration. Maybe it’s fear deep down, too. I don’t act out, I act ‘in’ (hard on myself). Rather than physical violence, it’s crying. Although, I’ve been so angry that I’ve had fantasies of doing damage…doesn’t everybody? But, of course, I’d never act. But the thought is entertaining.

I never showed any anger toward a therapist. Some of them said some pretty antagonizing things to me, too. I had mentioned the comment one had said in another thread, and it really got under my skin. In that moment I didn’t react. It hit me when I left her office and cried all the way home and shouldn’t have been driving. I didn’t make another appointment to see her again.

I’m reading a book now about BPD called “Stop Walking on Eggshells”. It talks about anger is really deep down fear. So when I am angry and frustrated that I am not being heard and respected by my husband, I really must feel fear that he doesn’t really love me. I am getting mad at him to deflect from the fact I am afraid of losing him. This is a new thought for me that I just learned from this book. I’m still pondering if I believe this is true and letting it sink in and reflect on that idea.

There are other hurts that i felt very intensely. In time, I did reframe it so I could stop holding a grudge. When the hurt was fresh, I felt it. But in time, I told myself that person wasn’t capable of better. They really weren’t. I was fooling myself to have thought they were. I had given them too much credit. I tend to do that a lot. So, I am not angry at them anymore. But, I don’t think as highly of them like I used to.