Racing Thoughts....

Any time my wife leaves the house to go out with friends I get racing thoughts that she is cheating (never gave me a real reason to believe this) and they over take me sometimes and then the anger begins ending sometimes in a negative interaction with her....any suggestions on working on these thoughts?

Have you told her about the thoughts that go through your head and that you know they aren't rational? It sounds like a great deal of paranoia to me... how stressful!

Can you make yourself a list of all the great things about your wife that let you know that she wouldn't cheat on you? Then when she's out the door you can read over it and remind yourself that you're being silly. I tend to think everyone's mad at me and/or doesn't like me at all, so I'm consistently reminding myself in my head of all the things that they have done/said that is proof that I'm just imagining that they don't like me.

You need to talk to a psychiatrist about this one, please. It's so unfair to your wife to
let these delusions create a negative attitude toward her. Something can be done to
help you with that, and you may be doing your marriage a really big favor by talking about what to do.

I get paranoid thinking sometimes, too. The thing that helps the most is recognizing it as such. As soon as I notice the thought pattern, the thoughts may not go away immediately, but I can easily ignore them. I say to my brain, "i am choosing to move on". It somehow lets me acknowledge the thoughts, assign them no real meaning, and continue on doing whatever I need to without them dominating me. Sometimes I have to give myself some quiet time to process and move on, but it is getting easier and faster the more i do it.

I'm wary of using words like paranoia and delusions, as they are so so severe and indicate the person is in a state of psychosis -and no one knows this for sure. Sometimes people get very jealous, and this is precisely the form it takes, unfounded suspicions.

I don't know if this is an episode or plain old awful-to-feel jealousy. Therapy might help if this is an ongoing problem.

But meanwhile, maybe try and think of all of the reasons why she may not be having an affair, even making a list. Also, perhaps thinking of past instances when you felt this way, but it didn't end up being the case. It would be important to try to talk yourself out of this (at least to an extent) before you see her again, so that she doesn't get the brunt of it, it could really harm your relationship, as I'm sure you know.

If this doesn't only happen when she goes out like this, but seems instead to be part of a bigger picture of going down the rabbit hole of bipolar paranoid psychosis, then I would suggest you (also) get in touch with your psychiatrist about adjusting your medication.