[PurpleFlyingMonkeys]

So there are grounding techniques, ways to help a panic attack when you're freaking out, but I haven't learned any ways to de stress when I'm in a rage. I've got little patience, a short fuse lately. I don't start cussing and hitting or anything but I can feel myself getting so worked up and my voice raising so I have to leave the room.

Leaving the room doesn't do much, I still am stressed for quite a while after. So I was wondering if there were any tips anyone would like to share on how to NOT stress out or how to calm the stress when you're starting to get really upset. How to calm down when you're angry or stressed?

I think I remember the hospital (10 or 11 years ago) say something about repeating your favorite food in your head over and over until your calm but really that's not working at all.

Any ideas? I hate the way I get so worked up so quickly

[TerryL]

How about quiet, deep breathing? that's something that can be done even if there are other people around. It helps me a little. and if no one is around, I do it as freely as I want to.

[Leed]

My therapist told me if I was in a REAL BAD RAGE, to go into my bedroom, close the door, pile up pillows, and pound them and scream bloody murder into them. But keep pounding them too. The screaming into them did me a lot of good -- I'd cuss into them too. (don't tell anyone ) After I was exhausted, I felt the rage had left me. I was just spent!! Totally exhausted.

So maybe it will work for you too. Worth a try anyway. Best of luck! Hugs, Lee

[shezbut]

((((PFM))))

It's great that you can control your physical impulses when anger strikes, without any lashing out! Kudos to you ~ that's a very difficult impulse for me, personally, to control. I second the advice that Leed gave you about going into your bedroom.

Close the door, put your face into a pillow and scream out all of your frustrations. I fight the temptation to hurt myself in times like these (I don't know if that's an issue for you), but you may want to try chomping down on a few carrots if you sometimes struggle with that temptation as well. Others use ice (I used to, but my tooth enamel is all gone from the ice I've chewed on throughout my childhood.), or hard candies. Just something that resists, and you have to put a lot of pressure and focus on what you're doing to get the piece to break.

Best wishes sent your way

[whatbeanbelieved]

Okay, this helped me this last week when I fell into a bit of a loop. I'm not sure how you feel about meditation or whether you believe in energy bodies, but this essentially is a lot more... self-driven a meditation than the others:

Hope something helps and works out for you!

EDIT: PFMonkeys, I have also been working with some grounding techniques, which are all along the lines of some sort of belief in the earth/your energy/etc. But I don't think the belief is necessary to perform the technique. Essentially, it has to do with actual grounding - literally interpretted - and one pretends to be a tree for a while. Which is really... oddly helpful and relaxing, and I'd love to share that with you if you're interested.

[jelly-bean]

I try to say a little prayer for help when I get really angry and if that doesn't work then I leave the room and go to my room and beat the heck out of a pillow and yell into it like leed suggested.

[PurpleFlyingMonkeys]

I've never screamed, it's something I can't do. I've gotten so angry, and tried to scream while like in the car or something but I always hold back, even when I'm trying it comes out like a whimper. I've tried in the pillow, I've tried a lot of different things but it just doesn't happen. So I just grunt as loud as I can, it's the closest I can come to screaming.

I also pull on my hair, it somehow calms me. I don't pull it out or anything I just grab big chunks and tug on it and for some reason it helps. But I look like a nut when people are around.

I used to hit things all the time. I've broken many fingers (I know I punch wrong) and even toes from kicking things when I get angry, so I stopped it some time ago but I still feel like I need more control on my anger or perhaps my patience.

My daughter is 4 and she's gotten to the point where I have to say something 5 times before she listens. Now one of my biggest pet peeves has ALWAYS been if I have to repeat myself more than two times. And all day every day I'm saying the same thing 5 times. And I have two puppies at home that are great, but scratch me and the furniture and always seem to be scratching my daughter. There's just a lot going on all the time. Of course more than that but I get so flustered, so frustrated and I don't yell at my daughter or the dogs but I can tell that my tone is not pleasant and I hate that about me. And it gets to the point with the dogs where my heart is racing I'm so upset.

So I walk away to avoid saying anything with a "attitude" or anything, but it takes forever for me to relax

T says yoga, but it bores the heck out of me, same with meditation, if I ever had time to actually do it I would probably fall asleep. And I don't see how it could help in the moment.

[shezbut]

PFM,

I think that you need to try to give yourself a pat on the back. You may be becoming snippy, but you're noticing that...which is a step in the right direction! As soon as you notice that it's taking a while to calm down or that you're constantly repeating yourself to your daughter, I'd recommend changing everything.

Take a deep breath and say, "____ let's put on our jackets and go for a walk to the park." Or wherever ~ point is, get out of that environment for a few minutes. You daughter will get excited, and that will be a good opportunity to remind her to do whatever. Feel free to admit that you become frustrated sometimes, just like she does. And when she doesn't respond to you the first or second time, you become pretty frustrated because this is happening so often. Ask her what you both can do to make this occur less often. Let her come up with some ideas.

Chances are that she'll share something/s that frustrate her. If not, it's a great time to ask when you're sharing your emotions. You may be able to help each other a lot with one or two of these walks to/from the park together.

Best wishes!!

[amyalex]

I struggle with trying to find an outlet for my anger too. I haven't, but I always feel like hurting the person that is making me mad. I might try the screaming into a pillow thing. I hope you find a good way to cope!

[susan900]

Originally Posted by Leed

My therapist told me if I was in a REAL BAD RAGE, to go into my bedroom, close the door, pile up pillows, and pound them and scream bloody murder into them. But keep pounding them too. The screaming into them did me a lot of good -- I'd cuss into them too. (don't tell anyone ) After I was exhausted, I felt the rage had left me. I was just spent!! Totally exhausted.

So maybe it will work for you too. Worth a try anyway. Best of luck! Hugs, Lee

This sounds a good idea!,,

I find that as someone in my family, often makes me cross-I find it so hard not to defend myself, and by this point, I an angry and upset! My hubby says "just walk away" so Im gonna try to do this.

[Perna]

If you can stop and try to figure out where the anger is coming from, that helps me. I get angry when I'm anxious/afraid, in the sense that I don't have "control". Anger lets us know we feel something is being/has been taken from us (which is anxiety producing); it just gives us the "energy" to figure out how to act.

So, when you feel yourself getting angry, ignore the angry incident (I once called and cussed out a grocery store manager because I left my 2 cans of cat food because the clerk put it in a separate bag when I only bought like 4 items total; I took one bag but didn't know/think about there being two bags -- was trying to blame the clerk for my own not paying attention; in reality, it was a reaction from something that had happened hours earlier that I didn't feel I could do anything about -- kind of a "kick the dog" delayed reaction (boss yells at husband, husband goes home and yells at wife for being 5 minutes late with dinner, wife yells at child for not eating all his vegetables, child kicks dog for laying in doorway and almost tripping them; if husband processed the boss thing, he doesn't mind waiting 5 minutes for his dinner, goes to kitchen and compliments wife on good smells and kisses her "hello", wife is able to be caring and compassionate and coax the kid to eat at least one more bite, kid sees dog and lays on floor to chat with dog).

I "drop" whatever is making me angry, whatever if going on "outside" and look inside immediately when I realize I'm getting angry, first checking that whatever if making me angry is "worth" it (the grocery store manager said he'd find the 2 cans of cat food and they'd be there waiting if I came back to pick them up (what was I expecting, that he'd fire/yell at the clerk? :-) and I, still angry, realized that would not be worth the time/cost of the stupid 2 cans of cat food? Why was I going to all this time and trouble, making other people unhappy over $1.00? I doubt the store manager needed the angry conversation?) and if it is worth it, I don't bother with, drop, my angry "stance" and try to solve whatever problem I perceive there is instead.

I don't have very good luck with just walking away; I'm still upset and whatever trigger there has been for me isn't resolved and will keep getting me again and again? I don't want to be in the next room still thinking about whatever has made me angry and still thinking of retorts, etc. and chewing on myself. If someone else is doing something I don't like; (a) I cannot do anything about another person's behavior, past, present, or future and (b) the operative phrase is "I don't like" and I am responsible for my own likes/dislikes and matching my feelings with my thinking/good brain to come up with actions that are good for me.

I look at my default/automatic pilot responses if I keep having the same thing happen again and again. If my parent or sibling, boss, friend, etc. keeps saying/doing things I don't like, I have to look at why I don't like it.

I left home because my stepmother called me "stupid" one time too many. I knew I was not stupid, didn't really have a self esteem problem there but the name calling from someone I would love support from hurt my feelings. What to do?

(1) I could tell her, "When you call me names it hurts my feelings; I would love more support from you instead of name calling," and open up the way for an understanding dialog/conversation.

(2) I could think about "stupid", which I am not, think about the incident that resulted in the name calling (I was making Good Seasons salad dressing and put the water in before the vinegar or vinegar before the water, whichever was "wrong" :-) and see what is going on with that; in my case, "stupid" is a little over the top? It doesn't really make a whole lot of difference in the larger scheme of things which is done first in making the salad dressing? That means it was my stepmother who has the bigger problem, not me. I'm not so "stupid" as she is "unreasonable", "critical", "controlling"?

(3) I can think about how I feel (hurt feelings) and what I want to do about it (leave home; the name calling was not a sudden, new thing and I felt unable to confront and work through this incident and all my previous relationship at that time) and then concentrate on making a plan to do that.

When a boss criticized me unfairly in public, after I finished feeling hurt and came to understand that I was not in the wrong, I came up with a plan what I was going to do so it would not happen again or how I was going to set a boundary with him; his behavior was not something I was going to tolerate in my life and if he did it again, I was not going to stay at that job! Coming up with a plan (avoid him; if I could not avoid and had to do some work with him and he made fun of me again, I'd warn him that "I was not to be spoken to disrespectfully and if he did it again, I'd quit," and then I'd follow through -- three strikes and he'd be out!) and understanding my own feelings and "doing" something for myself made me feel much much better!

(4) Some where in there is the possibility that I have something "wrong", that what I think is going on is not what actually is. I could ask questions, clarify what is going on. Kind of like (1) above but more "general". Being curious is much more interesting and comfortable than being angry or hurt is. We can assume people are hurting us or we can assume we don't quite understand something and are being hurting ourselves in some way; it works both ways: Just because you are paranoid doesn't mean people aren't after you but, too, just because people are chasing you does not mean you "should" be paranoid; you may have left your change or credit card at the store and the clerk is trying to find you to give it to! One can't know until the person actually interacts with you. "I know they are going to fire me" is a lie; you can't know the future. However, acting like you are going to be fired can, in fact, make that happen but it would be your own actions that helped bring that about, not "they" and theirs. If you feel you are going to be fired, it's not wrong to plan for that but that too, is your decision/action and can influence the future. "Handwriting on the wall" cuts both ways just like paranoia; it can be there or imagined. Living in "now" and waiting for less mistakable proof than feelings and dealing with feelings as they arise works the best for me and my anxiety.