[H3rmit]

I searched past threads on hostility - not much here. I'm really having a problem with hostility and anger these days. Or, actually, realizing it's a huge problem that has tainted my entire life, and is having specific effects lately. I was warned in the past that my bad temper could get me in trouble some day. Up until now it just caused embarassment, because I made sure to never hurt anyone when I was angry. I'd blow up, but not threaten or attack.

But now, over the past year, I have had angry exchanges with my husband to the point where my loud voice has really hurt one of his ears. It's become sensitive. Sometimes he has a headache for more than a day when it gets triggered. He's going to go to the doctor and see if he has an actual ear problem or sensitivity, now that I've reminded him he was going to do that. But I still lose it and speak loudly enough to trigger the hurt sometimes. I don't want to hurt him, but when I get upset I am not thinking clearly.

I get really angry. I am an angry person. I realized a while back that I feel a lot of hostility to the world and especially, of course, people. I don't know what to do about all this and it makes me sad. I am not great with feelings. I grew up with blocked feelings that exploded frequently, and I am still learning how to feel, after five decades. I'm sad about this. I don't know what to do.

I heard something about an "internal boundary" like a container within which you can deal with feelings rather than having them spray out unconsciously all over the place. Nice idea, but I don't know how to get it. Emotional progress is very slow, and I am very sad.

Help?

[iwonderaboutstuff]

I got nothing but feels for this. I'm a yeller myself and the only thing I can do is walk away. I don't know what else to do when I feel the rage. I know some things make me more susceptible, like being tired or hungry or work stress, so I work to manage that stuff.

[JaGo]

Have you every tried meditation? It wasn't easy for me to get into the habit of, but it worked wonders for me in terms of relaxing and not getting so angry all the time.

[thecrankyone]

I'm naturally loud under the best of circumstances, so when I get angry or feel I'm not being heard I can break ear drums miles away, or so I've been told.

I have to actually make a conscious effort to not be loud, it doesn't' always work. I'm always being told to lower my volume. Oddly I have trouble filtering out back ground noise so that doesn't help.

I have to constantly think about my volume even when I'm in a good mood.

[gayleggg]

You might consider an anger management class or therapy. Maybe find out what is causing you such angry and hostile feelings. Learning to react in a more appropriate way is possible but takes professional help, at least I believe it does. I think it would help your self-esteem if you could learn to manage your angry outbursts in a better way.

[pegasus]

First off, anger is a healthy emotion that is ok to have but needs to be channeled in the right direction.

If as a child, you were taught to hold in all your emotions or it was unsafe to let out your true feelings, this might be something to work on with a therapist. Bottling up your feelings is the worst thing you can do as holding it all in ends up like a cork coming out of a champagne bottle. You need to be able to let it out safely. Rather than having a huge explosion each time, you can learn to express your feelings in a safe way. Working out what it is that really is making you feel angry, is it really here and now stuff or is it stuff from the past? That would be a good starting point.

[Thunder Bow]

What did you do? Yell directly into his ear? He probably has a pre-exsisting ear condition. Remember with anger, do not add on to it by making unnessary accusations. Keep it focused on topic, with out making it worse by adding on accusations that may not be relevent.

[H3rmit]

Thunder Bow, no, I didn't yell directly into his ear. He is sensitive to many physical things, so that is why he's going to have that ear checked out.

JaGo, yes, meditation does help. I find it hard to be consistent and decisive about many things. But you are spot on. When I meditated regularly, this was not really a problem. Then again, maybe I didn't keep it up long enough to find out, if you see what I mean. I really should go back to it.

Gaylegg, you are right that it would help my self-esteem, as I am ashamed about this failing of mine. I am just like my dad, a yeller. I don't want to be abusive, but in hindsight, I see I am. Unfortunately, I've never been able to find a therapist that was any help for anything. I will look around for an anger management class.

Edit: and part of how meditation works is that it allows some awareness before the strong reactivity kicks in, giving me a moment in which I can choose to act differently - walk away, speak consciously, etc.

I can relate to what everyone said. Thanks for your comments. I'm happy to hear more, also. I really appreciate the input.