By J D Murrah
There are many issues involved with anger.
There are many issues involved in living with someone that has anger issues. Although anger itself is not a mental illness, some types of anger and angry outbursts may be indications of deeper issues. This is especially true when you are dealing with someone who has any type of addiction going on. By any type of addiction it runs the gamut to include sexual, gambling, alcohol and drug addictions. Poor ability to deal with anger is also associated with many organic disorders as well. Deciding on the best way of living with such people often begins with knowing what exactly your are dealing with.
10 General Suggestions on living with an angry person
Some suggestions on living with an angry person:
1. The first concern is safety. Make sure that you and your family are safe. Do not take chances in this area. When there is violence or threats of violence do not hesitate to call the police. Prior to doing so, you may want to make sure that you have a getaway bag filled with the essentials that you need. You may also want to have the phone number of a local shelter if you have to suddenly leave.
2. Do not make threats toward the angry person. When they are in that state of mind and emotion, they are simply reacting, they are not thinking.
3. Do not try to discuss matters logically with them when they are in the midst of their anger. It is not by chance that the Romans used the phrase "Anger is a brief madness", when discussing this issue. In the midst of anger, people are not rational.
4. Do not block doors or access to passageways. Angry people often feel threatned. When they feel trapped on top of that there is often even greater agitation.
5. Do not take what they say personally. This is especially true when the angery person is someone with alzheimer's or other organic issue. When you take it personally, you will often react personally to the comment.
6. Avoid blaming. Blaming only serves to agitate and increase the intensity of the anger. Blaming will not solve anything other than identifying a target for the person's wrath.
7. Establish clear and consistent boundaries. Having clear and consistent boundaries will help develop a sense of order and structure. Boundaries can also be made in terms of routine and schedule.
8. Do not add alcohol or drugs into the mix. These may give you a temporary reprieve, but they usually lead to even more loss of self-control in such situations.
9. Encourage them to sit down. The likelihood of anger turning into violence decreses when people are sitting down.
10. Decorate and arrange the home or environment that you are living with them to remove 'triggers' and instead have one that creates a calm peaceful setting.
Ways of Keeping the Anger Alive
Many times, those who harbor the anger justify it. Some of the ways that this occurs are as follows:
-Bringing up unresolved conflicts from the past. They often replay old battles to work up their anger.
-Trying to force another person to listen to their story line. These people will ikely call back after you hang up on them just to keep the anger going.
-Trying to control others behavior. They use anger to intimidate and control people and situations.
-Putting annoying people in their place. Angry people feel they are on a mission to put others where they belong.
-Obsess on memories of past hurts. They replay mental movies of past wrong with the intent of staying angry and seekign revenge.
-Replay past hurts for sympathy
-Obsess on threatening images or memories
-Assume what happened in the past is going to happen again.
-Compare the past with the present. Since anger often accompanies justification, you will find them always making and finding excuses to stay angry.
-View the objects of their anger as something less than human. They often treat them and refer to them as objects.
-Maintain an on-ging fight in their head which keeps them worked up.
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