Can We Talk About Anger?
I’m experimenting with a slightly new format: including a resource section at the end of my newsletter with reflection questions and journaling prompts and/or recommended reading/viewing/listening. Send me a message to let me know what you think about this new feature, if it’s helpful, and if you’d like to continue to see me include something like this going forward!
I usually choose my newsletter topics by what’s on my mind that week. And recently, I’ve been angry. But I’d rather not write about it. In fact, this week, I scrolled the ongoing list of Substack topic ideas that I keep in the Notes app on my phone to see if there was something — anything! — else I could write about instead. But anger is what’s been bubbling up with the most ferocity, so I’ll concede.
Why don’t I want to write about anger?
Because I don’t want people to know that I feel angry — ever. The deepest despair is easier for me to write about than the rage I sometimes feel. Because I’m a nice person. I’m bubbly and friendly. I’m not allowed to get angry. This probably partially has to do with my upbringing — being conditioned to be a “good girl” — but I don’t take it personally. It’s bigger than that, and it doesn’t just apply to me. Women aren’t allowed to be angry in our society; it’s not an emotion we can express without facing judgment, from both ourselves and others.
Pay attention
My psychiatrist has told me that I need to pay attention to my anger. Because the way it comes out, and how I often experience it, is directed inward, as anxiety and depression. When I’m angry at someone, it can feel like anxiety. And when I’m angry at life, or a bunch of circumstances and people all balled up together, it can turn into feeling powerless and slide over into depression.
In addition to my daily dose of antidepressant medication, I also take Xanax as needed for anxiety. But I can’t just pop a Xanax every time I’m mad at someone, my psychiatrist reminds me.
Lately, as I’ve been feeling so angry, this memory keeps coming up.