temper

I have a similar problem...the smallest things can just throw my mind off completely.It doesn't translate to violent actions so much as thoughts.I don't know how Clockwork Orange it all is - the harder I tried to be good and not angry,the more my anger manifested itself in strange unhealthy ways.

i do this when i am drunk and i hate it. i've been a lot better lately though by a) not drinking as much and b)when i feel myself growing angry, i take a few seconds to reason with myself, and ask myself "why am i getting angry?" and if there is no reason, or a piffling reason that does not require anger, i just point this out to myself and i calm down a lot. it's not actually that hard, you just have to catch yourself at the moment of ignition, as it were, and if you're with the other person say something like "OK i can feel myself getting angry and there's no reason, and i'm going to try and stop it but can you help me by turning over to the Simpsons please?" you have to observe the changes in yourself and once you can recognise when it starts, you can nip it in the bud.

i'm afraid that didn't make much sense but if you can do it it's very, very effective, or at least has been for me.

also anthony, not bottling things up would also be a good way to avoid getting angry as much. David sounds like someone that you can talk to and you are certainly an extremely articulate and intelligent person, i'm sure that you can always reason things out with him and tell him when things are bothering you instead of bottling it.

another thing (sorry i keep posting, things keep occurring to me) - i realised that my anger was due to things that totally were'nt the fault of the people around me, it was all due to work stresses etc. and the only reason that i took my anger out on the people around me was that i felt "safe" doing it and it felt like something i could control, whereas in reality i was threatened by things that i couldn't control and where having a temper tantrum wouldn't have helped anyway - i was just displacing the anger i felt at one thing to another, safer target who didn't deserve it at all, and then there was the remorse and the tears and i STILL FELT ANGRY. you must explain to David if this is the case that it's not him you've got the problem with, though he probably knows, and find out a way to sort out what *is* making you angry.

and now i will shut up :)

Grr, you are making me angry with your continual posts.

I very rarely get angry. Occasionally I get nasty though, what is even worse.

i find a nap helps. i'm not being facetious. babies have it sorted.

I do this too Anthony. It used to be far worse before I realized I was releasing rage from many years earlier that should have been directed towards people long gone. Therapy and various meds for depression/anxiety have helped me to control this rage. the meds I just started though seem to encourage violent mood swings. this is supposed to go away after a couple of weeks. i hope so.

Wow, ILE is home to the short-fuse FUX0RS! No wonder I feel at home.

I have the unhappy tendency to go from super laid back to raging fury at the drop of a hat. For some reason, the falling hat just sets me off. (I'm also addicted to unbearably awful jokes, but I digress.) A lot of it is due to internalization of little things that irritate me; a bunch of small annoying things will happen where any one of them on their own is no big deal and I recognize that intellectually, but piled on top of each other they become a festering boil on my psyche which turns me into Dan-The-Powderkeg. It's worse when I'm tired; yesterday I was exhausted and irritated all day and several small annoying things happened, culminating in a pedestrian who wandered out in the middle of the street and stood in front of my car as I was driving down the road. This was annoying, but then she shook her head dismissively at me as if I was the idiot wandering out where I wasn't supposed to be (she was jaywalking). I rolled down my window and started yelling at her. I don't remember exactly what I said; something along the lines of if she wanted to commit suicide, not to pick my car. My wife was appalled.

My fuse is very short now that I am in the 72 Hour Danger Zone of No More Cigs.

Yesterday a crack-head appeared, wraithlike, on my landing, demanding a lighter. Yes, that's what we are: the Clerkenwell Smoking Accessories Centre. Someone actually asked my upstairs neighbour if they had any tinfoil. I shouted at Mr Crack-Head to get the fuck out of our stairwell, schnell!, and to make sure the door didn't hit his arse on the way out.

I always get angry. All the time. More in a grumpy passionate arguing outraged slightly tongue in cheek kind of way. My friends laugh alot when I am arguing about something. I end up laughing then aswell. It's kind of a recurring theme in our "arguments".

I've obviously gotten my dander up at points on these boards, though hopefully not *too* often. I get generally riled in my mind about universal idiocy, ie politicians who I'd like to dump in boiling oil and those who follow them without question. But I don't let that translate to getting peeved at my friends, at least I hope not. Perhaps happily, I'm not quite like cosmic twin Dan, though I can get annoyed at things easily enough -- especially if you're coming to complain about a bill. ;-) Mostly, I'll just brood for a bit and then relax. Last time I went off on somebody directly was October, and in fact I think that was the first time I went off on anybody in such a complete, total and utter way in, well, years? More than a decade, even? I'm not sure. Anyway, the guy deserved it, being the lackadaisical ex-housemate now currently hiding in Texas.

Argh Ned, you are making me RELIVE THE FURY. I keep seeing this girl shaking her head at me and I want to YELL. (NOTE TO IL*: Do not shimmy in front of me.)

D'oh. Well, imagine her turning into Ja Rule.

How surreal! But it works! I'm now going to imagine every little thing that irritates me turning into Ja Rule.

WWJRD?

See, there's always hope. :-)

I'm a veritable ball of fucking hatred, but fortunately I've passed the stage where I'm throwing things at everybody and breaking doors (well, most of the time). For the past two years I've been veering between apathetic-to-the-point-of-narcolepsy misery to seething mass of rage (via oblivious catatonic drunkeness, lalala hello?), but I seem to have got it to the stage where the only person who has to deal with any of it is me. Which is just wonderful, oh it is so lovely.

I have no idea why I'm saying this on an internet message board, especially not one that members of my band read. What a fucking twat, hey?

WWJRD, e.mily?

And why can't I spell your name?

The only things that make me lose my temper these days are frustration and personal stupidity. It happens pretty much 2-3 times a day, then.

i have supreme anger. i can't decide whether its because i am immensely paranoid or whether its because people are fuckheads. i'll go for the latter, it avoids painful self-examination, and makes my tantrums seem necessary.

Blessings of Power to ex-smoker suzy