Published on 12, July, 2020
Hello everyone,
TL;DR: I'm looking for advice on dealing with my mood swings and outbursts of anger.
I'm hoping for a bit of advice. I've had mood swings a lot throughout my life. I'm not sure if they are tied to my autism or not, but today I had a massive mood swing going from happy to angry and ended up snapping at my wife which, understandably, really upset her. It's been a very long time since I've done this, but several years ago, during a time which I now recognise as me being in burnout and struggling a lot, I had a lot of moments like this.
I was wondering if anyone has any advice on how to manage these things. For context, I was trying to make hot chocolate for the family using a velvetiser thing from hotel Chocolat (as a side note I highly recommend these). They use flakes of grated chocolate, but a few weeks ago they were left on top of the air fryer and several of the sachets melted and clumped up. I tried breaking this up before use but some got stuck in the machine which causes the motor to make a horrible sound which makes me freak out because I feel like it's going to break the machine. I got distressed by this, but my wife just said it's fine and to keep it going but I ended up snapping at her and I upset her.
I fully appreciate that I am in the wrong here, but I would appreciate if anyone can suggest anything to help with managing situations like this where things are rapidly going wrong without me getting angry.
Thanks,
Phil
Unless you are using understatement I don't think you have an anger issue if this is the first time you have snapped at your wife in several years! Assuming snapped at just means spoke slightly harshly, or even yelled at.
If it is not understatement, then I and my husband and both my exes and my parents and our friends all have anger issues worse than you! I mean, it's possible we do, but i assumed it was reasonably normal to snap at someone in a stressful situation... Several times a day would be excessive, once a month would seem reasonably calm. How does one know what is normal?
Hi AuTriker.
The "several years ago" reference was about a time when I would regularly get angry and verbally aggressive (I'd never get physically aggressive with anyone). I think yes this was a bit of an understatement, but I was thinking more here about the rapid change in mood. We'd just sat down to watch one of my favourite films with my eldest and I was quite happy, and then this incident lead to a complete reverse of that in a very short space of time. I also have instances where I might become very down (I'd avoid saying "depressed" but it's that kind of feeling) as well so it's not just anger.
I think rapid mood change can be associated with ADHD (I am autistic and ADHD). I don't see why it is strange to be in a good mood, then something is annoying so i get annoyed with it, but sometimes if I am a more relaxed mood I don't get as annoyed.