Overwhelmed and behaving aggressive

This is what I hear for quite some time from my husband,  but recently got even worse.  I hear that I'm being argumentative, sometimes aggressive,  gruff etc. And I get questions,  why I'm angry. I ask myself for years, why I'm angry when I hear it from others. Or why I'm moody,when I hear it. Only relatively recently I understood,  that what I feel is not always what others perceive.  So it led me to a discovery,  that this bad behaviour is my reaction to overwhelm and stress. We have one child toddler. I can't really connect and play good with the little one. She often must repeat few times before I process what she says and respond. After 15 minutes spent with them I'm exhausted and totally overwhelmed.  In more extreme cases I feel my brain shaking and I bang my head off of a wall to calm down. Recently I had few days headache and nausea because of that, my husband wanted to call ambulance. I feel like a very bad parent and also bad wife and I'm afraid of losing my family.  I take care of them in terms of cooking, cleaning, helping, providing as much as I can but spending time with them is often a torture for me. After 15 minutes with them I need 30 minutes of pacing my kitchen and my long loop thoughts about alien encounters etc. I shouldn't have become mother, but I didn't know about it before it happened.  I love my family, I don't want to lose them. 

There are not many options available for me such as therapies. I don't know how to control my reactions, in order to not appear angry or crazy to my loved ones. 

Parents
  • Ouch I’m so sorry you banged your head Head bandage I hope you are feeling better. I’m not a parent so I can’t offer parental advice but I do believe parenting can be super challenging but don’t feel you are a bad wife or parent because I’m sure you’re not. One technique to try and cool anger down quicker is to either put your face in ice cold water and hold your breath for a bit (no longer than 30 seconds). You can also use an ice pack and lean forward, cover your face with the ice pack and hold your breath too. I also believe putting your wrists in cold water can help too. Please don’t go so hard on yourself x

  • Thank you, I will try with the ice. Problem is that its not anger. I don't really know what it is, it just shakes me from inside, because it's too much of everything around and I can't cope. My loved ones think I'm angry, but I'm not and I have no reason to be angry. Then when my husband asks me why I'm so angry, I start apologising sometimes also crying.

  • I have no reason to be angry.

    Can I ask if you have issues in general in identifying and connecting to your emotions?

    If you do, this could be a case of you are feeling a build up of stress and your mind wants to express these as emotions and the most primal and accessible ones are fear and anger.

    Your mind may be channeling your emotions into anger because it does not have the tools to do otherwise.

    A good therapist could help you with this alexithymia and finding ways to manage the build up of stress in a healthier way. Just make sure they are skilled at helping with autism and alexithymia.

    As a quick release thing I found having a few boxes of cheap pencils around where I could snap one when I needed a release gave me a token action that helped me let it go. You need some mental processes to back this action but for me it works a treat.

Reply
  • I have no reason to be angry.

    Can I ask if you have issues in general in identifying and connecting to your emotions?

    If you do, this could be a case of you are feeling a build up of stress and your mind wants to express these as emotions and the most primal and accessible ones are fear and anger.

    Your mind may be channeling your emotions into anger because it does not have the tools to do otherwise.

    A good therapist could help you with this alexithymia and finding ways to manage the build up of stress in a healthier way. Just make sure they are skilled at helping with autism and alexithymia.

    As a quick release thing I found having a few boxes of cheap pencils around where I could snap one when I needed a release gave me a token action that helped me let it go. You need some mental processes to back this action but for me it works a treat.

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