Let's start with introductions. My name's Ian.
All: Hello, Ian.
Oh! I didn't realize you were all here already! Man, this Internet is boss. So, how many are we?
All: Almost 7 billion.
That's RIGHT! EVERYONE is angry! EVERYONE needs anger management! I'm so glad you all could make it. Let me tell you why I'm here. Besides being court-appointed and all. The simple fact is, I let my anger get the best of my self control and I nearly killed my ex wife with a well-aimed ceramic ashtray. She's all right now, thank God. No permanent damage. Physical damage, anyway. The raw emotion of that moment is something that I will never forget. My frustration turning to anger, which turned to rage, which turned to blinding rage, which then turned into an action I can never undo, and is forever on my Permanent Record.
So now I decided to write this blog and hope that others out there will read my words and maybe glean some insight and apply it to their lives. Or even better, help me discover insight into my own torn psyche-- why am I the way I am?
I have been going to weekly meetings for some 30-odd weeks now, and it has only now occurred to me that I need to write my feelings down in a way that will help me make sense of them. Then, hopefully, I can work hard to live a more normal life, maybe get into another relationship, if I'm fortunate; and learn to recognize the signs of anger before it's too late, if SHE'S fortunate.
I had said that I felt blinding rage. That's not precisely true. To call it blinding would be to discount my actions; as if I had no control over what I did. I had FULL control over my actions. I remember being so enraged at what she did that I picked up the first hard thing that I could find and launched it at her head. I own that fact; and I am profoundly ashamed by it.
More than that, I remember that my emotions changed abruptly in the time the missile left my hand, no longer in my control. Like a knife plunging into my stomach, I felt the ice-cold jolt of panic at what could happen to her if that ashtray made its mark-- and I was frozen. I wanted to reach my arm out and grab it before it connected, or at least push her out of the way to avoid the blow. Instead, I watched in seeming slow motion as it connected with her skull, above and behind her right ear. She clutched her head and ran inside, screaming "I'm gonna call the Police!"
I remember feeling great relief that I hadn't killed her-- it's true, we were divorced, and I hated her sometimes; but we had many great times in our history and she was the mother of my child, and I remember thinking how selfish it would be of me to rob a kid of their mother. Of course, the cowardly "I don't wanna go to jail" popped into my head as well, and so I took off, and left her alone. Another thing I'll not likely forgive myself for. Can I tell you how low I felt? How much like a lower life form? Jail would have been too good for me.
The funny thing is, I am normally staunchly anti-violent. In normal situations, I keep my cool, maintain the upper hand, and use humor or empathy to diffuse the situation, whatever it may be. I have truly not been in a fight in my life that wasn't rolling around on the ground with a friend over a Zagnut bar when I was 10. So where did that rage come from? How could I do that to another human being?
These are questions I'm not likely to answer anytime soon, and certainly not here, today, in this inaugural blog. I suppose the best I can hope for is what the counselors in anger management keep telling me: to recognize my physical cues of anger and arrest them before I cross the danger line in the cycle of violence. Shorthand: Keep My Cool.
I sincerely respect any comments you folks wish to make, and will read them without anger. Just be sure to leave your address.
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