Rages
 

I had a bunch of things go wrong today. And I'm not in a great place as it is. Everything I touched got ****** up. Typical adhd stuff.

I won't go into it all but I felt like all my deep feelings of unworthyness and inadequacy and failure all hot me at the same time. I flew into a rage and it took everything I had to calm down and not smash stuff or hurt myself. I really wanted to hurt myself. Then I just ended up crying.

I don't want to get like this because I know I'm scarey. How do you bring yourself back when you feel like you can't contain it anymore?

Re: Rages
 

Meditation. There are great apps out there that are guided meditation. Don't worry if your mind wanders, they say that's normal. It's really just people telling you to breathe.

There have been times in my life where I have just required the opportunity to thrash. Hub use to hold me and I would just grrrr and try to get him off of me and that worked wonders as well. (no, I never hurt him) My current meds have made it so that doesn't happen anymore. Guess there's some benefit to being bipolar...good drugs :p

Re: Rages
 

You know, the trick is to simply observe your breath, and observe what yo are observing.
Every time you notice your mind wandering, simply bring it back to the breath.
You need a solid target: ie sensation of breath at the nostrils, or at the belly button. Specificity helps.

I have bipolar too, and I have to say that holding focussed attention in a manic state is not at all easy.

Outside the manic state it is much easier.
From my perspective, when I am outside that state I am normal nd all is good.

Re: Rages
 

You know it is hard to give advice and hope that it will be correct, however my perspective is that it is not at all easy settling these states when they are going full on.
The question for me is how do I stay mindful enough to catch the flare up before it goes critical?

Re: Rages
 

I'm a firm believer in crying.

Re: Rages
 

That's what I ended up doing. Then continued for most of the night and then I ate a big packet of corn chips :(

It took most of today to recover and now I'm really tired.

Re: Rages
 

Usually kick or break inaminate objects curse alot eat Mac n cheese lots of ice cream etc

Re: Rages
 

Exercising (swimming, spinning, lifting weights) is what works best for me. Preferably early in the day. It leaves me relaxed for the whole day. Best regards!

Re: Rages
 

Me, too. It's even a part of my daily schedule that at 10.20 AM after going from toilet break I will punch a wall once for each hand. Coffee helps too.

Re: Rages
 

Remember they are just emotions and they are 1) not you and 2) not solid and are transient.

Take a deep breath or several to give the emotion space, and then get curious about it: how does it manifest itself physically in your body? Do you feel tight in the chest, hot in your face, tingly in your hands? Is it a certain color?

Then decide where the emotion ends, where are the edges? Can you work on the edges to start to untangle it?

This is the mindfulness approach to dealing with your emotions. I'm JUST learning how to do this, believe me!!

The point is to get some distance or objectivity from your emotions so that they, including this rage you are feeling, don't take you over. It's just another emotion that has come, and will go. Think of it as a storm cloud. A storm may suck, but it will not last forever.

Also please remember not to beat yourself up over feeling a "negative" emotion. Everyone feels all sorts of emotions, and you shouldn't judge yourself or attach any sort of value judgment to feeling one sort of emotion over another.

When you get better at mindfulness, you start to realize more and more that you can just honestly feel an emotion without having to act on it, unless you decide you want to. That takes practice and I'm not there yet either, but I'm working on it.

Check out the "Ten Percent" app if you have a smartphone. A lot of the content is free (although the course on emotions, unfortunately, requires a subscription). I don't work for them and am not getting any money for recommending the app, it's just a great app on mindfulness, which by the way is great for folks with ADHD in other ways.

Hope this helps,
Daniel

Re: Rages
 

What app is this about?

Rage-Reduction Kit?
 

I've posted on this somewhere before, and I hope it doesn't sound like I'm trivializing the force of these inner hurricanes. But about 25 years ago I had these exact same questions of "how will I prepare to deal with one of these storms the next time it happens?" And the corny-sounding gimmick I came up with seems to have been surprisingly effective.

Since I have been a "first-aid kit" sort of person since childhood, when I realized I was being blown off course by these rages, I decided I had to have some kind of tangible "kit" always with me. I commandeered a little travel money-pouch, so I could always have it on me...though really I more often carried it in my purse or briefcase.

In the pouch were 4 things: 2 little bottles of essential oils, one "calming" (like lavender), one "activating" (like orange or mint), a tissue, and a printed out "cheat sheet" of the mental exercise and reminders I thought (in my saner moments) would help me regain my balance.

The cheat sheet will be different for everybody...think about what your weaknesses are, and what a really good friend would tell you.

But two features that some might want to borrow are

1) --right off the bat--(while opening the calming scent and inhaling it) to link this rage to some childhood experience and take yourself back mentally to that time when you were largely innocent and helpless and seriously in need of protection, care and encouragement. Feel the hurt and fear and sense of injustice (or whatever). Now mentally give your younger self the physical protection and emotional comfort you needed then. What did you need to know and hear? Put some ideas on your cheat sheet. Take your time over this, as it often takes time for a child to stop crying and calm down.

2) Now it's time to put on your emotional raincoat (because you probably still have to deal with those same pricks and insensitive people) and you need to get back out there and fight those dragons and get on with real life. So take out the activating scent, and the encouraging script on your cheat sheet, and take some time to remind yourself you have been through a lot, you may be bruised but not beaten, you are still here, still kicking, and still moving toward the light--or whatever is on your cheat sheet.

I would say the whole routine would take me about 20 minutes, and was silent, but I needed privacy because of the crying and the need to focus on the exercise. I feel the scents were a huge help in "distracting" my emotional brain, but your mileage may vary.

The strange thing is that after going to all this trouble, I only ever actually used the full "Rage Reduction Kit" a few times after that (though I carried it for years), and I have only been knocked sideways by those old rages a few times in the last 25 years. So I'm wondering if it changed my brain somehow...if so, it was an improvement. I don't miss them.

Re: Rages
 

Thanks everyone some great responses here.

I think the rage comes from feelings of powerlessness and abandonment. And the expectation of humiliation and ridicule instead of assistance

I'm still doing trauma processing and that's bringing a lot of stuff up for me.

Most of the time I feel like it takes everything I have to keep it together and not be crying all the time. And I hate to use the word 'depressed so I'll say instead that depression is there. At least now through the therapy I know why I've spent almost all my life hating myself. I was trained to. :(

I'll check out that app I do think mindfulness and the first aid kit are great ideas

Re: Rages
 

or, I go back to bed fully dressed with make up and boots, sleep 2or3 hours an get up again. the boots on are very comfortable in bed and ready to go.

Re: Rages
 

I hit someone the other day. A stranger I'd got into an argument with. It wasn't hard and I'm a 100% sure that it didnt hurt but I do feel guilty and stupid and embarrassed about it. I also called his partner a stupid idiot though I don't feel so guilty about that.

With age I'm getting more and more easily angered and I'm more likely to lash out. I say things I regret because even if they are true saying them isn't worth the hurt they cause the other person.

Re: Rages
 

One thing that I have learned from my personal experience and also from using mindfulness with others, is that we are often wrong about the causation.
Ie we feel threatened and we react-- then needing to "make up an excuse for the way we acted. I think this is something I learned from Prof Dan Siegel.

Here he talks about the "downstairs brain" firing off too much.
The trick is that we do not know that this process is happening.
This talk is brillant

Mindfulness is a difficult skill to use effectively, and I think that it is much better to seek formal training rather than use an app.

Re: Rages
 

The app is called "Ten Percent". It used to be called "10% Happier". It's a mindfulness app I got for my iPhone. I don't work for them, I just found it makes mindfulness/meditation practice easy and convenient.

D.

Re: Rages
 

Is it available for free at Google Playstore?

Re: Rages
 

I don't know - it's available for free on the iPhone's store (the name escapes me right now, Apple store or iTunes or whatever)… There's a lot of free content, and then the more advanced courses require a subscription. I used it for free for over a year and then took the plunge.

Just do a search for "Ten Percent" on the Google Playstore and see if it's available.

D.

Re: Rages
 

I did it and after checking it, I'm not really interested so I skipped it.

Re: Rages
 

I use mindfulness exercises but also have found that playing guitar, exercise and carving are excellent outlets. There's something deeply satisfying about wailing on a chunk of wood when I'm worked up!

Re: Rages
 

I try to channel it by cleaning,or like others say playing guitar exercising etc.helps when I take my meds on a regular basis,boy that was hard to admit n kind of embarrassing..

Re: Rages
 

I forgot the link(s)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G0T_2NNoC68


and




http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FXxrJEnIboM

Re: Rages
 

One thing to be aware of in this area is that to be truly effective you need to stay with it long enough.
The sympathetic (stress _ response, once activated takes about 20 minutes to settle, and while it is active it will drag your attention back to negative thoughts and feed itself.
That is why a long enough period of meditation is required to calm things down properly.
Unless you get to that point the agitation might resume.
However, our memories are "filed" according to emotional state- so they may trigger recall of some difficult event that still carries that emotional charge, and that winds you up even more.

You end up in a loop.

Re: Rages
 

well, when I get frustrated I try to remember a good time for self soothing, doesn't matter with who, even if it's just a weird but good memory of me defeating super Mario bro's or something.

if you want my actual advice, knowledge from my own therapy, and it might not be the same thing for you, try to imagine in your head your own mother, father, and self, and remember the best time and worst time at the same time.

that good time with either of them, is your good place to go to when the switch get's flipped the wrong way.

just my 2 cents