If you only knew how much I wished I could be more carefree
For as long as I can remember, my father has had a habit of getting very angry in heated situations and yelling and then, generally no more than an hour later, having calmed down, being super apologetic and regretful of his actions (as far as I can tell). For as much as we've told him this, I have never seen him even begin to overcome it. For the most part, it's not a big deal to us anymore, in fact we used to joke that he was being "bipolar," before I knew the real meaning of the word.
I always thought I had been able to shake whatever imbalance I inherited from my father in this respect. Certainly any temper I get is from him... I'm the only one who will shout back at him, not that that helps matters. But I've always been careful not to let any anger I have get out of hand.
However, now that I've been in enough heated, grown-up situations, I've realized that I do exactly the same thing he does, except instead of yelling and being angry, I feel intensely sorry for myself, and I get sullen and cry, at the expense of the other person. And then, about when I'm done feeling sorry for myself, this wave of regret comes over me and it's actually remarkable how much turnaround there is, it's like in my head I do a complete 180, and I just hate myself for what I've done. I hate myself for being so selfish and there I am, being my father, apologizing profusely and thinking of nothing but you.
People used to say I cried to manipulate people, because every time I got into an argument with someone at school I would cry, and then, if there were sides to be picked, who wasn't going to rush to the crying girl's side? This was followed up by a little less serious manipulation, when I "cried to get out of detention." Not exactly, I just felt so sorry for myself that I cried, causing the detention-giver to feel just sorry enough to let me off the hook. Jesus. I'm sick of feeling sorry for myself. I do it far too often. But if my dad couldn't control his heated, emotional anger, how can I control this?
When someone yells when they get emotional, it's pretty easy to blame them. It's easy to say, look, you're hurting the people around you. When I cry and feel completely sorry for myself, I'm hurting the people around me too. But for some reason it looks a little less clear cut because I appear to be in so much pain too. Is it really any different? Maybe I am manipulative.
I always thought I had been able to shake whatever imbalance I inherited from my father in this respect. Certainly any temper I get is from him... I'm the only one who will shout back at him, not that that helps matters. But I've always been careful not to let any anger I have get out of hand.
However, now that I've been in enough heated, grown-up situations, I've realized that I do exactly the same thing he does, except instead of yelling and being angry, I feel intensely sorry for myself, and I get sullen and cry, at the expense of the other person. And then, about when I'm done feeling sorry for myself, this wave of regret comes over me and it's actually remarkable how much turnaround there is, it's like in my head I do a complete 180, and I just hate myself for what I've done. I hate myself for being so selfish and there I am, being my father, apologizing profusely and thinking of nothing but you.
People used to say I cried to manipulate people, because every time I got into an argument with someone at school I would cry, and then, if there were sides to be picked, who wasn't going to rush to the crying girl's side? This was followed up by a little less serious manipulation, when I "cried to get out of detention." Not exactly, I just felt so sorry for myself that I cried, causing the detention-giver to feel just sorry enough to let me off the hook. Jesus. I'm sick of feeling sorry for myself. I do it far too often. But if my dad couldn't control his heated, emotional anger, how can I control this?
When someone yells when they get emotional, it's pretty easy to blame them. It's easy to say, look, you're hurting the people around you. When I cry and feel completely sorry for myself, I'm hurting the people around me too. But for some reason it looks a little less clear cut because I appear to be in so much pain too. Is it really any different? Maybe I am manipulative.