| June
18, 2000
Last March, I got an email from Richard
on an article that dealt with passive-aggressive anger in the victim, Burnt Offerings. I heard from him again this week when
he wrote to tell about his recovery experiences. More power to you
Richard! His March email is followed by the June submission.
Please note that although the original
article was written with regard to "victim" anger, the topic is
equally applicable to abuser anger. Victims and abusers - a somewhat
arbitrary distinction - were both victims; are both victims...
Dr. Irene
Subject: "The Victim's Anger:
Burnt Offerings" article
Very, very well written. This is the first article on
the internet I have found so far which does not just simply
"blast" the person who does this behavior. You took the time to
explain what happened to the person to make them act like this.
I never realized it was my inability to express my anger and frustration.
Total denial. I really liked part "She is unlikely to get a handle on
her life and her behavior until she owns her anger and takes
responsibility for her behavior."
You have given me ideas of how to recognize my behavior when I do it.
(Afterwards unfortunately though for now.) Now I can recognize the
behavior. I look forward to "fixing" this part of my life.
Thank you so much for this information. Richard
Richard sent the following in this week:
Being PA (Passive Aggressive)
Let me tell you what it is like actually being a PA.
When you are first told, by someone you respect, that they think you are
PA, the first thing you think is "f*** you. Nothing is wrong with me.
"Who are YOU to call me names and label ME?"
Then you decide to humor yourself to prove them wrong and you do the
research on the Internet. You read and what you read is very, very
unpleasant. What you are reading is really you and you never even knew
these things about yourself! You realize you are a real jerk. More
research finds nothing much except that most PA's are buttheads
<grin> and treat people poorly. Wow. This is a little too
close for comfort.
The question remains though,
Why am I like this?
You cry a lot and you don't even know why.
I finally realized that I had a very unhappy childhood, which I had to
suppress as my own survival mechanism. My father was/still is a
screamer/yeller and my mother allowed it to happen. When you are
continually told you can never do this or that right, yelled at pretty
much continually, made fun of, name calling, picked on, etc. you basically
just shut down as a child and become very afraid to even try much of
anything. You are almost never told you did a good job on ???? Or, you are
a starting receiver for the football team and you father would rather
watch TV than throw the football to you for practice.
Why would anyone want to actually try anything and possibly confirm they
are stupid or dumb and that their parents are right? After all, they are
your parents who "love" you. When you did try as a child and you
made mistakes, you were not shown how to do it right, you were yelled at
and told to go into the house by the parent, who always said, "I'll
fix it."
You don't remember much laughter in my house. You never invited anyone
over, ever. When you did, your parents seem to always treat the visitors
better than they treated you. This was very painful since you feel like
"why can't my own parents be this nice to me?" You didn't invite
others over very often. You have very few friends even now.
You went to school and goofed off. You never ever studied and did
homework. Your parents didn't know or even seem to care what classes you
were taking. You were only criticized on the "D" in math and not
complemented on the 5 A's in the other classes. You were told "we
expect perfection". You try and you cannot do it so you're told your
stupid. You did manage to pass school without even trying very hard.
You are very afraid to stretch and test your limits and skills. Not only
the physical limits but also the mental and spiritual limits.
You get so used to being told how to think, what to think and when to
think and when you eventually find yourself as an adult, the only
parenting "skillsets" you have developed is the same as the
"parents" who treated you like crap.
I was taught how to be dependent on someone else to do my thinking for me.
As a child, you learn not to show any emotion or you'll be considered weak
and a crybaby. So, you don't. You just shut down.
And the cycle continues.
I can remember getting my younger brothers up for school, making them
breakfast, (I still hate puffed rice) getting them dressed, (often in
dirty clothes), kissing my Mom (who couldn't get out of bed due to the
variety of psychotic medications) good-bye and walk to school with my
brothers. I did this for many years. I think I started this when I was 8
or 9.
I can actually remember my father breaking and smashing my toys when he
was mad and handing them back to me. I have never, ever heard an apology.
You learn to feel anger and hate at families and other people who seem to
be happy and actually get along and appear to actually like each other.
You hate them since they seem to be happy. You hate others who can think
for themselves and are self-confident and happy.
You are told you cannot be "white collar" since we are a
"blue collar" family. Your family entertainment consisted of
watching TV. No talking AT ALL except during commercials. Vacations,
scouting, sports, etc. seemed to always end up with lots of arguing,
fighting and screaming either on the way there, the way home or once you
were home. Sometimes, it was all
of them.
You didn't dare talk back so you just kept in all the frustration, anger,
hate, everything.
I learned how to be shown, not to learn, or try or think on my own.
Very little you did was ever good enough or correct.
"Nice work", "good job" were almost never heard. Hugs
from Dad? I don't
think so.
And the "funny" thing is, you still defend your family to
others.
This is what I learned as a child.
When it is time for you to leave the nest and go out on your own, you are
scared to death. You only leave after going into the Navy. Your scared,
but excited. You write and call and almost never get anything back except
a message saying "these phone bills age getting expensive". You
don't call or write much after that.
When you enter the "real" workforce outside of the service, you
get to a certain level and are scared to break the glass ceiling since you
don't want anyone to make fun of you for making a mistake. You feel like
you actually should not be in the position you are in and that you will be
ridiculed that you might be found out you really are not all that smart.
So, you get into a comfortable position and you stagnate.
When you do make a decision, you are seldom confident in the decision and
feel that if it is wrong, people will just re-confirm what the you have
been told over and over,
You're stupid.
So, you never learned how to think and act as an adult even though you are
now an adult.
Your "adult" skills have not been learned. You don't know how to
ask for help to learn them so you just stumble along trying to figure out
to get them. You don't want anyone to know you don't know. When you don't
know, you revert back to what you have been taught, no matter how crappy
it is, because that is what you have been taught and after- all, you've
been told your too stupid to learn anything else.
I didn't learn to talk and discuss situations with my wife, I did learn to
yell and scream at her like my parents did/still do. I did not learn to
talk and teach my children, I learned to yell and scream or to send them
into the house or bed and "I'll take care of it".
I do not yet even feel like an adult or even a parent. I feel like some
dumb kid who is playing father figure.
As an adult, you finally get to the point in your life where you realize
that you are very unhappy and for the life of you, cannot figure out why.
The more you try and figure out what is wrong, the more frustrated you get
and the more you lash out at those who only are actually trying to help.
One day researching, you finally find the answer to "Why am I like
this?"
For me, I found that it was the "little boy"/inner child (I hate
that term !!) inside of me basically felt unwanted and unloved since it is
obvious, as a child, feeling like you are too broken and stupid to even
being loved by your own parents.
And you cry, a lot, and you don't know why. I mean deep crying with snot
coming out your nose and dripping off your chin crying. Inside of you is
the little boy whose favorite model car was just smashed because he was
playing with it and wouldn't take his nap. He was not allowed to show that
it hurt so you just act like it is no big deal. After all, you HAVE to be
a man.
38 years of emotions bottled up and never allowed to release. Scared.
Numb. Feeling dead inside. No feelings allowed.
The more you think about this little boy inside, you feel how hurt he is
and the more you want to cry not only for him, but with him for his pain,
anger and frustration. You want to try and ease the pain he is going
through and tell him he is not stupid and dumb.
After all, he's just a little boy.
The real kicker is, I am named after my father. My family was very mad
when we would not name my son the same name.
No doubt about it, I am passive-aggressive.
So you say to yourself, "How can I help this little boy?"
Once you actually realize the problem, what do you do?
I am trying to learn how to think like an adult and become the person the
little boy inside wanted to be when he grew up. I have to learn to
re-discover what makes that little boy smile and laugh.
What were this little boy's dreams? What were his goals?
I have to learn to not only love the little boy inside, I also need to
learn to become the father I never had, the mother I never had and the
type of parent(s) I never had. My current views of my life may be off
track a bit as an adult. I am still seeing the world as a scared little
boy.
When you finally realize what you have "become", you are very
disappointed. The little boy inside expected more out of his life.
I would think that other people who feel they are also going through
mid-life crises are also feeling much of these same things.
There is a little person inside them who was never really loved, and
that's all the little person really wants. After that feeling is settled,
go on from there.
I think of PA as a bad car wreck (Nobody dead, lots of damage). You don't
see the police officer just say "Yep, that's a bad car wreck"
and walk away. No, the police look for the cause of the wreck.
What is the "cause(s)" of the behavior?
I think this is the one main question I think every PA needs to ask
themselves once they finally realize what they are doing. Getting a PA to
actually recognize the behavior is going to be another thing. <grin>
Recognizing/Realizing the behavior is very hard though. You have to admit
to yourself have a "personality/psych" problem. Not nice to tell
anyone much less telling yourself.
It took a lot of soul searching for me to recognize the behavior.
What really worked for me, and hope works for others, is to think about
and write down your painful memories as far back as you can go. This will
hurt, a lot. Expect lots of tears and snot.
I then used a mirror and just looked at myself and thought about what I
wrote. I thought about my past, my frustrations, anger, hatred, and
happiness. Expect even more tears and snot. (grin)
*** I could not do the above 2 things right after each other. It took me a
while to "recover" from what I wrote. Others might have the
"strength", I could not.
You cannot lie to yourself while looking in the mirror. You will see the
little boy/girl inside who was hurt and now as the adult, you will
hopefully understand why you were hurting during that time. It's like
looking at yourself and talking to yourself when you were ??? years old.
You tell them they are not ??? and they deserve ??? or words to help
them/you through this hurt. You have to be the "parent" to
yourself that you never had and needed and wanted.
This "exercise" takes more than once to get through.
I really think anger and hate are the keys. You don't realize how angry or
hateful you became because you just bottled it up. As a kid, you don't
always know, or have any options, how to deal with anger, frustration and
hate.
Sooner or later, it will all "click". It feels like a huge
weight has been removed and you are, for probably the first time, start to
experience happiness. You feel giddy and grin like a fool for absolutely
no reason.
I now am starting to recognize the behavior in me and I am also starting
to see it in others.
I am learning to catch it (PA behavior) in myself, sometimes.
Unfortunately, I still sometimes see it AFTER I do it. <bummer> I'm
not over it (PA behavior) yet. As a matter of fact, I PA'd big time last
night.
At least now I can see it which is the first step to trying to prevent it
before it occurs. I know I won't always be successful. If I can catch it 1
time, it's much better than before.
I am just glad I am starting to learn about my behavior now and trying to
change it and not when my own children are already grown and it is all
they know. Then the cycle will have continued another generation.
So, this is what I am going through.
Don't look at a PA as someone who is just trying to piss you off. Chances
are, they aren't.
This poem always makes me think and brightens my day.
"Naked we come into this world and naked we shall leave it. When the
day and hour comes that no man knows, the only thing we will take with us
is our loves, our friendships, our angers, our hopes, our laughter, our
tears, our Memories. These are our only true possessions. We can make more
money but the savings account of days and hours is all we will ever really
have.
Don't miss the sunrises, rainbows or the sunsets. You only get so many
chances.
May you and yours be happy and
well."
Richard
Honest and heartfelt...good stuff! Thank you
Richard! My very warmest regards, Dr. Irene |
