Anger
I think this has been my biggest hurdle to overcome. After dealing with a sociopath, I have had so many horrible, horrible things happen to me–from the abuse by the sociopath to the abuse by his enablers to watching my false friends fall under his spell and stab me in the back. I have had to endure all this while I KNOW the truth, while I have tried to show people all of the facts only to find that his charming lies override my ugly truths.
I have found that more people were angry at me for showing my anger than they were angry at the narcopath who abused me. People gossiped about me right in front of my face saying I must be the problem since I was so mad. A religious person told me I was the problem for not forgiving. Another person who agreed that my ex was an abuser said that I was still the problem because I was “attacking” him by telling people what he did to me and so many others. A pastor told me I was the problem for airing “dirty laundry” that should remain private. If I showed anger, that made me the bad person–even worse than the person who abused me until I was angry. I had more than one person tell me that, even if he did abuse me, I was still the problem because I continued to be angry. (Funny, because he’s continued to abuse more women, and they aren’t concerned about that!)
Of course I am angry!
I’ve had well-meaning friends tell me I have to stop being angry and being upset. I know that’s true, but after someone has desecrated your life, your self-esteem, your feelings and your character, it’s hard not to be angry. You can’t just wake up and not be angry. And that is okay. Just like forgiveness takes time, (if you choose to forgive,) so does getting past anger. You have to live through the anger. There is nothing wrong with feeling it. There are good and bad ways to express it, but the anger itself is a natural and very valid emotion. And yet, people fear it and consider it all bad–or have considered me bad for feeling it or admitting I feel it.
Anger is a valid emotion!
My anger is well-deserved. I put up with a lot before I finally kicked the abuser out of my life, and I put up with more after he was gone. I know it’s okay for me to feel it, but at the same time, I knew at some point I had to figure out how to escape it and get to the next step of recovery. At some point, once I’d stewed in my anger enough, I had to make a conscience effort to say “no more.” Of course, it still comes back some days when I’m reminded of something horrible, but it doesn’t rule my life anymore. I don’t wake up angry and go to bed angry like I did at first.
It was never a raging anger. It was a mixture of hurt, sadness, disappointment, anger, depression, confusion, stress and more. A darkness that took over every single day. I had the weight of knowing how dangerous this person was, how much he hurt me and others, the possibility that he’d hurt me again, and the sick feeling of knowing that, not only was he not held responsible, but he was getting all the sympathy and support by pretending he was the victim while I was the one suffering. What frustration.
When I decided it was time to stop being angry, I had to purposefully change my thoughts, refocus and redirect them. The reality is, that bad things happened to me. I could easily dwell on them, but now I say no. I’m not pretending nothing happened or denying reality, but I am accepting that I can’t control what happened or how others treat me. I had to accept the things I couldn’t change and start focusing on something better.
But I don’t feel guilty for feeling angry….
Hi! Thank you for your article about anger after narcissistic abuse. Right now I am at the point of being terribly angry. I am so angry that don’t know how to control it. Also some people are treated by me with way too big anger than normally only because I am full of anger after 6 years of abuse. I am also a little bit paranoid – I perceive people as trying to hurt me because my ex still send people (like police or lawyers) as mediators between us to prove me he was right and I am the one to blame. I cut off all relations with his family (they blame me) but still they find the way to contact me and my family and show how much better they are. Please, give me any advices how to manage anger issue and stop being so paranoid.
Wish you the best,
Jola
Thanks for this article.
I also feel really angry. The guy who was abusive with me is being socially applauded for being a ‘sensible’ and ‘feminist’ person. He is in a left wing party in my town. I feel rage and I’m scared even to speak about that because I know people will blame me for “trying to destroy his status”. The only thing I want is that reality comes to surface and to avoid that he is secretly abusive to another woman.
This! The covert narcissist ex-girlfriend abused me so much emotionally and mentally. She would make me feel bad for doing my hobbies. She tried to get me to be angry at her and she wanted me to have hate-sex with her. She manipulated my emotions and abused my desire to have a normal relationship with her. No matter what I explained or how much I complimented her, there was always another “misunderstanding”. When I didn’t want to move in with her because she changed the date on the ticket to an earlier time, she got worse. She kept being seductive and she also said marriage. Then she said august, but then she went silent. She didn’t get to be with me or marry me and she ruined my hobbies. I’m angry at her. She never loved me back and nothing I did was able to fix it. She doesn’t want to stop being a narcissist. She keeps being mean and making me feel bad. She only abused me and gave me chest pains! I’m sad, angry, confused, and traumatized. She needs neurosurgery! Narcissism is pure evil!