furious

“I think a lot of women have convinced themselves they’re sad when they’re actually furious.” — Christina Tucker @xtinatucker

I don’t know how to be angry. I don’t know how to write about being angry. I’ve been angry so long, but I haven’t named it, not really. I didn’t know how to live anger in a healthy way. I still don’t.

I wonder if I have ever believed in anger. I mean, it must just be hormones.

It seems absurd to me that I just now realized that the word “furious” fits me. Seeing that quote by Christina Tucker hit my heart-gut like boom, and then I was dumbstruck. Huh, I said to me, I think anger is underneath all of this heaviness I feel and all of this pain I call anxiety and depression. (Both are still real things, but I’m just saying that maybe part of their catalyst is that I’m angry.)

This is so weird for me. I knew I was angry, but it was like it was part of a disorder. Or disorders. Things I’ve gotten help for, but can’t seem to settle into, not really. I’ve known I’m a generally anxious and depressed person for a very, very long time. And I know that I feel impatient and skin-crawly a lot of the time…but still. STILL. I did not name it. I did not fully see it.

I’m furious.

Often in my dreams I’m railing against something or someone, yelling, screaming, attacking. Livid. I wake up with a moment of satisfaction and then I’m humored and maybe a little scared. What was that?

It doesn’t suit me. Right? I mean, I’m nice and loving, right?

My daughter is angry. She says so all the time. She adds, FED UP!

Me too, I think. She is fed up over sickness all the time on everyone everywhere, and homework and anxiety and life, to name a few. Or at least I think that’s what it’s about? Maybe a lot that’s underneath it, for her, is the same as the rest of us. There’s nothing wrong with her. What is the deeper thing? Now I’m asking that for both of us.

I try not to tell this beautiful ten year old of mine she can’t be angry, but I think I tell her that anyway. I tell her all the time that anger is wrong even if I don’t say that explicitly. I say, Stop. Don’t yell. What are you so upset about? That’s enough. Don’t be rude.

Then other times, when I’m doing better, I tell her anger is normal and she’s not bad for feeling it. Let it out, girl. Have at it.

But I don’t really know how to show you how to do that.

Either way she slams the door to her bedroom and then comes out later apologizing. It’s a cycle. I do it, too. I lose it over some stupid shit that isn’t what I’m furious about. What I’m furious about is underneath, I don’t know what it is exactly yet. Maybe I’ll find out.

We are culturally hell bent on quiet and keeping the peace. We believe anger is terrible. It’s an awful idea. It will rock all the boats and make people not like you. Keep the peace. Be nice. Calm down. Stay on the eggshells. Don’t let the sun go down on your anger. (If it does, you might dream you’re in a rage.)

As kids the stopping of our very selves came at us in sighs and redirection and sit still. Stop it. Stop it. Don’t. Settle down. Someone was always angry but pretending not to be and we could sense it. Or they were flat-out mean and terrible but we could not be mean or terrible in return. We were not allowed.

So now what do we do with our angry selves all tied up while we sit inside, sick again. Sick with some never-ending virus and all the world ablaze with angry people being angry in such disgusting ways. Look at that anger. See? Anger is bad.

We don’t learn how to do it, be it. Some of us don’t even let it out sideways, we’re so well-trained. So refrained. So nice.

Sometimes I fold the laundry like it’s done something to me. Take that, denim. You should hear the snap when I shake out those jeans. Or I put the dishes in the dishwasher, again, too loudly. I’m just tired, I say. I’m sorry, I say.

What would you be so furious about, Heather?

I don’t know. Stinky socks and sweatpants? Crusty bowls and Nutella spoons? Dog hair? COVID? Winter? Loss? Pain? Being misunderstood. Being “too sensitive” and not trusting myself because of the lies and the shhhh, that’s enough, settle down. I don’t know. I guess the list is long.

Would those of us who are furious be so furious if we had felt the anger as it came, let it direct us? What if we had been allowed, and not asked if we have PMS, or called a bitch or too intense.

I’m not angry. I’m just hurt. I’m not mad, I’m just tired.

Why can’t it all be felt, all at once?

Yesterday, when mulling this over, I heard someone on MPR quote the Bible and I will now paraphrase the scripture, Go ahead and be angry, just don’t let it make you an asshole.

Anger isn’t everything that I am. It is not everything my daughter is. It is a byproduct. It is a reason. It is a necessary emotion. Anger is not ugly, it’s telling us something. I know this, but I haven’t ever really known it until now, at forty six years old. It is simply something to unpack, for me, in therapy. It is another thing to unpack. Use for good. Turn over. Redeem, reshape and name.

My precious daughter with her Big Feelings and me with mine. We are wild and creative and kind. We are layered and hurt and loving and furious.