Healthy releases of anger
Another key to an anger avoidance plan is to short-circuit irate feelings or get them out in a healthier way. Unfortunately, many women go for not-good-for you fixes when upset: overeating, smoking, drinking or giving your credit card a workout instead of your body. Instead, if you're getting steamed, says Sandra Thomas, director of the PhD program in nursing at the University of Tennessee, go somewhere private, breathe deeply and repeat a mantra. "One I really like a lot," she says, "is I'm breathing out anger. I'm breathing in peace."
Doing this, says Thomas, sends the stress hormones in your brain a message: "Hey guys, we're not going to fight. We're going to calm down here." There's also the "relaxation response," a phrase coined by Dr. Herbert Benson, founder of The Mind Body Medical Institute in Chestnut Hill, Mass. One technique involves sitting quietly with eyes closed, relaxing your muscles from your feet to your neck, breathing slowly and repeating a word or phrase. "[It's] really an exercise in quieting the brain," says Marianne J. Legato, author of Why Men Never Remember and Women Never Forget (Rodale, 2005), "and it changes the blood flow to the brain, changes brain metabolism.... [It] leaves the person not only refreshed but better able to think and remember." They work best, says Cohen, if they become a habit. "Do them regularly. Don't wait until you're having a stressful day."
Exercising the rest of your body is also important. Doing some physical activity, says Middelton-Moz, calms your body down. "It releases the power of the anger and helps you get back in balance," she says. Exercise causes the brain to release endorphins, pleasure-inducing, pain-killing hormones. An overall wellness plan includes eating right, talking with friends and getting enough sleep.
Getting a grip is good for you. "Anger does seem to have this cumulative effect," says DiGiuseppe. "When people don't resolve problems, their patience wears thin and they're likely to explode." However, being assertive, doing some physical activity and understanding your anger have an immediate effect on your health, says Middelton-Moz. "It takes practice, it takes awareness and it takes breaking the myths you've lived with all of your life.... The good news is that as soon as you begin to do that, you're stopping the damage you've been doing."
Wendy is developing strategies for her triggers. "I'm prepared for specific situations," she says. "But if they catch me off guard, I'll have to think about how to deal with it." After the spat with her aunt, Wendy and a cousin had a disagreement. After he snapped at her, she told him it wasn't OK to speak to her so rudely and left the room before things escalated. "Some people are really good at expressing boundaries and demanding respect when they're angry," she says. "That's where I want to be."
Is mad bad?
Being mad isn't a bad thing; it can actually be good for you. "When you're angry," says Raymond DiGiuseppe, "you have what we would call high self-efficacy or high belief in your ability to change the world. That's really a good thing."
Twenty-six years ago, Candy Lightner of Fair Oaks, Calif., outraged at the death of her teenage daughter, Cari, who was killed by a repeat-offender drunk driver, formed Mothers Against Drunk Driving. More recently, singer-songwriter Sarah McLachlan, upset by a promoter's certainty that people wouldn't pay to see more than one woman on a tour, launched Lilith Fair. The concert series raised more than $7 million for various charities and, in 2004, was named one of the 50 moments that changed rock and roll by Rolling Stone magazine.
People who express empowering anger, says DiGiuseppe, are focused on the future - thinking about the kinds of changes they would like to see and coming up with a concrete plan for making them happen - whereas people with vengeful anger are stuck in the past, coming up with what-I-should-have-said fantasies, for instance.
"When you express anger as you feel it," says author Jane Middelton-Moz, "you don't take it out on your heart, your stomach, and your other vital organs."
Women who use anger in a positive way, says DiGiuseppe, may have a glass-is-half-full attitude toward life in general, seeing the good in everything, even the bad.
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