I’m not even sure how to ask this. I am in a pretty good spot in life, although my schedule with the kids and work are making it so my own hobbies are nonexistent, which is a minor-ish irritation.
I have been getting irrationally angry at people though; traffic, my parking garage idiots, I almost got into a fight with a guy at the gas station who was a little aggressive with his panhandling (he drove up to me to ask for money?) , and most recently, some guy on my neighborhood page and I had a disagreement about a school board thing.
I had calmly explained why I thought he was wrong, and he started calling me names (yes, I know this is childish), but, our kids go to school together, so I told him he is welcome to say whatever he likes to my face instead. As dumb as this sounds, I am 95% willing to kick this guy’s ass when I see him.
I have never been described as low-intensity, but this recent wave is making me wonder if I’m crazy, or if people are more asshole-y than they have been in the past? Covid? divisive politics?
15 comments
You’re not crazy. People have lost their fucking minds in the last two years.
Scientifically speaking, the first year of the pandemic (2020) saw a 25% increase in anxiety and depression. This was [reported by the WHO](https://www.who.int/news/item/02-03-2022-covid-19-pandemic-triggers-25-increase-in-prevalence-of-anxiety-and-depression-worldwide), and represents a world-wide increase.
Anecdotally, I’ve seen other people have shorter tempers, and I’ve caught myself having a shorter temper as well. Then combine that with an increase in aggressive drivers, people having less patience, intentionally divisive political rhetoric, changes to social habits and relationships stemming from isolation or changes in work conditions, the Great Resignation, and other factors.
So like a lot of stressful situations, when things happen that are out of people’s control, they tend to try to exert more control over what they can control, or even what they just think they can control even if it’s not true.
I started going to therapy even before the pandemic because I wanted some help dealing with stress in my life. My therapist recommended Stoic philosophy, especially Marcus Aurelius and Epictetus. I already had the *Meditations* and a collection of Epictetus, and I got a collection of Seneca’s writings. I also got a book called *The Daily Stoic*, which has short daily readings from the three aforementioned philosophers as well as a couple others, and I read each day’s entry once in the morning and again before bed. Besides other lessons, they are good reminders that the only thing we truly have control over is ourselves, including our perception of things and how we respond to other people and things that happen.
You’re going to overcome this because you’ve already taken the most important and difficult step: recognize there is a problem and analyzing the problem. Having experienced something similar there’s a couple of pieces to consider
– The pandemic has made it tough on all of us to get back into pre-pandemic social norms. It will take time to adjust and empathy will be super important.
– Hobbies being non-existent is absolutely not minor. I can’t advise how to carve out the time, but I can advise that it’s vital that you find time for yourself and your hobbies.
– I know time is limited but exercise and/or meditation even if for a few minutes a day will go a very long way.
– Sometimes it’s very difficult to adjust a behavior on our own. If you continue having difficulty, looking into CBT. Can pickup a book or read about it on the internet and/or seek help from a professional.
My main recommendation is to go to counseling, if possible. A lot of guys really struggle with anger. Sometimes it’s really something else – but it masks as anger because feels more acceptable in a man than depression, anxiety, insecurity, etc. Counseling can help you figure out what it really is, how to cope with it, and maybe how to get rid of most of it.
Counseling is especially a good idea since you have kids, for two reasons.
1. You don’t want to your anger to be directed at your kids. Even if it hasn’t yet, you said you’re getting angrier so it could, eventually.
2. You will be modeling a positive way to improve mental health to your children. A lot of people are ashamed of asking for help, you can show them there is no shame. Since men tend to have a harder time asking for help (and also opening up, talking feelings, and just tend to be less chatty) it is often even more powerful to see your father prioritize his mental health than it is to see a mother doing the same. Especially if you have sons.
You’re not crazy; you’re probably just being more reactive than you used to. As we get older, we often focus on different things, sometimes things that aren’t even as important to us as we think they are (such as what you’re describing), then those things that were small start to get to us. Those things can wear us down if we let them and cause us to lose focus on the more important things (family, hobbies, work, etc). Next thing you know, you’re at the doctor with stage 2 hypertension, or even worse, in the E.R. with heart failure or a stroke.
My advice to you is to take some self-discovery time to figure out what’s triggering your anger, and are those things are important to you enough to risk your health and your family losing you? Once you figure this out, I would also recommend working on changing the way you react to those stressors.
Someone cut you off in traffic? So what, it’s not a race and certainly not worth risking your life just to give them a piece of your mind. Let it go.
Do you think someone is wrong, but they won’t listen? Sounds like their problem, not yours. It’s not worth wasting your breath.
Aggressive panhandling? You’re justified to be stern with people who get aggressive; afterward, don’t let it get to you; just laugh it off. You can change your life if you can figure out how to change the way you react to life.
If nothing works, I would also recommend seeing a therapist as it could be an underlying issue in need of some skilled self-discovery. Best of luck to you, friend.
Therapy, meditation, and fighting tooth and nail to get as long a period of alone time as you can manage. Things don’t happen for no reason, and even though you think you’re happy with your life there’s probably some subconscious stuff going on that’s making you act like this.
I’ve found this happen to me in my life as well. I was really easy going in my 20s, then turned angrier in my 30s and now in my 40s I am more mellow.
I believe it has to do with your life experiences. When you are younger (20s) you accept things easily because you are relatively “new” to the while life thing. You don’t have enough experience to really make an opinion one way or the other.
Now that you are older you have responsibilities: spouse and kids, mortgage, etc. This adds extra stress to you day as well. You now have responsibilities. That guy driving crazy on the freeway isn’t “cool” any longer, he is a danger to your children now. The panhandler asking for money is annoying because you’ve witnessed the same shit so many times in the past. The PTA asshole resorted to juvenile tatics and you just don’t have the time for that BS anymore so let’s cave his face in the next time I see him (you won’t, but the thoughts are there!).
All a part of getting older. Believe me, there will be a day when you mellow out. That kid wants to drive crazy in traffic? Nothing I can do but be on the lookout and drive defensively (no big deal). That panhandler? Hell, if someone is THAT strapped for cash that they would beg, maybe I will give them something or at least kindly decline them. I don’t know their full situation in life which brought them to this (no big deal). That PTA guy calling me names? Other people in the conversation will see how immature he is, I will not stoop to that level (no big deal).
EDIT: Just saw OPs age and adjusted some things.
Take a blood test and make sure your testosterone levels are normal. Sudden bursts of anger/irritability can happen when your levels have dropped due to lack of sleep, stress, or just age.
Not saying this is it, but it can’t hurt to check with your doctor. Every male in my family has experienced this with the exact same symptoms you described. Good luck.
I can totally relate. I could have written this post a few years ago. In my case, at least, I discovered that anger was sadness’ louder and more aggressive twin. For me, it was burnout with work and family obligations that gave me some pretty intense feelings of sadness, hopelessness, and frustration that I was always suppressing (because I’m not one to generally display intense emotions). The result was that I became unpredictably agitated. Nobody around me knew what would set me off, and I didn’t even know. I just knew that at the drop of a hat, I could go from completely fine to extreme uncontrolled anger.
Now, I take anti-depressants, I do therapy, and I have a medical card that helps. I’m still burnt out. I’m still not sleeping enough (demanding job that I haven’t been able to change yet, and two little boys at home that keep me from sleeping). I am trying to make changes to my life to fix the underlying issues, but until then – medication, therapy, and THC help me out a lot.
If I was being like this with people, and that wasn’t my normal state, I would start to think that I needed some proper down-time. This sounds like there is some unrecognised stress that is coming out in irregular ways. if you’re naturally hot-headed then I suppose the current times would sharpen the edges further
I have observed, lately, that people seem to be losing their heads over nothing at a higher rate than I noticed before. I am not saying this is you, but just a general observation. Almost every day when I drive I see someone do something inexplicably aggressive and obnoxious without any real stimulus for it. It is one thing to go a little nutty in bad traffic, but flying off the handle in normal traffic? My coworker says “People forgot how to be outside.”
Again, I am not saying that is you, that you are the obnoxious one, just that it seems like people are getting more obnoxious in general and it is tiring to say the least. I think it is fair to say that it is normal to be aggravated by aggressive panhandling and obnoxious people online.
You can’t fix everyone around you, but you can control your own reactions. Ultimately anger and resentment is a poison you take that seeps into the people around you. Anger and resentment runs in families, it is like a cancer. Anger and resentment are normal emotions, but dwelling on them shortens your lifespan. You might take a more introspective look at your own life, commiserate with other males (like you are now), think of strategies to help you deal with the anger and bitterness, etc. You can also see a professional, terminally angry middle aged man is not a new patient to psychiatry/psychology, they might be able to help.
My experience is that anger comes from feeling like our territory is being invaded.
Because humans are primates with a big blob of abstract reasoning bolted on top of our simian brains, “territory” can end up referring to all manner of abstract concepts. In particular, our sense of freedom and agency gets mixed into that. Having a certain amount of “territory” means having access to space (conceptual and literal) where we can do what we want how we want.
Being middle-aged and a dude already involves sacrificing a lot of our agency. We work full-time or longer to provide for our family, we give up time for our spouses and kids. Our “man cave”, if we have one at all, becomes a smaller and smaller corner of the house that we get less and less time to spend in.
Then the pandemic comes along and you can’t even go to the movies or have a fucking beer in a bar for two years.
It starts to feel like our territory has been reduced to a tiny fence around us that we can barely fit in. When we’re in that emotional state, *any* further infringement, even the tiniest imposition can feel like a the last straw and we lash out in anger. We’ve given up so much already that all we have left is this one tiny hill and yes we will fucking die on it if we have to.
Of course, the reality is that the people triggering our anger now are not the same people that forced us to make all the sacrifices that led to this point. They didn’t create the lack of real growth in wages. They didn’t start the pandemic. So it’s not fair to point our anger at them.
But it’s understandable that these feelings are welling up. It’s happening to a lot of us. We just have to try to be kind to others and ourselves and process the feelings in a healthy way.
People are drinking more, thinking less. The whole world is going darker as population pressures find their self-correcting mechanisms. The environment’s getting worse, wars becoming more likely, generally human beings are viewed as an inconvenience and annoyance rather than an asset of any kind.
Maybe you are stressed? I get really irritated at everything when that’s the case.
Also, if you have lived in a corona-bubble for this whole time, so you haven’t been with your mates and work buds, that also might be a cause. Isolation and too much time alone tends to make people angry.
I’ve struggled with all of this. First of all, a lot of involved parents struggle with lack of hobbies or more generally – time to do things for ourselves. It’s so hard to fix with kids in the picture. One thing I do as a hobby is gardening because I can involve the kids and do it from home. Also lifting and biking. The latter I can do while pulling the kids in a trailer.
Regarding the anger, I had to start seeing a therapist because of road rage and similar issues. I was very confrontational and unstable in public situations with men especially. Therapy helped as has lifting weights; it feels like I’ve got less energy to sweat the small stuff after being so busy with kids and tired from lifting and exercising.
Overall I think we’ve all been generally more irritable during this pandemic. Political unrest, increasingly extreme political viewpoints in media, isolation, financial issues from economy and inflation, all of that is creating a lot of friction in our society. Moving arguments with neighbors online on Facebook and nextdoor instead of resolving face to face isn’t helping. The online nature of our interactions are also emboldening idiots who would otherwise keep their extreme opinions to themselves.
Also, and this is very specific to my situation, but I had my hormones checked and after a few months of testing I was diagnosed with a tumor on my pituitary. Now my libido is healthier and my emotional irritability is much much lower. So more generally if you think your behavior is not where you want it to be, talk to a therapist, talk to a doctor.