Discover What Brings On Anger

“Five years of marriage seem like five centuries,” says Brooke, 23, the mother of 1-year-old Janey. “I shouldn’t have married Ed. We’re temperamentally unsuited and bicker constantly.

“When we first met, all we did was laugh,” she recalls. “Back then, Ed had the ability to make anyone smile.”

Ed’s high spirits are still evident, Brooke concedes, when he’s not around her. “At home, he’s argumentative and bossy, and when he has his temper tantrums, I actually get scared.

Lately, when she hears that tone, Brooke flees to the bedroom in tears.

“Ed only seems happy when he’s outside with the guys playing sports,” she says. She can’t remember the last time they spent a quiet evening together.

The minute Ed returns from work, the fights begin. “Ed snaps at me and has little patience for Janey. Then after a minor argument over something stupid, like the fact that the garbage wasn’t taken out, he storms out of the house, leaving me to clean up and put Janey to bed.”

Brooke wishes Ed would pour a little of the energy and enthusiasm he has for sports into his job. (Brooke’s brother-in-law, Arthur, a prominent architect and realestate developer, arranged for Ed to manage his large office.) “Ed has such a great opportunity at my brotherin-law’s firm, and he’s not taking advantage of it,” Brooke laments. “If neither of us is happy and we never talk about why, how will our marriage get better?”

Ed, 26, an athletic six-footer, is as unhappy as Brooke is and as unclear about why. “I know I haven’t been the best husband or father, but I’m trying,” he insists.

Before he realizes what he’s doing or saying, Ed starts snapping at Brooke. “Something sets me off, and we’re into a round of quarreling,” he says. “And before I know it, Brooke is holed up in the bedroom in tears.”

Ed grew up on a farm in Kansas, one of five brothers who spent nearly every moment outside. “I hitched a ride to the coast after high school and started working at whatever job I could find,” he says. “I was pumping gas when I met Brooke, and I fell hard and fast.”

Though Ed feels honored that his brother-in-law would take a chance on him, he can’t shake the feeling that he’s letting him down. “I’m not a swivel-chair, desk-sitting kind of guy,” he says. “Being in an office all day, then coming home to a cramped apartment, makes me want to climb the walls.”

Getting a handle on your anger

“Youth and inexperience account for a large part of the unhappiness in this marriage,” says Evelyn Moschetta, a marriage and family therapist. Brooke and Ed seem to know very little about themselves or each other, let alone their ultimate goals or deep feelings.

Once they had a professional counselor guide them in their discussion, these two quickly pinpointed a key source of Ed’s frustration and resentment: Ed was not cut out for a desk job, but he didn’t want to disappoint Brooke or her family by admitting it. When he tried to discuss his feelings, Brooke would begin crying and leave the room, ending any serious conversation.

Ed escaped by playing sports, but more often than not, he bottled up his anger, which soon spilled over into temper tantrums at home.

Once Ed understood the source of his annoyance and was able to talk calmly to Brooke, she agreed that a desk job was not right for him. Ed decided to talk to Arthur - who recognized Ed’s management skills and quickly transferred him to his construction department, where Ed now spends most of his time supervising crews building housing developments. Much happier, and much more aware of his tendency to explode, Ed rarely loses his temper.

Do you find that you sometimes respond to seemingly innocuous comments or events by quarreling, yelling or losing your temper? Here’s what marital therapists counsel couples to do:

First, give yourself permission to be angry. Feeling anger is a normal emotion.

Monitor your behavior for one week. Who did you get angry at and why? Can you determine any hot buttons, guaranteed to set your temper flaring when pushed?

Recognize your body’s reactions to anger. When your hot buttons are pressed, does your stomach churn or heart race? Tuning in to the messages your body is sending can help you handle anger appropriately.

Pinpoint your hot buttons. Each time you get angry, write down exactly what triggered your reaction and how it made you feel.