LD Resources

How I Deal With Anger
© 2007 John Dyson

I have come to learn that we have many different feelings: sadness, happiness and anger. As a child I did not have good role models on how to deal with my feelings. I am now learning how anger is perhaps the hardest feeling to deal with. Anger can be a positive feeling that can motivate a person and this aspect of anger has been a big part of my life.

As a child, I experienced a lot of anger. For the most part, it was never dealt with in a positive way. For myself there was lots of yelling and violence, and my first instinct was to run and hide. I kept everything in and didn’t show any feelings. I grew up keeping quiet, and I do not like anyone getting angry. I was the family peacemaker. Little did I know how much damage that I was doing to myself. I felt my feelings did not count at home or in school. To top it off, I was born with a learning disability. By not dealing with my anger, I made myself a double victim.

My feelings about anger began with my parents. They could not get along and were always yelling at each other. I witnessed a lot of violence between them. My mother used booze and drugs to deal with her anger and my father kept his anger in. Neither was a good way of dealing with anger. I remember being afraid whenever voices were being raised. This would always scare me very easily and by not expressing myself I was doing a lot of damage to myself. It was only going to get worse when school started.

My parents moved a lot so school was very unstable. It was the case of always being the new kid in school. I was always being challenged by other kids to fit in. I got into lots of fights; also my schoolwork was very hard. I had lots of problems with English, math and history. To my teachers and myself everything I did was a mess. However, when asked to do something orally I had no problem. I was given lots of compliments on how well I spoke. I knew something was wrong. My mind and hand were not on the same page. I was very ashamed. One report card said I was lazy and sloppy. I was very angry with myself. My self-esteem was nil.

If my school was bad, my home life was only getting worse. My parents could not look after themselves and they couldn’t look after me. My mother gave me up as a crown ward of the system. The anger and damage from my parents was going to haunt me for years to come. I kept all the anger in my body. I did not want to share with anyone. I thought he was carrying all my anger, and I was doing lots of self-damage. As an adult, I was aware of how I was keeping my anger in. This was affecting my abilities to have relationships and finish school. I soon reached the stage where I knew I needed help with my learning disabilities. I found a great therapist who helped me deal with my anger. Through our friend I met Jessica Colson, a great lady, who did the documentation of my learning disability. I felt like chains were being cut off me. This eased some of my anger.

Sadly Jessica was killed in a car accident. This could have crushed me. I still feel I have a long way to go. But thanks to Jessica, I will not quit.

This is kind of funny, but this is my third version of this essay, I’ve written. This ties in with my learning disability. I am very hard on myself. I thought my first two essays were not very good, so I thought I needed to do it again. I still have work to do on my writing, but that will come. Anger is what pushes me.

I wrote this essay two years ago before I really became comfortable with using a computer. I got a great mark in my English class. Just a few short years ago. The idea of writing an essay is something I never would’ve dreamt. Technology has been so invaluable for me.