Psychology not Psychiatry

Pre-disabling injuries, I was a highly independent female who was freakishly strong for how thin I was.  I could lift 50lbs quite easily, pick up a queen size mattress to flip and rotate it without help, carry my end of a couch without issue, etc...

I was near 40 years old the first time I sustained a severe and disabling injury with permanent pain and ramifications to my entire life.

I can no longer look down without pain.  Bye bye goofy golf, a pastime that I had adored since childhood.  

Bye bye to batting cages, baseball games, volleyball, tennis, ping pong, basketball, bowling, swimming laps, shooting pool, and every single one of the numerous activities I'd always enjoyed.  Even if I stunk at them I laughed at myself and enjoyed them!

I also used to swim laps 3 days a week for 45 minutes, power walk 5 miles in 50 minutes, 5-6 days a week in addition to lifting little weights and using a terrific little machine "the thigh and bun roller"; it used your own body weight and strength to move it.

Go ahead, laugh at the name, but let me tell you something, it was highly effective! 

I also no longer could push a mower or even ride one because the bumpiness is too jolting for all of my damage.

Ditto speed bumps.  I try like heck to avoid them and when I inevitably get faced with one in a parking lot I've not been in before; I view them with dread because if I am already flared up, they worsen it, and if I'm not, they can throw me into a pain flare up. 

Thus, I will drive out of a lot and around the block and back in to avoid them, if I can, that is how much they flare my pain.

I also no longer let anyone drive me because no matter how much I say, GO SLOW!  Crawl over them!  Etc...what is slow and crawling to me, is NOT what is slow and crawling to people who have healthy spines.

These all encompassing restrictions meant I had no physical outlet anymore through which to release negative emotions such as anger. 

If you've ever put a lid on a pot that is boiling, you know what happens to your stove when the heat and pressure is more than the lid can bear, right? 

Well, we humans also have our limits, lids, and boiling points too.  And we spew ugly messes as well when we boil over.  Thus, I suddenly found myself consumed by anger like I had never known. 

I finally conceded that I couldn't control it without outside help and sought the assistance of a PhD who specialized in anger management. 

At my first appointment, I asked him "What made you specialize in anger management?"

He smiled a knowing grin and replied with an inarguable confidence: "Everybody gets angry."  I liked him immediately!  I had felt awful about my anger and since it had never been problematic, I just didn't know that I had that much company! 



Here's what I learned in and about, anger management as taught to me by the psychologist: anger is the result of fear, rejection and hurt. 

I found that definition as thought provoking as I did surprising.  I thought of it often and each of those adjectives to try and utilize logic to breakdown their contributions to my cirucmstances so I could get a hold on my anger instead of it having the unhealthy hold on me that it did.

Anytime you want to improve your mental and emotional health, you have to take the emotions out of it long enough to be objective about them.

In not many sessions at all, he taught me to have a longer fuse which was very great improvement! 

The next time I made the biggest and longer

lasting improvements on reducing and eliminating

my anger issues is when I read the bible. 

If you haven't read it and you have anger issues,

believe me, it is the key to regaining peace.

I was on so many Rx's back then that I chose to see a PhD in Psychology, not an M.D. in Psychiatry, because I didn't see where a new Rx was needed and it definitely was not desired.

If you feel the need to see a mental health professional, I encourage you strongly to do so and depending on why you seek one, start with a PhD or other counselor who does not write Rx's because too many docs and patients start with them when in fact, everyone's focus should be on all natural measures of restoration first because your best health does not necessarily come in a prescription pill, but worse health can and does!

Not so coincidentally, being on numerous narcotics, muscle relaxers, and other Rx's, actually contributed to my anger issues because their unhealthy and numerous side effects left me cloudy headed, nauseated, dizzy and constipated. 

As a result of the constipation, all of those horrible, unhealthy toxins, stayed in my system, including my brain, and screwed my emotions up even more than the anger, depression and anxiety I battled as a result of a disabling injury and chronic pain. 

I didn't know it until early 2015 but there is actually a medical term for this situation that I called "a roller coaster ride from hell".  The med term is "emotional lability".

Now that I've gone the natural route with herbs

for pain management so successful since early 2012

and take Rx's as the exception,

my anger issues are also better managed.

Additionally, I eventually realized that anxiety is a pre-cursor to anger. 

I take 400mg of Holy Basil every morning upon waking and it is AMAZING at how much it helps relieve anxiety and depression! 

By default, my anger also was no longer the problem it had been.

I only saw him for several appointments because I realized that he didn't have the magic wand I was seeking to remove it from me, only God can do that.

Plus, I have a lifelong friend who does see a therapist regularly and when we'd speak and I'd give her advice, she'd say "That's what my shrink says". 

"My shrink just said the same thing at my appointment today!" etc...thus, I'm not saying I am a psychologist but I am saying that I came to realize that we often have the answers inside of us already. It's just a matter of doing the work to pull them out.

Something with which I am well-acquainted as a person whose primary personality trait is an analyzer and secondary, a regulator.  Meaning that it is my nature I figure out what's wrong in any situation, personal and professional, then formulate an action plan and do the work to reduce or eliminate it and prevent it again if applicable.

This has served me very well management and running busineses; and best of all, enjoying the many physical and spiritual health victories that God blessed me with for doing so!