Why get angry when you feel betrayed, hurt and disappointed!
Everyone experiences betrayal at some point in their lives. In almost all relationships, there is a significant breach of trust at some point, so I’m pretty sure you’re in the middle of it right now, have already experienced it or will experience it again.
We’re not necessarily talking about infidelity, although almost half of all relationships face it. There could be other significant breaches of trust too. Maybe the guy took out a loan you knew nothing about? Maybe he promised more than he could deliver and you were “cheated” out of much of the experience you expected? Maybe your trust is too low because the guy never keeps his promises and breaks appointments with you left and right? Maybe he flirted with a colleague?
But contrary to what many people believe, trust is actually not that hard to restore if you know what to do and how to do it specifically, how the process works and what steps to go through. One thing that all too often ruins the process for the couples I work with in my clinic is unbridled and uncontrollable anger and rage!
When you experience a major breach of trust as a person, your entire foundation, the foundation on which you have built your relationship, totters. That foundation is ripped out from under you in a split second and you stagger, dazed and feeling like you have been knocked out in a boxing match!
Your basic belief “I thought we cared about each other’s feelings” has now been replaced by “I don’t know who you are as a person, and I’m pretty sure you no longer care about me, my feelings or my needs.”
And you should know one thing!
Trust builds trust.
Cause of anger
When trust is gone, so is your security!
And when your basic security in a relationship is gone, you are insecure about yourself, your relationship, your future, your love, etc. And what does an animal in the wild do when it feels insecure and is attacked? The animal automatically reacts and flees, freezes and paralyses, or attacks.
And attack, as we know, is the best defence!
But why now?
When you are attacked, pushed back, angry and feeling down, it is often psychology:
“If I can blow myself up like this and be so angry and furious and show how strong I really am, that’s probably the last time you’ll ever put me over the top and let me down, because you won’t dare!”
Thus, your anger becomes your unconscious way of regaining your safety and security. When you show your mighty strength, you often experience a sense of security that you can protect yourself and take care of yourself! (Besides, vredeshåndtering, there were probably no others who could take care of you and look after you)!
So getting angry is actually a very healthy and completely natural and EXTREMELY normal reaction to having your otherwise secure worldview shattered and the foundations ripped out from under you. And it is also very common to have outright tantrums against an otherwise “loved one” in many of the first weeks and even months after you experience a major misstep.
As crazy as it sounds, this is part of the process of rebuilding trust and safety between you.
The psychology behind it is here:
“If you repeatedly tolerate me getting angry, upset and upset time after time, it is my reassurance that you won’t hurt me again, and it also shows me that you want everything from me because you will stay with me and be my partner even if I am angry, upset and upset for a while.”
But beware, your anger can destroy your recovery!
If your anger goes on endlessly, in the long run your partner may even find it hard to believe that he or she too has made a mistake, even if he or she is willing to accept the consequences of his or her foolish behaviour that has hurt you, even if your partner loves you more than anything else in the world and really wants to be with you and see his or her part in it, your anger and rage may be more than enough at some point.
If it never stops, or doesn’t subside a bit over time, your partner will eventually change his or her mind:
“No matter what I do, there will just be more anger, more swearing, more rage – if at some point it doesn’t go away, I have to leave, because we can’t live like this forever, it exhausts us both, even though I love you and want to be with you and I’m sorry for what I did!”
Or your partner experiences your anger outbursts with such intensity that it threatens your partner’s own safety and security. And what did I tell you about what happens when safety and security turn into insecurity?
That’s when we go into attack mode, which is when two wounded and angry people fight each other in a desperate attempt to rebuild trust, safety, security and grounding.
So however you spin it, you need to find other ways than ONLY your partner to express your anger and frustration. And you need to figure out what can alleviate your “madness” if it’s been going on for a long time. You need to work on yourself, on your healing and on your healing so that trust and safety are in optimal conditions for recovery, and you need to figure out what your partner can contribute to that process. Your anger is healthy!
But your anger is there, I know!
It is, as I said, a natural and very healthy mechanism of the healthy body (and primitive brain) for an incredibly crappy experience/event that you (and probably your partner) would rather have missed.
So that’s why you get angry and upset when you are cheated, hurt, lied to, cheated on or have your trust abused.
