There’s only so much mistreatment someone can take before they either break down or explode with rage. And when the negativity is coming from your in-laws, some believe it’s best to grin and bear it in the name of keeping the peace.
That’s exactly what one woman did, despite being taunted for a decade. It took just one triggering remark about her difficult childhood recently, to unleash ten years of pent-up rage on her mother-in-law. The woman says something inside her snapped and she could not hold back everything she’d always wanted to say.
She never had a family growing up so when she got married, she was excited to finally gain a set of parents
Image credits: freepik (not the actual photo)
But she’s received 10 years of mistreatment from them, and when she finally snapped, it wasn’t pretty
Image credits: RejwanX / freepik (not the actual photo)
Image credits: kues1 / freepik (not the actual photo)
Image credits: Aleakielou
“She left crying”: the woman gave some more info when prompted
Holding in anger can harm us more than we might realize, and here’s why
Some people let rip when they’re angry while others hold it in. Then there are those who have learned how to manage their emotions and deal with their anger effectively.
Experts warn that repressing anger can have some very serious consequences, including the risk of depression, anxiety and even physical illness.
Research has shown that bottling up anger can cause physical strain on our bodies. “Holding back anger creates inner tension, which can then cause a wide range of psychosomatic ailments, such as indigestion, chronic pain, chronic fatigue, frequent migraines and even cancer,” reveals the Eggshell Therapy and Coaching site.
It credits the College of Nursing, University of Tennessee with reporting that “there is evidence to show that suppressed anger can be a precursor to the development of cancer, and it contributes to cancer progression after the diagnosis.”
Anger shoudn’t be confused with aggression or violence. “When anger emerges, there are many different paths we can take in our reactions, and aggression is only one of them,” explains the therapy site. “With practice, a highly sensitive person can learn to express their needs and frustration healthily and gracefully without resorting to outbursts and violence.”
Image credits: Pablo Merchán Montes / Unsplash (not the actual photo)
According to Eggshell’s experts, repressed anger usually stems from childhood trauma or social conditioning. Someone with repressed anger might never have learned hot to properly manage their emotions when they were younger. It’s possible that they were silenced, shamed, or even punished for expressing anger in their early years.
They warn that suppressing an emotion does not mean it will disappear. “As anger repression is a habit, it may take some time to undo the ongoing pattern of repression,” notes the site.
The first step is to understand that anger is not a bad thing. “You may consciously learn about the function and benefits of anger, then set an intention to befriend it. Then, little by little, you can experiment with widening your window of tolerance towards anger,” advise the experts.
They add that in the beginning, it helps to sit, breathe, and feel whatever you’re feeling for a few minutes, even if it’s unpleasant.
“Then, you incrementally lengthen how long you can tolerate feeling anger without cutting off, dissociating or going into denial,” suggests Eggshell’s team.
They also advise doing activities like drawing, journaling, and writing letters (which you don’t have to send) as a way to help deal with anger. And if it works for you, you could choose to scream or punch a pillow as a way to release pent-up energy without hurting others.
Many netizens rushed to support the daughter-in-law
But not everyone took her side
In an update, she said that her husband had apologized but it didn’t end there
“Life has changed”: the woman revealed that they’d moved and things were different now
