fullyfunctionalminiaturebeehive:
There is a really popular post on this site like “men who slam doors are making sure you know how much they want to hit you” and I can’t find the post but I wish it would stop because it is not true and it has the potential to spread a lot of panic and anxiety in already traumatized people.
Slamming doors, stomping your feet, punching pillows, throwing rocks at the ocean, anything physical that doesn’t hurt anyone is an excellent way to deal with anger; it is actually pretty common advice in anger managment (or any type of emotional mediation therapy) to let off some steam when you’re furious so you don’t say or do something in the heat of the moment.When a person is angry their body floods with adrenaline and it doesn’t just go away so acting out something physically helps your body metabolize all that adrenaline so that you CAN take a few breaths and discuss something calmly.
There are three rules to healthy anger management:
1. You can’t hurt yourself
2. You can’t hurt others
2. You can’t break things that aren’t meant to be broken
This is a pretty common type of anxiety thinking for abuse/trauma survivors and if you find it triggering you should definitely talk to whoever is doing the door slamming about them finding an alternate way to throw off that excess energy. But by itself slamming doors doesn’t mean someone wants to hit you, it’s actually a coping skill for emotional mediation!While it can be a healthy way to manage anger, you need to make sure you are not doing it “at” someone. Removing yourself from the situation and slamming a door or punching a wall can be cathartic and not harmful.
But being violent towards an inanimate object in the presence of someone else can be interpreted as a threat towards that person. Especially if they have a history of such violence being a prelude to violence against them. If you are going to use violence towards an inanimate object to cope with anger or other emotion, then it is your responsibility make sure that violence is not sending a message of impending violence.
^^^^^rosslynpaladin
I grew up in a frequently violent home and door slamming was one way the abuser used his rage to make sure we feared him. If you have to handle your anger physically in a healthy way do not do it in front of potential victims- go to a gym or something. Slamming things is not okay. How about you drop and start doing pushups? I’ve never had a pushup thrown at me.
^^^
Triggers are weird - my primary abuser was not shouty/sweary so having someone be loud or swear in frustration (not AT me, but in my presence or during an argument) is just kinda startling…but someone noisily, busily cleaning the kitchen makes me INCREDIBLY anxious, despite not being an inherently toxic action. Hell, Anger Cleaning is a great way to deal with frustration!
It’s all in context, as with any interaction. For example, as long as my fiancée lets me know what is going on if she’s bustling about in a way that could be construed as (my brain WILL construe as) anger, it’s usually ok. It might not be for another person. It isn’t if she doesn’t let me know.
Like Rosslyn said, check with people, know each others’ needs.
(via love-lays-bleeding)
