This week I've dreamed about ghosts and dead bodies. Last night I became so infuriated (set off by Miley, but it couldn't have all been about her) that I had a complete meltdown. My mother woke up because I had been driven from my bed and was huddled in the middle of the living room floor, weeping with rage and frustration. Having woken her up made me feel like such an infant, but I was glad to have someone awake nearby who wasn't insane with anger.
I just don't deal with anger and frustration. I try to, but what I often end up doing is convincing myself that they don't exist and then stuffing them away. I don't know how to do it differently. And bedtime is a crappy time for me anyway, because so often I can't fall asleep, and then I sleep too long. I love actually sleeping, but the beginning and the end of it are the worst.
So I get stressed out at bedtime, especially when I've had a run of rough nights, which I have. And I get frustrated about walking this dog that isn't even mine, especially when my brother keeps switching the times around, which he has. And God knows what else it was about. But I was on the edge when I got into bed, and then.
And then I realized that there was pee in my bed.
Here's something to know about me: if I am asleep or trying to sleep or just waking up, I will try to sleep through anything. In Zimbabwe I tried to stay asleep when there were ants swarming all over my face and upper body, until I woke up enough to convince myself that that was a completely insane idea. So. Pee.
I tried to sleep on the other side of the bed. But I couldn't sleep. I've been a bit of an insomniac lately anyway, and I was too angry to fall asleep. Probably within minutes I was shaking with rage and trying to tear apart the sweatshirt that I was wearing.
Obviously the answer here would be to kick the dog out of my bed (she was in my bed! What was I thinking? I have a completely irrational and inexplicable guilt complex when it comes to dogs.) and change the sheets, but once I've committed myself to going to bed, for some reason I have this stubborn attachment to not getting up again. Maybe this is because I'm already so restless at night that I'm afraid I'd truly never sleep if I let myself get up and do things after I had gone to bed. Anyway, after a while (an hour? Hour and a half? Half hour?) I threw myself out of bed and stormed into the living room, struggling not to tear the house apart or grab the dog by her hind legs and swing her into a wall.
This is why it is a really good idea to learn to actually manage your anger. I am aware that I am painting myself here like a completely insane person--but I'm not. I get this angry, oh, maybe once a year. I hate being angry, so, generally, I don't get angry. People actually comment sometimes on how ridiculously patient I am. And that's how I want to be, and that's how I am the vast majority of the time. But every once in a while circumstances all collude and catch me when I'm exhausted and stressed and hormonal and all the sudden I'm sitting on my hands on the edge of the tub, grinding my teeth, shaking with rage, trying not to speak or rip the toilet seat cover from its hinges and smash the bathroom with it.
I've never broken anything or hurt anyone in anger, by the way. I think the worst I've ever done is kicked my closet door or thrown a shoe at it. I just apparently have not learned to notice the steam rising and vent it before I pass the point of no return. And like many people, my family is my weakness here. There are wonderful things about family, but no one can find and push all of your buttons the way they can. Last night it was like I was an elevator, and they walked in and just wiped their hands straight down the button panel and watched every single one light up.
I've mentioned before that I sometimes dream of having a soundproof room just for me, with blank walls and filled with breakable objects for me to throw at them or rip apart. This goes back to my being an INTP/INFP, and how we INT/FPs, though we feel deeply, tend to be extremely reticent when it comes to showing emotion. Or registering emotion, in my case. Anyway, the anger vent room fantasy:
I went to bed early tonight (9pm!) and set an alarm to get up at 11 and walk the dog. While I was dozing I had a dream that someone kept bringing things into the walkway outside my door and smashing them or ripping them apart and leaving them strewn all over the ground--pyrex dishes, furniture, and so on. Maybe my subconscious is telling me something.
Writing all this down makes me want to apologize. Anger of that magnitude is such a terrible thing, and it twists everything in its path and leaves me so shaken. I got out of bed today a little after one (I couldn't fall asleep until about six am) and I felt like an invalid recovering from a horrible illness. I felt pale and fragile and quiet. We went to the park today with Miley, and that helped some. The air helped, and the calm water and the quiet park, and the sun gilding the bare branches and vines as it slipped down into the cold grey river.
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