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The thing about anger is that once it takes hold inside of you, it’s a struggle to get out of it’s grip.

I’m exactly at that point right now. In the grip of extreme anger and just generally being a horrible person to anyone who crosses me. I’m angry all the time. On high alert and ready to pounce on anyone who pisses me off.

This isn’t the person who I am and it’s not the person who I want to be. I just don’t have any clue how to release the anger that I’ve allowed to build up inside of me.

Over the past few months of dealing with doctors who disrespect me and violate my patient rights, a totally incompetent insurance company, crappy medical care due to the area where I live, and having to advocate for myself so strongly, I am burned out. I feel like I’ve been screwed over so many times that I just can’t take anymore. And then, of course, there’s the constant anger bubbling beneath the surface. I’ve had to put on my “angry Black woman” voice a few too many times, just to be treated with dignity and respect. It’s exhausting, but if I don’t do it, these people walk all over me and it’s not okay. But every time I curse someone out, demand to speak to a supervisor, or file a formal complaint, it takes something out of me, leaving the perfect empty space for the anger to fill.

So now I’m filled with this anger and it’s spilling over into the other areas of my life. I think I’ve gone into super bitch mode one too many times because I don’t know what to do with this anger that’s building inside of me.

I’ve been feeling pretty bad lately about all the people I’ve made feel bad over the past few months. Granted, they provided horrible service to me, but that doesn’t justify how I responded to them.

One of my personal rules for life is that it’s not my job to make anyone feel badly about themselves. I say this to myself when the urge to be unkind hits. I’ve said it to others to encourage and uplift them. But lately, I’ve been acting like I’ve never heard those words in my life! There’s a disconnect between who I really am and how I’ve been acting. Because of this, I’ve become my own main source of negativity and I’m spreading it around indiscriminately. This is not okay.

I have to do better because it’s not right to take out your bad days on others. Personally, it’s the personality trait that I absolutely loathe in others the most. I think it’s evil and yes, it pretty much does make you a terrible person. I don’t want to be a terrible person.

Something needs to change. I need to stand in the light of my own integrity again. But with this depression eating away at me, I don’t know where to start. I don’t have the energy for apologies. Besides, I’m still so damn angry, there’s only one person who I feel deserves a personal apology. And I will make things right between us. But everyone else can kick rocks with socks on, as far as I’m concerned.

I think that the key for me will be to figure out a way to stop dwelling on the past and begin looking forward again. I can be a good person again, I just have to figure out how.

It’s not my job to make anyone else feel badly about themselves.