I've always been a generally "angry" person. By this I mean I've always had a bit of a short temper, but mostly about things I found annoying. Other than that, I remember a friend of mine describing me as someone who, "never gets mad, but when they get mad... they get mad." And it always clicked in my head that way. I mean sure, I'd get annoyed and irritated, but I wouldn't necessarily get mad unless someone did me dirty. That was, until two years ago.
I started finding that the simplest things would anger me. At the time, I was dating someone who ended up not being good for me, but I started realizing that everything they did would tick me off. But not only them, everyone. I would become irritated at the way the guy next to me clicked his pen, or the tone someone used on me. If things went wrong in the smallest way, I'd become irritated. I found it odd, and honestly uncomfortable. I mean, who likes being angry all the time? It's a horrible, horrible, horrible feeling, and one that I despise to this day.
I thought that maybe it was just stress. I was taking some really difficult classes and I thought that maybe the stress was just making me feel on edge, which made it easier for me to lose my temper. And yeah, I was partly right, but it wasn't until I went to a therapist that I realized the reason I was so irritable was because I was depressed.
At first it didn't make sense to me. Depression makes someone feel blue, or numb, but I didn't think that it could make someone angry, but boy, was I wrong. Dead wrong. My depression has made me into one of the angriest people I know, and I hate it. And for a long time, I've hated myself for it too. There were times last year, where I felt like maybe I could control my temper, and I could. I'd inhale and exhale, walk away from a situation, and I'd feel fine, but there where other times when it wasn't so simple.
I didn't think it was much of a problem for anyone else until last year, when the guy I had been dating, who turned out to actually be a really big asshole, told me that I had a "shitty attitude" and that I "didn't have to be mad all the time." As you can probably assume, his comments made me mad, but it also made me feel something that I hadn't felt in awhile: sad. I felt so sad, and miserable, and like the biggest bitch alive. I knew he was right, I mean, he didn't have to say it that way, but he was right.
For the longest time I've let my depression get the best of me. I've let it strip me of my friends, my motivation, and I'm now just realizing, my kindness. I feel as if I've become a horrible person, someone that I don't ever want to be. I've talked to my friends about it and they all say the same things, that I've been through a lot, that I need to cut myself some slack. And I have. But after awhile, too much slack is too much slack, and I've had enough of feeling like a bully to myself and others.
I know that my irritability is a symptom of my depression, and that it's not necessarily my fault, but I don't want to feel like I am being miserable to others because I am miserable myself. I don't know if that's been the case, but I'm going to make sure it's not.
