Blackouts when angry

Gomezy3k wrote:

kinmaelstrom wrote:I thought I was the only person to experience these. It's slightly different for me though. The whole black out portion comes on without any type of warning. What is the longest that you have blacked out for? My worst was 3 days...Please, if you find anything out about this, let me know. I have been to shrink after shrink after shrink, and not a single one of them, or combination of them, managed to find anything that has ANY of these symptoms...

For me, it is only a "short" while. By short, I mean maybe 10 or 15 mintues. And usually when I come to, I have committed something violent. There was the incident with my Dad. Another time when I came to my senses, I had almost beaten a cow (we lived on a small farm) to death with a shovel. Mine seem to be brought on by frustration or being trapped. I know I have severe anger issues.

I know exactly what you mean...apparently...when I was out of it for three days i threatened my family with a knife...more like spinning it on the kitchen table and stating, "Just trying to figure out which of you I am going to kill first," and I also apparently pulled a gun on my mother. My brother says that I looked like raw evil. I have had every test done, and the only abnormality was my sleep pattern. Apparently, it is far off, so I know there is something wrong up stairs, but they can't figure out what. It was always brought on by some sort of anger.

kinmaelstrom wrote:I know exactly what you mean...apparently...when I was out of it for three days i threatened my family with a knife...more like spinning it on the kitchen table and stating, "Just trying to figure out which of you I am going to kill first," and I also apparently pulled a gun on my mother. My brother says that I looked like raw evil. I have had every test done, and the only abnormality was my sleep pattern. Apparently, it is far off, so I know there is something wrong up stairs, but they can't figure out what. It was always brought on by some sort of anger.

Yeah anger does it... Well do not feel alone... at least there are two of us out there... LOL

I did until now. LoL! Nice to know someone else is a complete mind boggle to the medical institute. Maybe they can name it after one of us since it doesn't exist yet. LoL!

My mother and grandmother died 6 mos apart with my grandmother passing first. I was at my mothers (2 hrs from my home)sorting her belongings after her death. I went to the local store for some colored coded stickers to save myself some writing. I stood in line in a half daze anyway but there was a woman in the next line yelling. I tried to ignore her for a few mins then thought; "well maybe she has a valid argument and they have done her wrong." As I listened she became louder and louder telling the cashier how stupid he was and going really out of control about it. I looked down at the stickers in my had and thought "I wish my biggest problem was being unhappy with how my groceries were bagged." The I thought well, she'll be quiet and leave soon. But there were lots of people in front of me and I don't know where it happened exactly but I started to get further irritated by her meaningless aggression and thought to smash her face into the counter in front of her - then the image repeated in quickening repetition. All the sudden I heard my mother scream my name as if I was in REAL trouble! I turned my head to the right and there was no one there. My hand was raised to the back of the womans head and she was still screaming, unaware that I was 6 inches behind her. I looked at her, then the cashier - who looked at me with question. I shook my head confused and went back to the other line.
I don't remember the first step I took or walking over there at all. I just don't know... I'm glad I didn't hurt that woman but, things have gotten turbulent again.
The brutal murders of four friends is weighing heavy on the anger creeping in again. They were shot and thrown in the ocean. I have a lot less tolerance for people when things like this happen.
Someone is shooting cats in my apartment complex too. I'm afraid I will not be able to control myself if I see this happen. There is only one cat left and her shelter is by my apt. I haven't lived here long so I don't know my neighbors or if they would kill small animals like a preping psycho killer.
My real fear is that if I do black out and actually harm someone yes it could be fatal, I have trained in MA for a long time for self defense reasons but it was only after these stressful situations that I knew it was even possible for black outs to happen. I thought it was all made up and people were lying. Now I see I can be a victim of this. It's scary to know you can cease to be in control of your actions.
I think the stress management does help and I've taken a day off work everyweek because it's cheaper than paying a doc to see. I figure that will help me too. Only been 3 weeks so- we'll see.

I have had a few episodes where something upsetting happens to me, then I quickly go into a state of rage, and when the tirade is interupted, I regain control but I am totally confused because everyone around is looking at me as though I am a wild animal or something. I can remember what happened just before the upsetting event occurs, but that is it. The rest is like a dream or distant memory.

My main concern is that I have no idea what I am capable of doing while in the "red zone", for lack of a better phrase. You say you nearly killed a cow with a shovel.

Some of the times when this has happened I have been able to narrow down a common cause. It seems to occur when taking a hit to my self esteem. I have studied self esteem (particularly low self esteem) so I have trained myself to recognize when my self esteem is taking a hit and either adjust my attitude or walk away.

Has anyone a clue as to what this condition is, what it is called or how it is treated?

Hi Gomezy3k, I haven't experienced that blackout but I think that was due to your extreme anger that you are not able vent out. When you are repressing your anger, it gets bigger and bigger inside of you that makes your anger worst. Your anger accumulates until you explode to the extent that you are able to kill without you knowing it. Maybe you are a shy and quiet type because these kind of attitude are usually the one that has this kind of anger.

crystalr0w3 wrote:Hi Gomezy3k, I haven't experienced that blackout but I think that was due to your extreme anger that you are not able vent out. When you are repressing your anger, it gets bigger and bigger inside of you that makes your anger worst. Your anger accumulates until you explode to the extent that you are able to kill without you knowing it. Maybe you are a shy and quiet type because these kind of attitude are usually the one that has this kind of anger.

I am emotionally numb and do not feel much of anything except anger. That is the only emotion I can feel. I am shy and quiet, but that is because I do not do well with people. I do not relate well to them, and so by reading books, watching TV and movies, I learned the appropriate response to various situations. Unfortunately, on occasion, I have responded inappropriately when I picked the wrong response from my memorized list.

I am afraid to "let the dragon out of its cage" as I call letting my anger loose. I am deathly afraid I am going to hurt someone if I express my anger. As I mentioned earlier, since I do not do well with people and do not know the appropriate limits to keep things from getting out of hand.

I used to drive my shrinks and the staff nuts because they would try and get me to talk about feelings and I would give a logical response that had nothing to do with feelings. I would make a great robot or vulcan (except when I turn into a Romulan when I express my anger)...

There have been a couple situations when I was younger that I got so angry I don't remember what I did. There was one time I got into a fight with my brother and pushed him through the glass on the storm-door in the front of our house. I don't remember doing it and I don't remember afterwords either. To this day, I don't remember it. Another time, my sister and I were playing a game and I freaked out and tried to strangle her. I don't remember either incident. I was told that I did both of them, but I don't remember a thing about it. I think I was around 10-12 years old. There was another time in 7th grade that I picked up a kid and threw him into a bicycle rack. I'm still not sure how I did that, but that is what he told me. I haven't had any situations like that since then though.

There was an instance back in high school where I had gotten so angry I blacked out. It was wierd because although I was consious, I didn't remember anything. I had to ask my friends what happened. Since then I have always tried really hard to avoid confrontations. It may make me seem like a wuss, but it realy freaked me out, I don't know what would happen if I were to ever reach that lavel again, and I don't want to find out. I did some reading about it and the closest thing I've found is what was refered to as going berserk.

From Wikipedia:
The word "berserker" today applies to anyone who fights with reckless abandon and disregard to even his own life, a concept used during the Vietnam War and in Vietnam-inspired literature (Michael Herr's Dispatches) and film (Oliver Stone's Platoon and Adrian Lyne's Jacob's Ladder). "Going berserk" in this context refers to an overdose of adrenaline-induced opioids in the human body and brain leading a soldier to fight with fearless rage and indifference, a state strikingly similar to that of the 9th century berserkers

I know what you mean. When I would get furious or extremely nervous (before a performance, etc), I would black out. It was never serious because I never became violent; I acted the same way I would have if I hadn't blacked out. That was the most that ever happened during black outs until about a month ago when I went to a concert. It's very vague, and all I can remember is sort of standing somewhere and someone shoved me and I shoved them back, though that part is fairly vague. I can remember the guy taking me by the neck and pushing down to where my face was almost touching my knees, and that's all I can remember. I "woke up" as I was punching this guy repeatedly and I then almost immediately stopped, and he fell. Now, I'm a girl that's only 5'1", so you can only imagine the look on this guy's face. It's still a little fuzzy, but I can vaguely remember standing over this guy glaring at him as he stared up at me in shock, telling me to calm down. I asked my friend that was with me afterwards and she said that when he pushed me down, I swung up and started punching this guy repeatedly with both fists until I suddenly slowed down (which is when I "woke up", because I remember coming to and realizing what I was doing and stopping). That's the only experience I've had with blacking out and becoming violent, though my dad told me that it used to happen to him when he was a kid and a teenager.