Finding wellness through treatment at Serenity Lane doesn’t just mean finding recovery from AUD. It means identifying your triggers for anger and https://ecosoberhouse.com/ finding out why you’re self-medicating with alcohol. It means learning how to approach your anger in a way that serves you and your recovery.
In most cases, women are at a higher risk of experiencing alcohol-related domestic violence from male partners. Unfortunately, feeling aggressive from alcohol can stem from more than one variable that’s beyond your control. Aside from existing anger issues, people can turn into aggressors when drinking for several reasons.
Dealing with Being Angry While Sober
Anyone who’s lived with an alcoholic parent, partner or other close family member understands all too well what happens when their loved one’s personality changes suddenly as soon as they have a drink or two. Suddenly, the person they know and care for is a much different, angrier person — short-tempered, abusive and often violent. If you or someone you love is battling alcoholism and anger aggression and alcohol misuse, help is available. Consult with a mental health professional and/or an addiction specialist who can provide resources and recommendations for treatment options. Intimate partner violence is of great concern when it comes to alcohol and anger. Violence can occur in marriages, long-term partnerships, and dating relationships.
While anger isn’t necessarily a side effect of alcoholism, drinking to “dull” or “numb” the anger (or other emotions) isn’t just ineffective – it could be a sign that it’s time to seek help for some deeper issues. The stress-reducing effects of alcohol often make people believe there are no real consequences for their actions, which leads to confrontations, fights, or displays of aggression. This is called alcohol myopia, and it’s another reason why people are quick to anger when they drink. In other words, whatever you’re feeling before you drink will likely be magnified once you’re drunk, and because your decision-making is impaired, you’re more likely to act out that anger. The relationship between recovering alcoholics and anger is so complicated that even things like lack of healthy coping skills, resentments, toxic relationships, dishonesty, and unhealthy behavioral patterns can contribute. Additionally, even people not struggling with a substance use disorder can experience anger and these other emotions.
Alcohol and aggression
They completed surveys assessing their endorsement of traditional masculine norms, use of thought suppression, and both trait and alcohol-related aggression. It was found that thought suppression mediated the association between the toughness masculine norm and alcohol-related aggression. Another study of 249 heavy drinkers similarly found that alcohol intoxication predicted higher levels of IPV in those who reported low psychological flexibility (Grom et al., 2021). By Buddy T
Buddy T is a writer and founding member of the Online Al-Anon Outreach Committee with decades of experience writing about alcoholism. Because he is a member of a support group that stresses the importance of anonymity at the public level, he does not use his photograph or his real name on this website. In a 2017 report, researchers shared their findings of the relationship between alcohol and dating violence.