Letters Between Sundays

“Understand this, my dear brothers and sisters: You must all be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to get angry.” – James 1:19

I don’t know if I get my anger issues from my mom or from my absent father. What I know about him is that he was a woman-beater and took his anger out on my mother. There is a possibility that I got it from him.

My mother’s anger came out in words—being passive aggressive and playing mind games—a different type of anger. Maybe I have both kinds of anger. We’ll see by the end of this blog.

If you know me as a person, I hated school. I didn’t hate the learning part as much as I hated the bullying. I started my period early, at 9 years old, and with most periods, you gain weight. I was a heavy-set girl in 4th grade—the biggest girl in the class.

I will never forget the first day I got bullied. The teachers didn’t do anything, no one was listening to me, and I was getting blamed for my own bullying. I had built up so much sadness and anger that I started becoming a bully myself. Of course, when I started to bully, I got suspended, and it just escalated from there.

I became rebellious because of my anger. I would lie, cheat, steal, and just became an awful kid. Mind you, I was only 10 years old in 4th grade. Every time I got bullied, I saw red and didn’t know what else to do besides bully other kids, so at least someone knew how I felt.

When middle school hit, I was getting into fights every other week, getting suspended, and getting in-school suspension. I was still getting bullied—food was thrown at me, boys would rip my clothing, kids would tell me to go kill myself and that I was worthless. Not only did I take my anger out on other people, I took it out on myself. I started believing what they were saying and was self-harming.

By 7th grade I was smoking weed, skipping class, mouthing off to teachers, and just didn’t care anymore. I suppressed my emotions so much that I couldn’t tell you what I felt besides anger.

At home, I would say our family had a lot of aggression in the way we talked. My mother called it “passion.” If we weren’t screaming when we were talking, nothing was getting thrown, or no one was getting hit, then something was really wrong. That’s just how life was. If you were angry, you hit someone or something. If you were pissed off, you cussed up a storm and started hating on people. If someone did something to you, you did it right back—or something worse. There was a lot of hatred in my heart.

“Don’t sin by letting anger control you. Don’t let the sun go down while you are still angry.” – Ephesians 4:26

When I got to high school, the bullying was still happening, even though I lost weight. Instead of the guys saying mean comments, they started cat-calling and harassing me. We had mean girls and mean teachers who didn’t talk to you if you didn’t have a specific last name or weren’t loaded.

By freshman year of high school, I was drinking, smoking, and popping pills to suppress my emotions—the anger, the sadness, and the hurt from the past 9 years of my life. I also played sports, which helped me release a lot of my anger in a healthy way. I just wanted someone to see my pain, to see that I was hurting.

I’ve had conversations with girls who literally told me, “Wow, you’re really nice! I would never talk to you because I was scared of you.” Is that what I wanted? For people to be scared of me?

“Get rid of all bitterness, rage, anger, harsh words, and slander, as well as all types of evil behavior.” – Ephesians 4:31

When I came into the church and started my Bible studies, I had a hard time opening up. I avoided emotions like they were the plague. It would take me about a week to figure out what I was feeling toward a specific scripture in the Bible, or how I was feeling about what my discipler was telling me.

The only feelings I understood were anger and sadness, and I didn’t really show the sad part. Still to this day, when I’m trying to open up, I literally laugh and hide behind sunglasses when I’m about to cry.

Once I started reading scripture about anger, I saw how much damage I had done in the past—to others and to my own heart. I felt instant guilt and shame, and a little bit of relief, knowing that I don’t have to live this way, and that someone (Jesus) knew everything I was feeling. In this moment I felt great, like there wasn’t anything left for me to do. But this was not the case. I had, and still have, a long way to go.

I struggled not just opening up to my friends, but also to God. Even though He knew how I felt, He still wanted me to be open. Why was it hard? Maybe because I didn’t want to look weak. Maybe I was scared of my own feelings. Maybe I wouldn’t know how to feel or act after opening up.

I wrestled with this for a very long time. Before opening up, I felt a distance between me and God. I was discouraged that I was putting this barrier between us. I also didn’t know how to regulate my emotions, nor did I know how to show them. Looking back on it, I was a mess!

I had a lot of work to do, and that meant I had to change my heart. I needed, and still need, convictions. Going through all of this—trying not to have outbursts, having patience, being more calm—I was still living at home, where all we did was fight and scream, throw anger at each other, and be passive aggressive. I felt like I was going through a war battle, not just spiritually either.

My problem was, I thought it was going to change overnight. But it takes patience and effort.

Over the past couple of months, I would say I’ve simmered down a little bit. I started being open with God and working through my emotions—how to feel them and be okay with that. I also had to grow in talking about my emotions with the sisters in the church, and become more gentle and sensitive.

This helped me because I just learned this week that the girls don’t come to me because they’re scared of how I would react—aggressively. When I heard this, I knew I could be a little passionate when I’m talking. But when learning about my own behavior from other people, I realized I’m very intense and passive aggressive with my words, and my facial expressions and body language don’t help.

When I heard this, I was stubborn. I thought I was fine with how I responded to things. I make little jokes and comments to reflect what I’m truly feeling. But I’m not gonna lie—it hurt to know they can’t come to me, because of me.

I knew there was going to be a lot of repenting going on. I realized it’s the sarcasm, the words I choose to call people, my little hits when I’m talking, or just how plain mean I can be. This is a turning point for me, because I thought it was just my personality. But I realize now that the way I act, treat people, and express my emotions are all coping mechanisms from trauma and insecurity. I didn’t realize how deep this goes—and it probably goes deeper.

I’m not saying I’m perfect, or that I have all of this figured out, or that I even have a plan—because I don’t. This is a lot of information for a girl who didn’t even think she had emotions.

What counts is that I am trying. I’m talking about it with God, and I’m choosing to repent.

Being angry controls everything you do. When I’m angry on the road, I drive recklessly and have road rage. When I’m angry with my mom, I take it out on my brother or my sister—or myself. I have a lot of work to do, but I’m doing it for God.

I don’t want to have a hard heart and treat the people around me like they don’t matter. I don’t want to scream, or think about ways to be passive aggressive, or how to start an argument.

I didn’t like being called out, but I’m glad the sisters did it, so I can change my ways and bear fruit!

“Instead, be kind to each other, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, just as God through Christ has forgiven you.” – Ephesians 4:32