Anger Management and Counselling in Comox, BC.

Anger is called a secondary emotion, brought on by a triggering event and or thought. What I'm interested in was a therapist, is what is behind the trigger. What are the fears, the needs that aren't being met. By identifying different triggers, and the the triggering thoughts behind them, we can depersonalize a situation so that it simply becomes a problem to be solved, without fault or blame, and discover alternative thoughts and behaviours that lead a path to better choices, without shame or guilt.

Anger is an emotion that we all have experienced – it is natural, normal and healthy. However if it gets to be too much it can become destructive and damaging to those around us and ourselves. It can lead to problems in our personal lives as well as at work and play. How we express our anger can be the key to learning to better manage our angry emotions. Anger is a biological reaction and yet we can learn to manage it better. We can learn to express what we are feeling and to use various calming strategies that help us to identify our triggers and learn to control our reactions. The benefits to learning manage our anger are endless and often life transforming.

Have you found that anger has started to ruin relationships, interfere with your job, and negatively impact your life? Anger has a way of spreading and infecting day-to-day interactions. If this sounds familiar, you're not alone. I work with many people who are controlled by their anger. Typically, anger is influenced by other underlying causes. In counselling, we will work together to learn new coping mechanisms to limit anger while also looking at what is causing anger. If you want to take the next step, reach out to me, and we can begin to change how you react to anger.

My approach is to use a step-by-step process that follows an evidence based approach: goal setting; self awareness; cognitive reframing; behavioural modification; review of progress. Fundamental to the work is a good therapeutic relationship. That is, we have the collaboration and trust to combine your knowledge of yourself and your situation and my skills and knowledge of the clinical issues to make change happen.

Anger is generally masking other feelings beneath it. By exploring our family dynamics and history we can come to an understanding of the underlying feelings that trigger our anger and the thought processes and inner narrative we've built around it. I use an MCBT approach to facilitate this process. Enabling people time to think about consequences and their emotional triggers before reacting is part of my process.

Anger and violence are wildly misunderstood issues. I believe that it is important to explore the context in which the anger or violence occurs. For example, does it happen at home, or at work, or in public? Who is impacted by the anger or violence? How do the individuals who are impacted resist and respond to the anger/violence? Through counselling we will explore the context of the interactions. Once we understand the context (who is doing what to who?) I will respectfully invite responsibility taking and strategies for more helpful communication and responses.

When anger gets the best of us, we can say and/or do things that we later wish we could change or take back. Anger is an instinctive universal emotion, one in which we all have, but not all expressions of anger have to be hurt. In fact, anger works as a great informant and can motivate us to take action to improve our own lives and the lives of people that we care about.

Anger can be a reaction to a range of experiences, from past traumas to present-day stressors, and EMDR can help to desensitize and reprocess these experiences, reducing the intensity of the emotional response. Through the use of bilateral stimulation, such as eye movements or tapping, EMDR can help to process the distressing memories and emotions, leading to increased emotional regulation and a greater sense of control over one's emotional response. By addressing the underlying emotional triggers, EMDR can help to alleviate symptoms of anger and promote more adaptive coping strategies.