Keep calm is heartfelt advice

New research suggests that regularly getting angry may increase your risk of cardiovascular disease and stroke. While ‘don’t sweat the small stuff’ is sagely advice, some cannot be so calm and controlled when anger takes control. 

The New Zealand Mental Health Foundation says that anger is one of the many emotions that humans experience. They maintain that: “anger is not good or bad”. It can be helpful when it motivates you to take positive action, but it can also feel uncomfortable and drive behaviours that can cause problems in day-to-day life. When it comes to heart health and stroke, avoidance anger is clearly a significant detrimental force.

Like all emotions, anger occurs for a reason. It might mean that your brain has recognised that something around you needs to change. Often, anger covers up other emotions such as stress, embarrassment, fear, hurt or helplessness.

As with other difficult emotions, sometimes people bottle up their anger and struggle to express it. As a result, you may feel sad, guilty, ashamed, or scared. Or you may feel overwhelmed by anger and get so caught up in emotion that you do or say things you later regret. The expression of anger can often affect our relationships with other people.

It is never okay to be violent or hurt someone else just because you are angry. Seeking help to understand and better manage strong emotions can help to prevent harming others.

Anger can be obvious, for example, feeling furious in response to minor situations or feeling that you have no control of your anger. Other signs of anger could be less obvious and include:

• Being irritable and noticing that trivial things make you angry.
• Anger being your “go-to” response in stressful or challenging situations.
• Saying things to others that are aggressive or nasty, and out of proportion in the given situation.
• Feeling depressed.
• Avoiding being around friends or family/whānau.
• Social relationships with family/whānau members, friends or with work colleagues becoming strained because of things you have felt, said, or done.
• Using drugs or alcohol to make you feel more relaxed or calm.

Sages for the ages

Confucius was a Chinese philosopher, politician, and teacher whose message of knowledge, benevolence, loyalty, and virtue were the main guiding philosophy of China for thousands of years. 

In a  2024 study, researchers investigated the relationship between emotional state and endothelial cell health, an overall indicator of vascular (blood vessels) health. Endothelial cells line the interior of blood vessels and are an essential mechanism to maintain healthy blood flow throughout the body.

They discovered that anger is unique from other common negative emotions, such as sadness or anxiety, in its effects on vascular health. And while those effects may be reversible in the short term, repeated bouts of anger could have the potential to increase your risk of cardiovascular (heart and blood vessels) disease in the long run.

The research team similarly found that anger, but not the other emotions that were studied, had an adverse impact on vascular health. So, there is something about anger that’s ‘cardiotoxic’ and is a mechanism of why feelings of anger may be associated with increased heart disease risk.

Moreover, the team found that anger negatively affected endothelial cell health by impairing the blood vessels’ ability to dilate, restricting blood flow. This impaired state persisted up to 40 minutes after the recall exercise, before returning to baseline.

The Building Blocks of Anger Management

• Admit that you are angry, to yourself and/or to someone else.
• Believe you can control your anger. Tell yourself that you can.
• Calm down. Control your emotions.
• Decide how to solve the problem. This step only works once you are calm.
• Express yourself assertively but not aggressively. Ask for what you need in a firm but positive voice and do not blame others (e.g. use “I” statements such as “I feel…”, “I need…”, “I’m upset…”).
• Understand your conflict hot buttons.
• Recognize early signs of anger.
• Do not suppress your anger, but do not take it out on others.
• Regulate your emotions.
• Express your emotions constructively.

 “Fly off the Handle” is an American phrase that alludes to the way that an axe head can fly off its handle if it becomes loose. The expression was first seen in print in 1834, in Thomas C. Haliburton's The Attaché; or Sam Slick in England: “He flies right off the handle for nothing.”  Truly ‘losing it’ to one’s emotions. 

 

 

Feedback welcomed.

We would like to hear your thoughts on this Article.

Click here to submit your feedback.

 

Published:  November 2024

To be reviewed: October 2027