Is Depression Anger Turned Inward?
How chronically repressing anger impacts our body and our mood.
3 min read | Illustration by Marcelo Clapp
Sigmund Freud famously said that depression is “anger turned inward.” Depression is a complex and widespread mental health illness whose origins cannot be oversimplified, and much research has called Freud’s theory into question. For some, unexpressed anger can play a large role in depression. For others—especially men—anger and irritability are actually symptoms of depression. In this post, we’ll explore how chronically repressing our anger impacts our body and offer a guide to sitting with anger.
So what was Freud getting at? For many of us, it was never okay to express feelings of anger--we’d be seen as ‘too much’ or ‘threatening’ or ‘attention-seeking.’ Maybe we stuffed our anger inside in order to be seen as the good kid. Maybe we’ve witnessed/survived violence and vowed never to feel something that could lead to such destructive behaviors when unchecked. Or maybe we have had complicated feelings towards caregivers and every time we start to feel anger or resentment bubbling up, bigger feelings of guilt swoop in and steal the show.
Holding in anger takes a physical toll. Turning our anger inward has been adaptive and necessary at times. Yet habitually repressing our anger takes a physical toll on our body. Melanie Berkowitz, a therapist at Downtown Somatic Therapy, notes, “Holding in anger puts our muscles in an actual physical bind! Some muscles in our body will literally move forward and outward with the impulse to say ‘no’--in contrast, other muscles move inward to hold it all and not to rock the boat.”
Held-in anger can show up in clenched jaws or sore backs. Some repress their resentment to the point where chronic tension and pain emerge. All of this holding in comes at a price. We start to tell ourselves we’re ‘bad’ or unworthy, our bodies are fatigued, we try not to feel anything, and we start to feel helpless.
“Holding in anger puts our muscles in an actual physical bind! Some muscles in our body will literally move forward and outward with the impulse to say ‘no’ while other muscles move inward to hold it in and not to rock the boat.”
Anger is a feeling that, by itself, is not destructive— there is a vitality and a life force in anger. Yet anger can be tricky to face and easy to want to avoid. Tina Tacorian, another one of our therapists at Downtown Somatic Therapy, says that her patients’ feelings of guilt often get louder when they first start feeling their anger.
Tina says, “I validate the love my patient’s guilt is trying to protect--while still encouraging them to tend to the anger and put their guilt on the sideline for a while.” There is room to feel both love and anger; in fact, feeling both of these emotions deeply can reach and heal some of our deeper wounds.
So, how do you sit with anger when it arises? Give yourself permission to notice the qualities of your anger when it emerges. Acknowledge the vitality in the feeling. Anger is informative: it lets us know we feel disconnected and its goal is to take care of us.
Try to take a stance of curiosity, understanding that tapping into your somatic experience can provide relief. What do you feel in your body when there is anger? Explore your posture. Do you want to make a fist? Is there a lingering, softer feeling underneath the anger?
So, how do you sit with anger when it arises? Give yourself permission to notice the qualities of your anger when it emerges.
When we let ourselves actually feel our anger without judgement, deeper feelings naturally emerge. These might be feelings of grief or fear. Try to nurture whichever emotion you are able to contact beneath the anger. Maybe you can nurture it by placing your hand to your heart or caressing the part of your body that holds most anger. And if you feel unable to offer this care to yourself, you might imagine a close friend lending their hand or a nurturing figure from a movie or book present with you.
For those of us who learn to sit with anger in an open-minded way, there is an opportunity to get in touch with more vitality and to connect with our core needs. If you’ve been struggling with depression or are aware that you have anger inside that needs a safe place to surface, consider reaching out to Downtown Somatic Therapy to begin exploring the full range of feelings you hold inside.