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In the spirit of my post in GH's thread Break from Gossip, I should walk the talk, eh and get to working on ME. So here I am because I admit I have a real problem and it's a lasting one that I haven't been able to kick yet.

I have incredible road rage. Some of you may be familiar with this issue since I've had it a long time and about a year or more ago I was working on it. I had gotten it beaten, too, to a large extent. I had figured out how to use humor and how to not take things personally, etc. Well it seems I've forgotten what I'd learned. And now I'm exposed to more traffic than I was back then:

My job entails driving all over the county.

And the slow-poke old folks are still vacationing here from frozen points up north.

And the crazy drunken, risk-taking spring breakers are about to descend on this area like a plague of locusts.

And soon it will be summer, which means families rubbernecking at all the sights.

Today on the bridge, someone was going 10 miles below the speed limit. I lost it and screamed some choice words at the top of my lungs. Luckily there was a driver between us, so I couldn't take my frustration out on the slow driver. To calm down I started to take deep breaths, but I was still enraged most of the 3 miles across the bay.

2 weeks ago I was almost deranged in my aggressiveness when someone was tailgating me, to the point of getting my knife out and making a show of cleaning my nails with it. :shock (psycho that I am).

See, so I'm not above BPD behavior, oh no - my plea in GH's thread wasn't about me being better than anyone. I have come a long way in recovery, but this rage has been resistant...

It's weird because it doesn't come out in other ways. I don't rage at people in my life and never really have, tho once in a great while I'd explode from keeping it all in for years and my dog would get the brunt of it (no, I didn't beat her, but I was mean and controlling and abusive in my own way). I'm not half as irritable about little things as I used to be like I was even just last year.

But this is crazy stuff. I literally lose it. And am mortified later after my reaction while sometimes still feeling smugly justified and self-righteous, too.

Is this a stuck-in-victim mode sort of thing? That somehow I feel I'm being persecuted (or inconvenienced or threatened or annoyed) and so I'm reacting in an aggressive way? The woman was tailgaiting me. It was dangerous, but it also was in my face aggressive and I responded. But the slow driver was just enjoying the view. The day before I had someone else do the same thing and I guess I was doubly frustrated. Is it because I feel powerless and I don't like that feeling? I was afraid I was going to be late for work - it was my fault for leaving late - so does that mean I projected my bad behavior outward because I couldn't/didn't want to accept responsibility?

And more to the point, what can I do to stop this?

Anyone reading this know what I'm talking about and what have you done to control it/banish it?

Oh, I also live in your neck of the woods, so I understand the northerners and their slow ways. LOL. I-75 is a my nemesis. I used to live up in the Bay area and worked in sales, so I had to drive all over the county as well. Luckily, now that I live down south, my job doesn't entail a lot of driving.

I will say, though, that while I do have impatience issues, I don't have the level of rage you seem to have. I know that when I have an angry reaction to others when driving, it's because I'm frustrated by their cluelessness and, to me, their OBVIOUS disrespect of ME. Because I'm on the road too, ya know, and they should be AWARE that they are IN MY WAY. So, disrespect and perceived cluelessness are my triggers. In my case, I have to remind myself that while we do share a road and they SHOULD be aware of what they're doing, I can't expect people to behave the way I do. That's the whole idea behind driving defensively. You need to take care of yourself and try not to take the other drivers' actions personally.

What worked for me was the couple of times I was slowed down only to discover that, but for being held up by the slow driver, (or even when I was held up because I was getting a traffic ticket :shysmile ), I had escaped a crash that I might well have been right in the middle of.

Also, I remember the times I've driven all shookin up going to the hospital (because Mom or someone else was in there) or some other equally distressing thing. My mind was 1000 miles away and even when I would get flipped off, I was so distracted, (and the other driver couldn't have known why and maybe they needed to get their loved one to the doctor or pet to the vet or whatever), that I hardly noticed.

Also, I used to be a very confident driver. These days, because of the anxiety, I drive in the hyper-vigilent 'granny position' and under the speed limit, (which, as referenced above, is hysterical considering my reckless and speeding ill-spent youth LOL ), and people do get mad so I pull over a lot and stay on just the side-streets that go to the gym.

I've been pulled over by the police once or twice because of road rage. I am much better than I used to be. I don't know if it was because of getting tickets, or because I calmed down. Maybe the Risperdal has helped. I try to leave the house with enough time to get to where I need to be. That way I'm not angry if someone is holding me up.

I also do the "granny driving" sometimes, so I have to see others' points of view there too. I do the same thing sometimes so how can I get mad at someone for doing the same thing I do?

hmmm, on the way back from work, driving over that same bridge I thought maybe I should do something like wear a rubber band on my wrist and snap it everytime I get the urge to get mad at someone while I'm driving. But I know I'd keep forgetting to put the band on!

Then I thought I should just come out and say - promise - that I will not engage in dangerous acts of road rage. Tell myself that behavior is not acceptable. That might work because then it's like I'm making it a value to live by and I want to be true to my values, right?

-Don't take it personally.
-Realise the dangers of bad driving.
-Cut the other driver some slack.
-Leave enough time to get there.

Thanks all, that's a good list. I'll have to just practice doing it until it becomes habit again.

I used to take my teen driving 'skills' onto the highway, and then would get angry at anyone who seemed to 'challenge' me and my right to drive as I wanted to. (My brother was dead set against me getting a motorcycle license exactly because he knew just how impulsive I had shown myself to be in a car :/ ...)



This is what helps me these days -> 'humanizing' the other drivers. (That, and getting to be an old lady meself!)

If someone pisses me off on the road, I try to get over my initial reaction to 'teach them how to share the road' and remind myself I don't know what's going on with them. They could be upset about something, a family member might be in the ER or having a baby, they could have just gotten their eyes examined (you know how the doc puts drops in your eyes that blind you for the rest of the day, even 'tho they say it's only "for an hour or two"...?), etc.

If my kids are with me, I sometimes turn it into a game... "Maybe they're going so slow because they're late for the dentist!"

I still get angry with people who talk on a cellular and drive like bozos, though. But I don't run them into the shoulder like I used to...


~ jr

I have road rage issues from time to time. I notice that mine come out more when PMS is a factor. Otherwise the Happy Pill seems to smooth most of that out.

Now that I live 4 miles from work (instead of 50) things are a little easier so it would seem that there's a direct correlation between the amount of time on the roads / distances traversed and the frequency with which the road rage surfaces.

I've also noticed that even though it's only 4 miles, there are still the random times when things will really piss me off during that short trip even outside of the PMS zone. I find that when I'm distracted by other things - running late, day is off to a bad start, fight at home, doggy diarrhea, etc. - that I'm more prone to a short fuse. It's like those other things have already burned up most of my wick so it's a much shorter journey from "just driving" to "gonna rip your head off" while in the car.

Some of the things I try to keep in mind:

- I used to be a youngin' & thought I was invincible, could do anything, drive as fast or as recklessly as I wanted. I've gotta figure that they'll learn sooner or later. Or not. Who knows, maybe they'll end up being a winner of the year's Darwin Awards.

- One day I'll be old & slow. I may think 45 mph is horribly slow but if I had grown up in horse & buggy times, I'd think that was recklessly fast so who knows -- in 50 years, will I think that 120 mph is recklessly fast while youngsters are flipping me off?

- I've been a tourist myself on occasion and I do enjoy being about to look out the window and see all the things I've traveled to see. I'm sure I'll be a tourist again at some point (like in 56 days!) so if it's good for my goose, it's only fair that it's good for their gander.

I had an archrival (no kidding) who used to say that "if you can't hold it in your hand and it won't matter in 5 years, it doesn't matter now." So if someone's being completely clueless (riding two lanes slowly), it won't really make a difference in five days let alone five years so it's not really worth getting upset over now.

And all of this wonderful insight, perspective and wisdom can still fly out the window when I've stepped in gum, am having a bad hair day and am running late for an appointment!

That brings me to the last perspective thing. When I see someone tailgating, changing lanes excessively, making gestures, being visibly upset: I remind myself that I look that idiotic sometimes and they sure must be having a bad day - best to let them pass without incident so they don't make twenty other people have a bad day too!

My mantra in the car has become "it must suck to be you!"

If you're an angry driver, it must suck to be that tightly wound and/or having a bad day.

If you're old & slow, you've probably got suckier things going on that 10 mph under the speed limit (like cataracts, osteoporosis, etc.)

If you're Speed Racer, your insurace rates must be sky high which has to suck.

If you're a family lollygagging on the road, well, you've got a car full of kids and you're spending all sorts of money to be in this wonderful place where I already live - so yeah, stuck with the kids sucks and going back to Omaha (no offense to anyone!) will suck too.

Whether this approach of mine is a form of narcissism (that my life is better than theirs) or not, it does seem to help me NOT get so pissed off at people. They're people, just like me, having issues of their own. Getting pissed at them isn't going to make things any better. (Especially if they call the cops on me, get out of their car at a stop light, etc.) Screaming at them from inside my car isn't going to magically press their accelerator pedal. Meanwhile, I have a cell phone - I can call ahead if I'm going to be late and just chill out.

Life's too short to spend it all amped up on adrenaline.

Funny but I haven't had road rage for years. I'm talking YEARS. And I used to be one of the worst! Swearing, screaming, making obscene hand gestures, honking, even to the point where the poor person in front of me would pull over just to let me get on my way.

I used to live in a very congested, not enough lanes, antiquated highway system type of area. It was there that I learned getting that worked up wasn't worth it to my health! It wasn't worth popping a vein over! I decided I'd get there when I got there. The goal was to get there in one piece. Practical me - that is the bottom line, right? In auto to get from point A to point B.

But last week, I lost it a little bit with another driver. :shysmile Getting a ticket where is live now is a LOT different than getting one where I lived before. I don't speed more than 5 miles or so over the limit. Well, last week there was some work being done on the road that I live on. One guy was right up my, um, back end because he didn't like me going just 5 miles over the limit. I got pissed. When he passed me, I sped up and got right on his, um, tail end. (Real mature, eh?) But then I calmed mysef down. It just wasn't worth getting so angry about.

Yes, I am a member of AAA (Automobile club). There was an article that they published not too long ago about the top 10 causes for auto accidents. I will recall this as accurately as I can, but this is from recall.

1- Eating in your car.
2- Texting on a cell phone.
3- Talking on a cell phone.
4- Taking your eyes off the road for a distraction, like changing a CD.
5- Leaning over to pick something up.

Tailgating (my pet peeve) didn't make the top 5! The reason? Anti-locking brakes AND people who live in congested, large cities learn how to drive that way - on the bumper of the car in front of them. :shock

Lots and lots of NYC, NJ and DC transplants move to where I am at now. These guys will crawl right up to my car bumper. I move over expecting them to speed on their merry way, right? Nope. Some of 'em actually slow down to get behind me again. Some will speed up just to get on the bumper of the next car ahead of them.

It is pretty damn comical in my book. I laugh at 'em cuz they are no longer on the freeway systems where they come from and still find the need to drive like they are.

I have satellite radio in my car. I love it. All sorts of different stations to listen to, chill out to. Satellite radio is my driving valium, my sanity helper...plus, there isn't ANYTHING worth popping a vein over!

PS I have the kind of car where I can change the channel of my satellite radio from my steering wheel. Also the car has voice recognition, so I can push a button on the steering wheel and tell the car what channel I want to listen to. It is really cool! I don't even have to take my eyes off the road. And it is a mainstream kind of car - a Honda.

I've been working a lot on my road rage. I used to have really bad road rage to the point it was a joke among all my friends because I'd yell at handicapped people who took too long to park their large vans.

I've been doing really well though, like last night I got stuck behind a semi that for some reason wanted to go 25 miles an hour [seriously] in a 45 mph zone on a one-lane street. Instead of getting upset I took a deep breath and just thought to myself that I wanted to hear the CD I was listening too anyway [my car has a much better sound system than my apartment]. Music helps a lot for me.