The Rational Basis® of Happiness Podcast

The Selfish Path to Romance. Download chapter one for free at DrKenner.com and at Amazon.com.

And right now, I want to turn to the phones and welcome Rojas. Hello. Hi. How are you? Hey, what's going on? Well, that's my question to you. What's going on? What question would you like answered?

Oh, no, I'm trying to figure out, where should I start off? It's like, I've been having, like, outbursts, like mood swings. One minute I'm down; the next minute, I'm off, like, real mad. And it's, like, simple things that make me go off. You know, I'm a nice person. It's just certain things—it'll make me mad, make me go off.

And what—yeah. And how old are you?

Twenty-two.

You're 22 years old, and you just lose it at times. Something triggers it, and you just lose it. You get real angry.

Yes, ma'am.

Have you hit or punched or kicked or done anything to a person? Have you crossed the line?

Well, not a person—like things, you know.

Give me an example of some things that you would punch or kick.

A wall, or, you know, not a person.

Yeah, and you're wanting to know what causes this?

Yes, ma'am, that and how I can get some help—if it is, you know, if it's bipolar, whatever it is. How can I get help, and what causes it?

Okay, I won't be able to diagnose whether it's bipolar or not. I can tell you what some of the symptoms of bipolar are, but that doesn't mean that you necessarily have it, because there are other things that you definitely want to rule out before we—well, I could tell you a few things with bipolar. But do you know what the two different poles are?

Do I know what the two what?

It's called bipolar. What do you know about bipolar, Rojas?

I recently had a girlfriend, and we're kind of going through some things because of it. But not too much. I just know it could be—it could be caused by, like, trauma when you're younger. Somebody could have done something to you or—

Yeah, and tell me what trauma you had when you were younger.

Whatever it is, I don't remember.

You don't remember at all. What was it like growing up in your family? Was it a mom and a dad with you, or did you have siblings with you?

Yeah, I had both, mom, dad—they're still together now—and a little sister.

And were mom and dad wonderful parents, nurturing, or did they lose it at times? Did either one of them have anger problems?

My dad.

Your dad did? Did he get angry at mom? Did he get angry at you?

Everybody.

Everybody. And give me a memory that you have of dad getting angry. What's the type of thing he would do?

Just kind of like when he got off work, everybody would kind of just go to their room. They'd go their separate ways and close their door or whatever. He'd probably be pissed because of something at work, or somebody coming in the house frowning, and, you know, things like that. So it'd be on a regular basis.

So dad would come in, and you would all have to hide away? You'd have to hide from him—is that what you're saying?

Right, right.

And if you didn't hide—if he got ahold of you, what would he do if he got ahold of you?

Well, he'd just get loud and, you know, say things, but he wouldn't, you know, carry out—

What would he say? What would he threaten? It sounds like he would say things, but he wouldn't carry them out. What would he threaten to do?

Just bad things. It's been a while. See, I've been on my own ever since I was 19, yeah, and it's kind of been a while, but it wasn't nothing too nice. And I also have, like, two scars, one on both sides of my shoulders. I don't know what happened—something like this.

You have two scars, so something happened to you in childhood that you don't recall?

Right, I don't know what it is. It looks like either some bad wounds or bullet marks, you know.

Some what? I can't hear the words. Help me out. It looks like—

I can't word it or think of the word right now. It looks like a bullet wound on both sides of my shoulders, or like a stab wound, like someone was on a—

A stab wound, okay. So it may be that—I worked with a lot of abused children, from two and a half years old on through adults, actually adults who had been abused. But when I worked with the children, they went through really severe trauma. I mean, some of them had broken ribs. Parents would learn how to hit where it wouldn't show, so they would hit on the torso, because the kids would wear clothes and could still go to school. And kids were taught how to lie, you know, where the bruises came from. And the kids had to put up with enormous irrationality of their parents. And if you've had a childhood like that, that you're trying to blank out, maybe these moments where you get angry—maybe there's something that's similar. What has happened—give me a situation recently where you just lost it.

Hey, I gotta interrupt this because we've got to pay some bills. Thirty seconds, that's it. A very quick ad, and then Ellen will be back.

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Give me a situation recently where you just lost it.

Around Christmas time, my girlfriend—she ended up saying something to me, and I just went the hell out. I just went out.

You yelled at her?

Yeah.

And did you do anything else?

No, I just yelled at her.

Okay, the fact that you're seeking help is wonderful. It's really a tribute to you. And if you could—if you're looking to get some clinical help with that, I would rule out something, and I mentioned this would be post-traumatic stress disorder. It's after you've gone through trauma. You necessarily have tried to block it out, but it hasn't been successful, and it will come through periodically. You could get some help. You could go to the website. Do you have a paper and pencil?

Yes, ma'am. You said it's post—it's traumatic—

Well, I can't diagnose you over the air, but the children that I worked with, some of them went ahead bipolar. And you'd ask, you know, what is bipolar? Well, the two moods are depressed, and then manic. Manic is when you really lose it. But it sounds like you've been through some serious trauma. It sounds more like post-traumatic stress disorder, and I don't know if you're having intrusive recollections or flashbacks or something that's going on, but the fact that you don't remember your childhood tells me that there's some trauma work that might benefit you. You could go to the AcademyofCT.org—the Academy of Cognitive Therapy—and they have a lot of information on bipolar and post-traumatic stress disorder that you could look up, read about, and get books that you might enjoy too.