Anger is often spoken about as if it is mainly a difficulty to be managed. We hear about anger management, anger issues, angry outbursts, angry people. Of course anger can become harmful. It can be used to intimidate, control, punish or avoid responsibility. When anger becomes frightening or violent, the priority is safety, accountability and protection from harm.

But anger itself is not only destructive. In therapy, anger is often more complicated than that. It may be a protest, a boundary signal, a response to being ignored, or a protective movement around something more vulnerable. Sometimes anger says, “something matters here”. Sometimes it says, “this has gone too far”. Sometimes it says, “I have been trying to stay quiet for a very long time”.

When we only ask how to get rid of anger, we may miss what it is trying to communicate.

The protective edge of anger

Anger often appears at the point where something feels threatened. That threat may be obvious: unfair treatment, criticism, betrayal, exclusion, coercion or danger. At other times it is more subtle. A person may feel angry when they sense they are not being heard, when their needs are dismissed, when a boundary is crossed, or when an old wound is touched in a present relationship.

This does not mean every angry reaction is accurate or proportionate. Feelings are meaningful, but they are not always literal maps of the present moment. A small event can carry the weight of many earlier events. A late reply to a message may stir a much older feeling of being forgotten. A partner’s distracted expression may touch an earlier experience of emotional absence. A reasonable request at work may land in the body as criticism, pressure or shame.

In this sense, anger can be both present and historical. It may be about what is happening now, and also about what the nervous system has learned to expect.

Attachment theory has long recognised that anger can be part of protest when connection feels threatened. Bowlby described separation and anger as closely linked in attachment experience: anger may be one way the system tries to restore contact, protest loss, or resist helplessness. In adult life this can become confusing, because the person we are angry with may not be the original source of the wound.

The anger we do not show

Not everyone experiences anger as an outward expression. For some people, anger is immediately suppressed, softened, intellectualised or turned inward. It may appear as resentment, tiredness, bodily tension, sarcasm, withdrawal, self-criticism, pleasing, or a vague sense of being “not fine” without knowing why.

Many people learned early that anger was unsafe. Perhaps anger in the family was explosive, frightening or humiliating. Perhaps the child who protested was labelled difficult, selfish or dramatic. Perhaps keeping everyone else calm became the safest option. In such circumstances, not showing anger may have been a highly intelligent adaptation.

The cost is that unexpressed anger does not necessarily disappear. It may settle in the body. It may become chronic tension, clenched shoulders, headaches, digestive discomfort, shallow breathing or exhaustion. It may also become resentment: a quieter, more enduring anger that grows when a person repeatedly says yes while something inside them is saying no.

This is one reason psychotherapy may not begin with the question, “Why are you angry?” Sometimes the more useful questions are slower:

• What happened just before the anger appeared?
• What did you need but not ask for?
• What felt unfair, unsafe or unseen?
• What did you do with the anger once it arrived?
• What might the anger be protecting?

Anger, shame and tenderness

Anger and shame are often close neighbours. Some people become angry when they feel exposed, inadequate, rejected or humiliated. Others feel ashamed for being angry at all. They may worry that anger makes them unkind, unreasonable or dangerous.

In therapy, this can require careful pacing. If anger is challenged too quickly, the person may feel judged and become more defended. If anger is encouraged without reflection, it may be acted out in ways that damage relationships. The work is usually neither suppression nor discharge for its own sake. It is the development of enough safety and awareness to stay with the feeling and discover what lies beneath or beside it.

Often, beneath anger, there is something more tender: hurt, grief, fear, longing, disappointment, helplessness or the wish to matter. Anger may stand guard because these softer feelings feel too exposed. It may be easier to say “I’m furious” than “I felt unimportant”. It may be easier to blame than to feel grief. It may be easier to attack than to recognise the depth of wanting contact.

This does not make anger false. It makes it layered.

The body’s part in anger

Anger is not only a thought. It is a bodily state. The heart rate changes, muscles prepare for action, the jaw tightens, heat rises, breath shifts, attention narrows. Polyvagal-informed approaches would describe this as part of the nervous system’s mobilisation for protection. The body is preparing to do something.

For some people, this mobilisation is frightening. They may fear losing control, so they shut down as soon as anger appears. Others may move very quickly from bodily activation to words or actions they later regret. Still others may not recognise anger until much later, when they replay a conversation and realise that something in them had been saying no.

Body awareness can help here, not as a technique to make anger vanish, but as a way to notice it earlier and with more choice. A person might learn to recognise their own warning signs: a tightening chest, a change in tone, a pressure behind the eyes, an impulse to interrupt, a sudden urge to leave, or a collapse into silence.

Once anger is noticed early, there is more room to ask: what is needed now? A pause? A boundary? Clarification? Repair? Distance? Support? A more honest conversation?

Neurodivergence, overload and being misunderstood

Anger can also be misunderstood in neurodivergent experience. Sensory overload, masking, social exhaustion, injustice sensitivity, communication mismatch or repeated invalidation may all contribute to anger or shutdown. What appears from the outside as “overreacting” may be the end point of sustained effort to cope in an environment that has not been accessible.

Neurodiversity-aware therapy needs to be careful here. It should not automatically interpret anger as resistance, immaturity or pathology. Nor should it romanticise anger or ignore its impact on others. The task is to understand the context: sensory load, communication differences, unmet access needs, accumulated frustration, and the relational history of being misread.

Milton’s “double empathy problem” is helpful because it reminds us that misunderstanding is not located only inside the neurodivergent person. Communication difficulties can arise between differently organised people, especially where one way of processing the world is treated as the norm and the other as the problem.

Boundaries, responsibility and repair

If anger carries information, one of its most important messages may concern boundaries. Anger often arises where a limit has been crossed, or where a limit has never been allowed to exist. This is why people who habitually please others may first encounter their boundaries as anger. The feeling arrives before the words do.

A boundary is not the same as a threat. It is not a way of controlling another person. It is a way of saying what is and is not possible for oneself: “I can talk about this, but not while being shouted at”; “I want to help, but I cannot take responsibility for all of this”; “I need more time before I answer”; “I do not want to discuss that today”.

Working with anger therefore includes responsibility. Anger may be understandable without every expression of it being acceptable. Therapy can help separate the feeling from the action. It can support a person to say, “my anger makes sense”, and also, “I am responsible for what I do with it”.

This distinction matters. Without compassion, anger becomes shameful and hidden. Without responsibility, anger can become harmful and entitled. Good therapeutic work tries to hold both.

What therapy can offer

Psychotherapy offers a space where anger can be approached with curiosity rather than judgement. This does not mean the therapist simply agrees with every angry interpretation. It means anger is taken seriously as part of the person’s emotional and relational life.

In a relational therapy, the therapeutic relationship itself may become part of the work. A client might feel irritated, disappointed, misunderstood or cautious with the therapist. If this can be explored safely, it may offer a different experience: anger does not have to destroy the relationship, nor does it have to be swallowed to preserve it. It can be spoken about, reflected on and repaired.

Transactional Analysis offers useful language here. Some anger may belong to a present-centred Adult response to a real boundary issue. Some may carry the intensity of earlier Child experience. Some may be shaped by old scripts such as “I must not make a fuss”, “I must keep others happy”, or “the only way to be heard is to become forceful”. The point is not to fit the person into a theory, but to use theory gently as an aid to listening.

Over time, the aim is not to become someone who never feels anger. It is to develop a more honest relationship with anger: to notice it, understand it, regulate it, express it where appropriate, and recognise the tender human meanings it may be protecting.

A more compassionate question

Instead of asking only, “How do I stop being angry?”, it may be worth asking:

“What is my anger trying to protect, and how can I respond without harming myself or someone else?”

That question does not excuse harmful behaviour. It also does not shame the feeling. It creates a space in which anger can become information rather than an enemy.

Sometimes, anger is the first sign that a buried part of the self is beginning to speak. Therapy can help make that speech safer, clearer and more connected.

References

Bowlby, J. (1998) Attachment and Loss. Volume 2: Separation: Anxiety and Anger. London: Pimlico. ISBN 978-0-7126-6621-3.

Dana, D. (2024) Anchored: How to Befriend Your Nervous System Using Polyvagal Theory. London: Ebury Digital. ISBN 978-1-5299-3858-6.

Hargaden, H. and Sills, C. (2014) Transactional Analysis: A Relational Perspective. London: Taylor and Francis. ISBN 978-1-58391-119-8.

Milton, D., Gurbuz, E. and Lopez, B. (2022) ‘The double empathy problem: Ten years on’, Autism, 26(8), pp. 1901–1903. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1177/13623613221129123.

Schore, A.N. (2005) ‘Attachment, affect regulation, and the developing right brain: linking developmental neuroscience to pediatrics’, Pediatrics in Review, 26(6), pp. 204–217. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1542/pir.26.6.204.

Stewart, I. and Joines, V. (1987) TA Today: A New Introduction to Transactional Analysis. Nottingham: Lifespace Publishing. ISBN 978-1-870244-00-8.