You put it forward wonderfully and it resonates with much of what I’ve been feeling myself. Ironically, the friend who let down my trust is a psychology student herself… that’s why I had confided in her in the first place. I looked up an online anti-depression/suicide prevention service run by psychologists, willing to help victims for free, but unfortunately the person who talked to me was not very patient or understanding. Upon my request, my parents visited a psychiatrist who demanded an insanely large fees. We can’t afford that much. That’s why I started looking to online forums for help.

I should clear that I’m not denying my parents’ role in shaping my temper to some extent. Its just that knowing how much else they did and suffered for me, and the undeniable fact that as an adult I had/have the responsibility of behaving in a mature manner and not like an uncivilized, uncouth barbarian like I did to Jerry, makes it hard for me to lay too much blame on anybody but myself. I’m not being mollycoddled or restricted today the way I used to be. If I truly love her, I should have changed myself for her the way I had been promising her every other day from a year. She had extracted from me this promise to change myself, a promise I’ve not been able to fulfill to this day. It was my New Year resolution to never hurt her again… and I ruined it in January itself.

Like you said, #2 is a root cause and will take much time and effort to work on. #1 is the immediate thing to address. I do not want to be what I am. I do not wish to hurt innocent people like this, by having a short fuse of a temper that goes off at the slightest perceived provocation. Every day I remind myself of the quote, “words you say cannot be taken back, so never say anything without thinking of its effects”… but in the heat of anger, I just forget everything and I feel this voice inside telling me, “don’t be a coward, just say it or you’ll blame yourself forever for not having had the guts to fight back.” When in reality I know that I’ve regretted every single thing I ever did due to anger, to this day.

If I’m able to truly help you out too, it would be a joy and honour for me. Sometimes these things work out better than all the professional help out there. 🙂