Resentment is hurt, disappointment, anger, or any other negative emotion that persists over a period of time. It usually doesn't go away on its own – instead, it accumulates and grows bigger. As this resentment continues, the people in the relationship find it more difficult to express love and empathy to one another.
But a marriage can recover from resentment: It takes shared responsibility, a willingness to talk openly, and a dedication to doing the healing work. You have to understand the hurts in your relationship, be able to talk them through together, and then commit to meeting each other's needs.
Resentment describes a negative emotional reaction to being mistreated. There is no one cause of resentment, but most cases involve an underlying sense of being mistreated or wronged by another person. Experiencing frustration and disappointment is a normal part of life.
That's because of the intense effect of resentment on the body—which essentially creates a toxic mind-body cycle. "Ruminating over the feeling of resentment and the interaction that brought about it can flood the brain with stress hormones that make you more susceptible to negative thoughts," says Dr. Awosan.
A: Unlike most forms of anger, which are triggered by specific incidents, thoughts, or memories, chronic resentment is a more generalized state: no one resents just one thing. Most resentful people drag a long chain of bitterness through life.
Bitterness and resentment relate to anger. When we let anger at others or frustration at our situation fester and build up in our hearts, we can begin to develop bitterness and resentment. Often bitterness takes root when we are hurt by others or we think a situation we are put in is unjust or unfair.
An individual may hold on to negative feelings, revisiting the distressing event again and again and becoming unable to let go of anger or a desire for revenge. In this instance, resentment may come to affect an individual's mental health.
This is an anguishing state that tends to prolong over time, to the point where it can interfere with other aspects of a person's daily life. It's not uncommon for their mood to change. Also, it's not uncommon for them to stop trusting others, have sudden attitude changes, and mistreat others. Resentment is like rust.
You begin to resent the other person and dwell on what they did to you. The injuries feel unforgivable, and the resentment turns into hate, like slowly hardening concrete. Your attitude toward the other person becomes rigid, and nothing they say or do makes a difference. Hate provides a perfect excuse to stay angry.
But What is Resentment Really? Now, feelings of resentment are not linked to any particular mental conditions. However, they may actually result from the inadequate expression of emotion after a painful (unjust) experience.
Chronic anger puts you into a fight-or-flight mode, which results in numerous changes in heart rate, blood pressure and immune response. Those changes, then, increase the risk of depression, heart disease and diabetes, among other conditions.
Strong, Uncomfortable Feelings
The feeling of resentment can be very distressing. Other uncomfortable feelings such as jealousy or ill will toward others may come along with it and linger. You may develop feelings of regret for the things you did or said or the way your life turned out.
Emotions of anger and resentment are often held in our jaw and around the mouth. If you often have a sore throat, mouth ulcers or grind your teeth at night, it could be a sign that there is an excess of overactive or stagnant energy in this part of your body.
The emotion of anger is associated with the choleric humor and can cause resentment and irritability. It is believed that this emotion is stored in the liver and gall bladder, which contain bile. Anger can cause headaches and hypertension which can in turn affect the stomach and the spleen.
An imbalanced liver and gallbladder can be caused by longstanding feelings of repressed anger, such as resentment, frustration, and irritability.
Resentment is like a poison we carry around inside us with the hope that when we get the chance we can deposit it where it will harm another who has injured us. The fact is that we carry this poison at extreme risk to ourselves. Being resentful, they say, is like taking poison and waiting for the other person to die.
The byproducts of resentment are numerous: desire for revenge, punishment, frustration, alienation, outrage, fury, wrath, hostility, ferocity, bitterness, hate, loathing, scorn, spite, vengefulness, and dislike. That's not an insignificant list.
Resentment is a symptom that something is wrong. It's a red flag that needs attention. In many cases, something in your situation is wrong or unfair and needs to change. In some cases, though, it might be that your reaction is the issue, not the circumstances.
Resentment is the feeling that you did not get your way in the past. These feelings are therefore based on selfishness (the need to get your wants fulfilled).
Resentment is re-experiencing negative moments from the past that hurt you. It is a cocktail of anger, shame, mistrust, fear and sadness.
In a series of studies, Vivian Zayas and Yuichi Shoda found that people don't just love or hate significant others. They love and hate them—and that's normal. The key to getting through the inevitable hard times, as my own research suggests, is to never stop trying to understand where your partner is coming from.
Consider taking an empathetic approach. Embrace the conversation with the person who hurt you — as hard as that may be. While you might feel like the victim in this scenario, it's very possible that they're the victim of a past trauma that triggered the act over which you're feeling resentful.