I very much enjoyed this, and hope it's okay to pass the link on to some folks.
I think it's almost a chemical addiction, the belief that crazy and love equate.
I had a conversation about that with some young women last night that could not grasp any of it. I felt sad, because I honestly can't say that I would have grasped any of it myself in my 20's. But one girl actually said she had tried to have a serious relationship with a girl who wasn't crazy, and she got bored. Oy.

Having recently found a decoy...

Somehow your postings are always well timed.

Thanks, once again, for a laugh about something I didn't find funny at the time.

It's awkward for me to admit this, but I happen to be one of those people.

And before you hunker down in your bomb shelter with your Civil Defense hat on, hear me out.

One thing I try to tell people who get emotionally close to me is that I have bipolar disorder (if you're reading this and this is the first that you've heard of it, sorry that I'm late.)

People with bipolar disorder have emotional triggers - events or subject matters that send them instantly from 0 to 60. (When I read the first paragraph of your essay, I imagined what it would be like to have a literal "hair trigger": "Oh my god, HAIR!!! RAAARGH!!!") For them it's a far more serious matter than not bringing up the Vietnam War when grandpa is visiting, there is no middle ground - having bipolar means it's difficult to put the brakes on when your emotions are getting aroused. Where most people have the ability to say "wait a minute, that statement hurt my feelings" and take things to a rational discourse - it's just not present with someone with bipolar. It's a whole new skill set that has to be learned and constantly practiced.

Now I'm not disagreeing with anything you've said. If there's one thing the world needs its one less self-justifying, "How DARE you call me an attention whore!" kind of post in a social network site. But reading your essay gave me some serious thought as to why I have blown up at friends and loved ones (most especially loved ones, I'm afraid). While I could give an near-endless list of reasons why, from touchy subjects (like money) to physical states (being tired AND hungry), but ultimately I think that the reason why people explode in the way you describe is because it brings self-medication.

Much like how an alcoholic will use any physical or emotional malady as a reason to get drunk, someone with a hair-trigger is really needing a release from some kind of inner turmoil. And in a bass-ackwards way, they lash out at the nearest person (who is also the closest person to them emotionally) as a means of trying to communicate what they really need - unfortunately it's delivered in such a way that the recipient is thinking "my God, what a prick1" It's like sending someone a love letter stapled to a dead kitten: it doesn't matter how genuine your intent is, they're worried about what you did to the kitten.

If anything, a person who has a perpetuating "hair trigger" needs help, but probably not the kind of help that a friend or loved one is truly capable of giving them.