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56: The Urge to Purge | Rage, Relief, and What We're Really Trying to Get Rid Of · Banish the Lies: Outsmart Your Inner Critic

• 0:03
  Tania: Welcome to Banish the Lies, the podcast where we outsmart that sneaky inner critic and get closer to the truth that sets us free.
• 0:10
  Tania: I'm Tania Cervoni, your host and fellow work in Progress here to share real stories and small shifts that help you reclaim what fear and doubt once stole.
• 0:21
  Tania: Let's jump in.
• 0:27
  Speaker: Welcome back to another episode of Banish the Lies.
• 0:30
  Speaker: Today was one of those days.
• 0:33
  Speaker: It started out fine and then became one of the tougher days I've had in a while.
• 0:39
  Speaker: I got into a conflict with someone that I care deeply about, and at the same time, I was worried about them.
• 0:45
  Speaker: And it's a really strange combination when someone's pushing your buttons while also, well, let's say pulling at your heartstrings.
• 0:54
  Speaker: And by dinner, I could tell that something was off.
• 0:59
  Speaker: I was just...
• 1:00
  Speaker: I was upset.
• 1:01
  Speaker: I wasn't feeling myself, and I ate past the point of comfort.
• 1:05
  Speaker: Not in a dramatic way, but enough to know I wasn't eating because I was still hungry, and I was left feeling really uncomfortable and just kinda gross.
• 1:18
  Speaker: And what happened next caught me off guard.
• 1:22
  Speaker: For the first time in I don't know how long, I had the urge to purge.
• 1:28
  Speaker: Now, if you're new here, bulimia was something I struggled with for more than 20 years.
• 1:35
  Speaker: I consider myself recovered for a very long time, so the urge itself caught me off guard.
• 1:43
  Speaker: And of course, my first reaction was 100% judgment.
• 1:49
  Speaker: I thought, "Seriously?
• 1:50
  Speaker: Like we're here again?" But then I noticed something really important.
• 1:55
  Speaker: I didn't act on that urge.
• 1:57
  Speaker: There was space, and years ago, there would have been no space between the trigger and the behavior, the urge would have arrived, and I would have followed it automatically.
• 2:11
  Speaker: But this time, I could observe it, and because I could observe it, I could get curious and take a look at, you know, what was really going on here.
• 2:23
  Speaker: And the answer that came to me was very clear.
• 2:26
  Speaker: I wasn't trying to get rid of food.
• 2:29
  Speaker: I was trying to get rid of a very uncomfortable emotion, rage.
• 2:34
  Speaker: Underneath the worry, underneath the concern, underneath the guilt was rage, A feeling I spent much of my life believing that I wasn't allowed to have.
• 2:47
  Speaker: It wasn't productive, it wasn't ladylike, and honestly, it felt dangerous.
• 2:56
  Speaker: So I learned to push it down, and today I was reminded that bulimia was never really about food.
• 3:05
  Speaker: Food was the vehicle, but the real goal was relief.
• 3:10
  Speaker: The real goal was getting rid of an emotion that felt too big, too uncomfortable, or just simply too unacceptable to hold And what's interesting is that later that night, I noticed a different version of the same pattern.
• 3:26
  Speaker: Someone crossed a boundary with me.
• 3:28
  Speaker: They were inappropriate, and I reacted.
• 3:33
  Speaker: And almost immediately, I found myself wondering whether I should apologize.
• 3:38
  Speaker: So here I am.
• 3:41
  Speaker: Someone has just done something inappropriate, and instead of focusing on what I needed in that moment to feel safe and to feel okay, all I could seem to care about was whether I had overreacted and hurt their feelings.
• 3:56
  Speaker: I was fascinated how I became more concerned about my response than the behavior that actually triggered it in the first place, and it made me wonder if this is the same lesson wearing different clothes.
• 4:11
  Speaker: You know, don't express too much anger.
• 4:14
  Speaker: Don't make people feel uncomfortable.
• 4:17
  Speaker: Keep the peace.
• 4:18
  Speaker: Manage yourself.
• 4:19
  Speaker: Stay acceptable.
• 4:21
  Speaker: After all these years, some of those old messages are still beneath the surface.
• 4:27
  Speaker: Which brings me back to the eating disorder, because what I know for sure is that the bulimia was never the problem.
• 4:35
  Speaker: It was just a symptom, and more importantly, a strategy, a strategy for dealing with emotions I didn't know how to express and I didn't believe were safe to feel.
• 4:45
  Speaker: The interesting thing is that most people listening to this, I assume, don't have an eating disorder, but I suspect many of us have our own version of this.
• 4:55
  Speaker: Not necessarily purging, but editing ourselves in some way, swallowing our words, smiling even when we're hurt, talking ourselves out of anger, apologizing before we even figured out whether we've done anything wrong, always being the good girl, in other words.
• 5:15
  Speaker: Different behaviors, but the same question: What feeling are we trying not to feel, or what are we trying to suppress?
• 5:24
  Speaker: Today reminded me that urges are often clues, and experiencing an urge, whether it's to purge or to stay silent or to pour a drink or whatever it is, isn't proof that you've failed.
• 5:39
  Speaker: It's simply information.
• 5:41
  Speaker: It's pointing towards something that wants our attention.
• 5:45
  Speaker: Now, in those moments, it can feel really hard not to act on the urge, and sometimes even harder not to judge ourselves for having it in the first place.
• 5:55
  Speaker: But if we can pause even for a moment and get curious instead of judgmental, we might discover something that we couldn't see before, a need that's going unmet, perhaps a feeling that's waiting to be felt, or even a message that needs to be expressed.
• 6:12
  Speaker: This work may not be easy, but it beats the shame of following the urge any day.
• 6:20
  Speaker: So today my urge was pointing me towards rage.
• 6:24
  Speaker: What might your urge be showing you?
• 6:31
  Tania: Thanks for listening to Banish The Lies.
• 6:33
  Tania: If today's episode resonated with you, take a moment to let it settle in.
• 6:37
  Tania: And maybe share it with a friend who could use it too.
• 6:40
  Tania: Lies, lose their power when we're brave enough to challenge them.
• 6:44
  Tania: I'm Tania Cervoni, and until next time, be kind to yourself.
• 6:49
  Tania: And remember, you're not broken, you're not alone, and you don't have to stay stuck.