Dealing with Disgust

Source: Robbin Higgins/Pixabay, retrieved from Canva

A child and her parents aren’t getting along because she won’t eat crackers or fruit, but is fine with hot dogs. A man rolls his eyes when his spouse insists that he wash his hands after using the kitchen sponge. My son, Colby, screams at his sister when he is grossed out because she is eating a banana while sitting next to him.

These relationship woes have a common culprit: A phenomenon social scientists refer to as disgust sensitivity. It is something I have dealt with personally since I was a young child, and that I have seen many times in my clinical work. While there is a physiological component to the disgust response, here I will focus on what to do when disgust sensitivity impacts your relationships, whether because others are misunderstanding your sensitivity, or you are having trouble relating to theirs.

Disgust is a universal human emotion that is thought to protect us from pathogens, such as those in rotting meat. It might also remind us of our mortality (i.e., that someday we will become rotting meat). Disgust keeps us in line as well by encouraging moral purity.

While most people would be disgusted by things like bodily decay, we also vary in what disgusts us and how easily we get disgusted.

If you are like me, you have gotten through the grossness of everyday life by grinning and bearing it. But disgust sensitivity has led to worse consequences than tension headaches. It has led me to feel misunderstood. For example, as a young adult, I had a part-time job helping people with developmental disabilities. Things were going well until I was asked to change adult diapers. I gave it a shot, but my disgust sensitivity hit the roof. Upon telling my supervisor that I couldn’t stomach the task, I was told that I needed “sensitivity training.” I felt misunderstood because I had a genuine desire to advocate for the individuals I served.

On top of that, research has shown that disgust sensitivity is associated with other traits. While I relate to some of them, like being female and anxious, I don’t to others, like having an authoritarian attitude.

Interestingly, I have also misunderstood others’ disgust sensitivity. As a beginning clinician, I worked with children who found foods like crackers and cookies to be gag-inducing. Their disgust sensitivity led to having limited diets, and therefore warranted intervention. However, I worried that my inability to see these foods as gross diminished my compassion.

My most painful regrets, though, are the times when my disgust sensitivity clouded my judgment as a parent. When Colby was a newborn and my daughter, Skylar, was a toddler, I noticed a dirty diaper in a parking lot. I left Colby in a shopping cart to make sure Skylar didn’t walk near the filthy litter. When I went to fetch the cart, it (and Colby) had vanished. After shrieking in horror, I realized he had rolled downhill, thankfully unharmed. The silver lining of my terrible decision was that it motivated me to change how I respond to disgust sensitivity.

Some instances call for accommodating the disgust-prone, like refraining from drinking out of the same glass as your friends when you know that this bothers them. However, intervention might be warranted when disgust sensitivity gets in the way of healthy social interaction—for instance, when it leads you to avoid eating meals with others or prevents you from being a better parent.

Given how challenging it is to combat disgust, it might be helpful to instead focus on building disgust tolerance. Disgust tolerance means being able to stand the feeling and allowing it to pass. It is like a muscle that can be strengthened with practice.

To build disgust tolerance, I recommend the following strategies:

1. Pair disgust with something pleasant. One strategy used to help children with food aversion is to have them play with food, thereby pairing it with fun. Borrowing from that technique, I cope with anticipated disgust by pairing it with a competing (pleasant) sensory experience. For example, I suck on candy when I use public bathrooms. This is calming and gets my mind off bad odors.
2. Tie disgust tolerance with values. I have realized that being a better parent necessitates building disgust tolerance. Going back to the story about Colby rolling to the other side of the parking lot, if I had remained calm when I saw the dirty diaper, I would have figured out a way to keep both children clean and safe.
3. Talk it out. Being open about your disgust sensitivity can provide a reality check that you need to lighten up, like when I learned that even though the 5-second rule is a farce, this doesn’t stop people, even scientists, from eating food after it has fallen on the floor. Also, talking things out has, at least sometimes, helped others better understand me.
4. Be Open-Minded. Recognize when you are reacting defensively to being challenged about what you think is disgusting. These signs might include tension in your body and giving lectures (e.g., “Don’t you know that kitchen sponge is teeming with bacteria!”). You can forgive yourself for these reactions while also remembering that disgust is more about gut feelings than logic. Therefore, it is important to be open to different perspectives.

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In addition to the above strategies, I have found it helpful to give disgust a prosocial twist by showing gratitude for resources that allow me to live hygienically. Understanding the discomfort of disgust has increased my empathy for those whose dire circumstances render them unable to avoid it as easily as I can. It has also motivated my efforts to conserve natural resources, like clean water.

While disgust is an inevitable part of life, we should all be allowed to live as comfortably as possible, without driving each other nuts in the process.