I really, really thought I didn't do this/wasn't capable of it. The exaggerated disgust I felt toward people who I felt were repressing should have been a clue.
Repression isn't always cool, polite and contained, as I mistakenly assumed. It can actually be quite expressive and stormy. We can escape from emotions to secondary emotions, or express them in a misguided way that is really about discharging them or fogging them up with in-the-moment adrenaline so they don't have to be deeply felt.
I took a bunch of notes on this recently when I read a book, so here are some examples from them of not so quiet repression:
Rage - flight from more vulnerable emotions into a highly stimulating one. Most sources I've read about anger have said it's almost always secondary. This was a highly embarrassing one to learn about. Many times, I've felt I was being the only honest person in the room by expressing my anger. But when I read about its relationship with fear and sadness, I knew. Who wants to own up to running away from something at the expense of others? I have a bad McFly complex about cowardice (nobody calls me chicken!), so of course my unconscious is going to do circus acrobatics to hide any personal patterns of it of it from my awareness.
Displacement - redirection of emotions toward something other than what really triggered them. It could be positive emotions, like doting on pets because one is afraid of humans rejecting them if they show affection. It could be negative emotions, like discharging grievances on people who are less likely to strike back than the real source of the stress. Emotion can be displaced onto the self, like blaming oneself for a problem to avoid standing up to someone else. Another humiliating highlight for me, having done literally all of these examples. Again, I didn't realize the dishonesty of it because I wasn't holding it in - but hiding can be about "where" as much as about "if".
Exaggeration of an emotion is just the opposite of minimizing it - each escapes the true significance of it and the challenge of its complexity by running to one pole or another.
Splitting - between good and bad. Either something is all one, or all the other. Idealizing or demonizing to avoid the feelings of uncertainty that come with accepting complexity and ambiguity in people or situations.
Regression - escape to an easier stage of life. Not acting one's age.
Drama can preempt a feared confrontation that was not necessarily inevitable - when it serves this purpose, it's the cognitive distortion of fortune telling coming to a head. Being convinced that a bad thing is coming, the anticipation is too much to bear. It can also be a way of extracting validation from others now, instant gratification. Difficulty sitting with the need for love. Being afraid to ask for company when lonely, so attracting others' attention with pyrotechnics instead - ironic how being ashamed of one's need for attention can precipitate way more extreme attention seeking behaviors than just unashamedly admitting the need.
Humor can remove the sting from a hard truth. It can be a useful way of introducing truth to the reluctant as long as it leads into dealing with the real emotional gravity rather than numbing it indefinitely.
Projection - as in the top of this post. Judging others with a special hatred that comes from knowing the fault intimately within oneself, whether one is aware of it or not.