My Experiences with Misophonia - an Introduction to the Condition and I

Hello Peeps!

I thought I’d take the opportunity to make my first post on Steemit about something that I feel confident in writing about and secure in laying out my feelings, rational or irrational as they may seem.

Misophonia is - as I would describe it - a reactionary, emotional response to specific trigger sounds, which range from common slurping and chewing sounds made with the mouth, to tapping or typing. To become immersed beyond what I’ll be writing today, I would recommend looking over the Wiki page (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Misophonia), which demonstrates how aptly named the condition is, “hatred of sound.”

What makes misophonia different from “I’m annoyed, stop that” is that the reaction to a sound is often characterized by a notable degree of irrational anger and stress that can be instantly elevated to rather than gradually increased toward, with some experiencing this anger along a scale that can lead to physical confrontation. In my experience, the tolerance I have for trigger sounds is much lower than, say, a dripping keeping me awake at night, which I can live with for a time before becoming irate and frustrated. Instead of gradually becoming more annoyed by a particular trigger, I will often experience a sudden increase in stress and anger, often anticipating further sounds and becoming anxious around the person or object emitting these sounds. Thankfully, I have become able to manage my own misophonia-prompted anger in ways that would avoid bringing harm to anyone else. However, that has not stopped me from previously bringing an amount of harm (non-threatening) to myself, which I will address further on.

While there are no known cures for misophonia, with studies still attempting to discover why the condition exists and what causes it, there does seem to be an increased interest in misophonia, its causes and potential solutions, which has prompted scientific research such as “The Brain Basis for Misophonia” (http://www.cell.com/current-biology/fulltext/S0960-9822(16)31530-5).

Misophonia has existed in my life since early grade school, where I remember in 1st grade being bothered by a classmate’s breathing to the point where I would repeatedly tell her “sh” during class, sometimes causing small disruptions which would annoy my teacher. At the time, I had no idea that what I was experiencing was not normal, and it wasn’t significant enough at the time to create a reason for my behavior to be addressed between my family and teachers, thus it went unchecked.

Then, when 4th grade hit, my mom decided to homeschool me. This is where my misophonia created a situation where, for varying lengths of time, I was consistently \ triggered by my brothers. Their crime was only making sounds and being loud while playing - yet it bothered me, it angered me, and I was frustrated and nothing helped. I fought with them and frustrated my mom. I remember the only real solutions were to either get them to find other activities or to find a way to take my work elsewhere. When I couldn’t tolerate the noise any further I’d crank up the sound on my earbuds to a range where I almost certainly damaged my hearing.

As they grew older,  these triggers occurred less frequently and I was able to better avoid being within earshot. My brothers would still sometimes play with toys and make these noises, but my situation was mostly under control.

Flash forward past high school and into college. I moved in with with my dad, step mom, and younger twin brothers after I transferred to a four year college and started living in the dorms during junior year. My younger brothers had the same occasional tendency to play with toys and make sounds, but during my junior year I seldom ventured home long enough to notice their habits. Sadly, after junior year I had to move back into the house, and so I lived with my family through senior year around my younger twin brothers, who I slowly realized have an incredible talent for making noise.

Coughing, grunting, singing, humming, tapping - I lived with and continue to live with these sounds almost every day of my home life when I’m not at work or out with a friend. I used to scream internally to avoid confrontation and when I couldn’t take it any more I’d yell. I’d hit myself in rage and dig my nails into my skin because physical pain was more tolerable than what I felt through misophonia.

It took until that senior year to realize that there was a name and classification for what I was suffering with. Misophonia was a new term that I fully began to realize had been a part of my life for over a decade. I researched and finally found more people who had stories to tell, and I felt more secure in knowing my disorder had a name and a face (so to speak).

I realized that what I was experiencing was common for a misophonia sufferer.

I discovered the misophonia subreddit (https://www.reddit.com/r/misophonia/) which contains stories, jokes, content and general information about those who better understand the stress of misophonia.

I read an exerpt from a book by philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer who wrote “The superabundant display of vitality, which takes the form of knocking, hammering, and tumbling things about, has proved a daily torment to me all my life long” (https://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/s/schopenhauer/arthur/pessimism/chapter8.html).

I read a news article about a woman was driven to suicide because she was unable to deal with misophonia (http://nypost.com/2016/11/16/every-day-noises-drove-this-historian-to-suicide/), which tragically illustrates how extremely debilitating this disorder can be.

Since these discoveries and experiences, I’ve explicitly worked on avoiding trigger sounds by using earbuds and headphones to isolate myself from any triggers, even avoiding family dinner if I feel overwhelmed by the constant smacking of lips or coughing. In my Discord group of friends, I simply leave voice chat or ask a friend politely to stop a particular noise if I feel like I am losing control over the situation.

I’ve fought to control situations where I feel the most vulnerable, and while I know I am winning against misophonia, I know that there are still many others who are unable to change their situation due to financial or social factors. I know that there are younger sufferers of misophonia who are unable to convince their parents of the reality of this disorder to the point where they feel without this control and without the comfort or support of those they live with.

All I want is more recognition for misophonia. I want to convince others with evidence of the existence of this disorder so that those who suffer are given the help they need.

If anyone would like to hear more about what I have to say I’d love to answer any comments or questions, or write another article on the subject.

Thank you so much for reading! I just to want to end with saying that this is definitely not exemplative of every misophonia sufferer out there. As with many different psychological/physiological conditions, every person is affected in varying degrees within that condition, for better or worse than I, and what works for me may not work for another, and vice versa.