My wife absolutely cannot stand my desire to listen to the radio at barely audible volume. She said it’s nails on a chalkboard. It forces her brain to process that which cannot be processed at this volume.
Agreed. Words that you know you could understand but can’t because it’s just a little bit too quiet are just AHHH.
For me at least, context and consent are two big things that can make or break me.
That is a great way to explain the difference, saving that one for reference.
I have pretty bad misophonia. It’s only really triggered by certain sounds (sand paper and chewing being the biggest offenders) but when it happens I literally go into fight or flight mode and freak the fuck out. I am a machinist by trade and needing to avoid sand paper at all costs really affects my life severely.
I’m probably neurotypical and I don’t get how people like me don’t understand misophonia
Almost everyone experiences misophonia. It’s rare to not be upset by the sound of fingernails on blackboards and similar sounds; what’s so odd about some people having a wider range of problem sounds?
misophonia is worse
nails on a blackboard are not a trigger for me, it’s an awful screeching sound and it makes my skin crawl but it is not a misophonia trigger
when my misphonia triggers, as the person above said - my entire body goes into fight, flight, or freeze, in that order too. My first instinct is to want to stop the source of the sound with force, but it’s rather socially unacceptable to punch people who are just eating and talking at the same time, so flight kicks in, but then it’s rude to get up and leave mid-christmas dinner, so i just freeze, and want to scream and cry because at that point my mind cannot focus on anything else but that one sound. It’s the loudest thing in my head constantly winding up my body to do something anything to stop it or just not have to hear it anymore.
i’ve settled on at least telling my family to not make my trigger sounds around me, oftentimes i’ve been told i’m “rude” for doing that too :| it’s seemingly incredibly difficult for them to understand that i’d like to feel nice at family gatherings too, and one thing they’d have to “sacrifice” to make that happen is talking with their mouths full of food
if a stranger makes any trigger sounds i just leave, i rarely care enough to put myself through the whole “you can’t tell me what to do also you’re being rude and i don’t care” thing so I suffer through it and dip at the soonest opportunity
I literally cannot watch minutephysics videos on YouTube because of the amount of mouth noise when he speaks. Even if I force myself to watch them I just absorb nothing because I just fixate on the mouth noise. It’s baffling to me that so many people not only don’t seem to mind, but don’t even notice it in the first place.
Interesting about sand paper is one of your triggers. I have misophonia too, some sounds more severe than others. I have a lot of sensory triggers but sand paper is not one of them. Hearing someone chew on food makes me want to instantly punch a wall or throw a chair through a window. I go into fight mode instantly. Also that squeaking noise that happens when you crush a cotton ball in your fingers and rub it against itself… ugh just thinking about it…
When the symptoms developed in my early teens there wasn’t even a word for the condition and it wasn’t u til the early-mid aughts that I found out what the name was and had an idea of what I was experiencing. Definitely made me feel less alone that at least one of my conditions had some info. It was very lonely before that since my sensory issues are very much present with me at every moment and they take an extraordinary amount of willpower and determination to keep them in check and I’ve only learned those coping mechanisms in the last few years when I dove deep into therapy and trying to understand my condition.
It helps now that I can point to documentation about my sensory issues and not feel like I am sounding like a crazy person. My friends and family know, I talk about it all openly now and can explain to people how it affects me. It is amazing the level of understanding and compassion people now have around stuff like this. That understanding of course isn’t universal and there is so much further society has to go in the mental health realm but for someone in their 40s to finally get some answers over the last 10-15 years about these things that affect how I experience the world. I have only been seeking therapy for it over the past 5 years but I can honestly say I am the happiest o have ever been, I am no longer this gloomy person trying to keep my emotions in check all the time to control my conditions but I live openly with them now, redirecting and using the condition to help me. Learning how to control my mind better and thinking patterns. It feels like aikido but for thoughts and emotions.
There is so much more to learn about our senses and we have made such amazing headway during my lifetime that I am hopeful for the future.
Take care and good luck!
Any luck using sound muffling headphones or something similar? I’m not sure if they would be safe to use on the job. That’s really tough!
I have a pair of Loop earplugs my brother’s wife bought me for Christmas a couple years ago. I was skeptical but they help a ton with my sound sensitivity. I used to not be able to be around kids for too long without getting really stressed out by all the yelling and crying and they pretty much eliminated that.
Sand paper is a particularly bad problem. I don’t necessarily have to hear it, just seeing someone use it will make me get away ASAP due to fear of hearing it.
There are many different types of synesthesia, misophonia being just one of them. Another is called mirror-touch, which has some symptoms related to seeing something, either IRL or on tv etc, and feeling the effects even though you shouldn’t be feeling them. Getting the effect of misophonia from just observing the use of something or an action could be an indication that you may have some form of mirror touch synesthesia as well.
You shove food in your mouth all the time. This may have green hair on it but it shouldn’t be a problem. Now stop struggling while I tape that funnel to your mouth.
