Ruining my relationship

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  • #1010090 Reply
    Hazel

      I’m 29 and started noticing signs that I wasn’t normal when I was about 9 or 10 – it started with a hatred of being around my dad when he was eating cereal. It has slowly grown over the years and over the last few years it seems to be escalating at a much faster rate. It’s like I’m collecting triggers as I grow older, and I can never shake them off so the list of things I can’t bear just grows longer and longer.

      I’ve been with my partner for five years: we have a young child together and another on the way. He’s my best friend and is the most amazing person I’ve ever met, but I have developed triggers around the way he speaks, breathes, eats etc. and they are growing worse. I have got to the point now where I have extreme reactions whenever he talks – I have to subtly put a finger in my ear to take the edge off the triggers and I just can’t focus on what he’s saying to me. He has been accommodating in many ways – he always puts music on when we eat, and avoids eating in front of me where possible etc. but he can’t help the way he breathes/talks and I know I hurt his feelings whenever I mention it, no matter how diplomatic I try to be.

      I have had cognitive behavioural therapy for anxiety, I meditate, I eat well – nothing helps. I just don’t know what to do anymore and I’m terrified that this will end us.

      I know there’s no cure so I’m not sure why I’m reaching out but I just feel so helpless and desperate and can’t talk to anybody I know about this!

      Hazel

      #1010130 Reply
      Damon

        Hi Hazel,

        I really appreciated your post. I actually live with three women who suffer from this condition (my wife and two teenage daughters). We’ve been married for almost 19 years now, and it has definitely strained our marriage. Tonight my wife slammed the bedroom door because I coughed. I about lost it, because she did it in front of my daughter, who I believe learned the behavior from her.

        I realize it’s a legitimate disorder, but what really makes me (and your husband) upset is when you express your discust, rage, etc. please understand that I love my girls very much and I’m sure your husband loves you so very much as well. But…humans make noises, and however you feel when he makes those noises needs to be kept to yourself. This means no sighs or groans or any expressions of discust. It very well could destroy your marriage, if you don’t get your reactions under control.

        I’m not picking on you personally; I’m just sharing how it feels to be on the receiving end. I’d love to hear your feedback.

        #1010136 Reply

        Hi Damon, I really feel what you’re going through and it must be incredibly hard and frustrating at times. Humans absolutely do make noises, it’s not bad or weird or wrong, it’s just a natural thing.

        I just want to clarify something regarding reactions though (and I hope this will be helpful). Misophonia doesn’t always allow the patient to control their immediate reaction. The part of the brain that is activated when a trigger sound is heard is the amygdala, which is an ancient part of the brain which is responsible for detecting threats/danger.

        Certain sounds (i.e. misophonia trigger sounds) can instantly activate panic/alarm in the amygdala before the patient has a chance to conceptualise it, or do anything. So when a misophone’s body tenses… or they shoot out a glare or emit a noise, they may not have had any ability to control it.

        The problem is we’re often playing catchup with these pre-conscious alarms going off in our head that we have no control of. It’s a bit like someone creeping up behind you and pinching you on the arm. You wouldn’t, in that millisecond, be able to suppress a wince but in the seconds that follow (as your brain catches up with the scenario) you may be able to exercise greater control.

        I hope this helps. That expression of upset, in the moment, is not about you (or whoever is making the sound) it is about the sound itself.

        #1010296 Reply
        Ted

          For decades I thought everyone in my family and my spouse had hollow cheeks and steel gears for teeth that made everything they chewed and crunched sound loud, piercing and annoying. Our family dog seemed to chew much quieter. I was always telling them, often rudely, to chew slowly or stop eating so loud or take smaller pieces on at a time, or to take their snack far away onto another room, or to another city. They looked at me like I paranoid and too fussy and anal. I was, and I am, about those sounds. Then I realized at 65 it’s my hang up and not their bad habits. So now I chose not to sit beside the noisy eaters at meal time, or to eat alone, or keep enough space. I can still hear the really noisy chewers and crunchers way down the table or across a room on a restaurant or on an airplane many aisles away. But now I try to pick my isolated seating space and pick my own eating times where I can bring my nerves and edginess down to a decent level and not want to shout expletives out to all those hollow cheek munchers….

          #1010317 Reply
          Craig

            I’m inclined to disagree. Some people eat very sloppily and could have better manners.

            #1015473 Reply
            alex

              I’m sorry to intervene so late.
              I suffer from hypreacussis or miso most of my life, i’m 35. First i was allergic to people ,family eating, chewing hard and smacking the forks and spoons of the crockery. They did this hard as they were always on hurry and agitated people.
              Speaking at the table continously while eating, in our culture it’s usual. I had to endure as a child (until in my 18-19s) as even though i was not a bad child i got punished for lots of things the hard way. I always felt different, maybe that’s why i don’t resonate easily with most people past my teen years.

              Now i ;m married for years, no kids, and my wife knows that i got this sensitivity but asks to never ever know of it or not to adjust in any way. I can’t control it it’s a nevous reacton when i hear neighbouts making hard sounds, which she hates also.
              She is eating with lots of smashing, raising up from the table to the fridge again, washing her hands 2 times during a single eating and reallly touching lots of object with no reason, like getting items from a place to another whlist she just needed to take one, again going up and down and going again to the table with another pot during the meal . I know i have sensitivy but mostly about gestures reppeated with no sense.
              Like i dont get why would she almost always eat fast, smashing the spoon and rolling the plate on the table like a soldier not like a woman.

              Problem is that: at one point, i endure like 20 minutes and i go to my room, i don’t close the door and i wait for her to settle. She become always aggitated and aks why i leave, am i upset by the sound? Now i don t say i m upset as she always react badly and humblwes me and points at me. Even so, she told me that she s very upset I left and she leaves home, as she wants to punish me this way. For this matter we separated 2 time for weeks, and I feel that i cannot do anything.
              I cannot react better than this: It always is hard enough to go and not say anythingn, my brains is so in pain to endure even as much. I feel guilty and i cannot know what to do: she doesn’t want to understand what it s like even if she is very educated in medicine, so I really have no hope of treatment.

              I did go to the medic I got medicines that i could n take as it woudl make me sleepy as hell like Stugeron and Trittico. I knw the side effect are highly unreversable and they only limit you. I have to study and cannot concentrate really well, as i forget easyly what i read.
              So I wish i knew what do yo usuggest, as going to theraphy really din’t help me alot. I feel this is just bull@@@@ trying to self gratify which does nto work on logical individuals as i consider myself.

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