Happy Memorial Day Weekend, everyone. Hope it's been a relaxing one for you so far...

Relaxation is the theme of today's post because this morning I made some interesting revelations about myself, with the help of a new therapist who I'm seeing to help me learn how to better cope with my misophonia. (Yes, believe it or not he and some of his colleagues do see people on weekends. I was quite impressed that he offered to meet me on a Sunday. He said he usually comes in to catch up with his admin stuff.) Although I wasn't surprised by many of the things we discussed, it certainly brought new light to my experiences over the years... Particularly how increased stress throughout my life may be one of the main reasons why my misophonia symptoms significantly increased over the years.

As I mentioned in my previous post, I was looking into different therapists who might have some experiences dealing with conditions that are similar to misophonia - such as those that involve anxiety or neurological conditions. This particular therapist's bio was the one that referred to working with PTSD patients and having experience with Rational emotive behavior therapy (REBT). I initially called him to learn more about REBT, to see what it was all about and to discuss whether it might be an potential therapy for my misophonia. When he returned my call, I was taken aback by how interested he was with my

For those of you who saw my last post, I survived the tornado warnings. (Woo hoo!) Albeit, sitting in a stuffy closet (despite how large it is) for an hour was a little unpleasant, but at least Tooki and I didn't wind up flying away and smushing a witch in Oz. LOL!

I've  come across several interesting articles/reports over the past week, some of which were forwarded to my by SenseHaven readers. (Thank you all for sharing.) The first of which was the paper for which I was interviewed by a student a couple of months ago. (Refer to my March 22 blog entry.) I was excited to see the final result and, with the author's permission, I'm sharing it here. It's called "Searching for Silence."

Some other interesting articles are: Wendy Aron's latest blog entry, "The cause of my Misophonia Revealed in Kid's Picture Books," two videos "Neurologic Condition Incites Rage Over Certain Sounds," and "Now hear this: Condition has patients on edge over noises," as well as two similar, but not misophonia-specific, articles entitled, "Silence is Now a Luxury Product," and "UTD's Callier Center Begins Trial for New Tinnitus Treatment."

I also forgot to share a radio interview, a newspaper article, and two research journal articles sent to me by one of the researchers from the misophonia fMRI study in London. The 10-minute radio interview of two of the researchers as well as the founder of the UK Misophonia Organization was aired by the BBC Radio and is entitled, "Misophonia, Mondegreens, and Miscommunication." The online newspaper article is entitled, "The sound of my boyfriend chewing makes me want to strangle him:" and is about a 20 year old model who has misophonia. The two research journal articles are, "Misophonia: Diagnostic Criteria for a New Psychiatric Disorder," published by PLOS ONE and, "Misophonia: physiological investigations and case descriptions," published by Frontiers in Human Neuroscience.

I also recently came across an interesting therapy that, according to Wikipedia, is a form of Cognitive Behavior Therapy called Rational emotive behavior therapy (REBT). Some therapists have been using it as a way to treat people with PTSD, but when I first read about it, I wondered if it's also something that might be able to help people with misophonia too. According to Albert Ellis, the psychologist that developed REBT, "One of the main objectives in REBT is to show the client that whenever unpleasant and unfortunate activating events occur in people's lives, they have a choice of making themselves feel ... frustrated, and annoyed,.." I won't go into an elaborate explanation here, especially since I'm not knowledgeable about the therapy, but you can click on the above link to read more about it for yourself.

I'm not sure REBT would be a good treatment for misophonia though. When I first learned about it, I thought it might be something to consider, since it seems to address a person's emotional reaction to outside stimuli, but after reading the Wikipedia explanation, I noticed one aspect of the treatment is "desensitization," which I've learned is a big no-no when it comes to treating people with misophonia. (We are confronted with triggers on a daily basis. Exposing us to more triggers is not likely to desensitize us.)

Well, it's a beautiful spring day outside. Time to enjoy it while it lasts!

Auntie Em, Auntie Em! . . . Wait a second. . . *I'm* Auntie Em! (Sigh.)

Here I am. . . Sitting on the floor in my master bedroom closet, Tooki's talons gripping my shoulder tightly, because it's the only place in my apartment that's far from windows. Yes, it's tornado season and our area has major tornado watch alerts happening now. This is definitely not something an east-coast girl is used to doing. It's eerily quiet, but the alerts say to take action now because it's hard to see tornados in the nighttime darkness. The airport that's two hours west from here evidently clocked winds going over 80 mph. Wow!

On a lighter note though... This afternoon I went to the symphony with my downstairs neighbor. She purchased the tickets before her husband passed away and asked me to join her. It was such a lovely experience and brought back so many memories! You see, I used to play the violin LONG ago but even more recent than that, I sang in choirs throughout undergrad/grad school and even one summer years later for the National Choral Society. Music has played a big role in my life over the years and listening to a live classical concert again, over a decade after my last time, was heavenly. Granted, I still had my usual misophonic experiences in such a public place...

back of her chair - even without any music playing! I had a feeling that fidgeting would be a big distraction to me so as soon as the lights went down and we knew no one else was sitting in our row, we moved several seats over to where we were perfectly centered in the row and even better, no one was sitting in the seats directly in front of us! We had a beautiful view of the orchestra and the featured pianist. At one point towards the end of the first piece, I heard and felt someone tapping his feet behind me. That's when I saw something that, on top of the tapping, caused me to switch my seat again...

... It's my birthday!  (Eek!)

Normally, I don't think much about birthdays. In many ways, I treat them just like any other day. This year is a bit different in that I am now the age that my dad was when he passed away, I was only 12 at the time. In other ways though... This year I see it more as the start of a new chapter in my life.

Spring is here, so I'd like to see it as an opportunity for a new beginning. Yes, the past couple of months have been kind of rough, but I'm hopeful that this will be a great year of change for me. I'm pursuing new endeavors and some of the earlier rough patches have even inspired new ideas, particularly with regard to misophonia...  We'll see what happens!   ;-)