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The "Butterfly's Whisper" Blog

Welcome to my blog. I hope by sharing my own misophonia experiences, others who are frustrated with misophonia sensitivities will discover that they're not alone. I also hope that people who may not have misophonia will gain some insight about what it's like to have this condition.

Please feel free to post any comments or use the "Contact Us" page if you have any questions/comments you don't want to post online.

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Good People!

4/9/2016

2 Comments

 
I had to make that the title of this post because that's the comment my MeetUp friend said after a misophonia interaction that just occurred...

I've been working on my writing at our regular meeting place way before the meeting was scheduled to start and had an interesting experience right after the group leader arrived. He was just settling into our table when someone waiting in line across the room started whistling VERY loudly. (One of my biggest triggers.) I debated about whether or not I should ask the person to stop but finally went over to the man. I sheepishly said to him, "Can I ask you to not whistle? I have a medical condition and it really hurts my ears."  He gave me a funny look but then said okay, and stopped. What surprised me was that he then said to me, "Thank you for asking," to which I replied, "Thank you for being so understanding." That's when the  leader of my group, who knows about my misophonia, looked at me and said, "Good people!"  That was a first for me! Not so much that he was willing to stop, but that he actually thanked me for asking him to do so.

What's funny is that after the man left, my friend looked at me and said he now had an earworm that's giving him the urge to whistle "The Lion Sleeps Tonight," since that's what the man was whistling. He was struggling because he wanted to whistle the song but knew that doing so would be very painful for me. What's weird is normally I like that song (when it's sung) but didn't even realize that's what the guy was whistling. I only heard the whistling sound and immediately felt my trigger response kick in. It didn't even hit me WHAT the song was, only that the whistling was torture to me.

Every now and then I'm pleasantly surprised at how compassionate some people in this world can be!
2 Comments
Bonnie link
4/11/2016 05:49:19 am

I think the key is that you were polite and gave a brief explanation as to why whistling bothered you. I often wonder how many people I may have inadvertently annoyed with some of my potentially triggering habits. How many times did someone shoot me a dirty look or glare that I misinterpreted the reason for it? I'd like to think most people are "good people". Kudos for your approach!

Reply
Emlyn
5/21/2016 02:20:47 pm

Thanks, Bonnie. Sorry for the delay in responding to your comment. Been quite busy lately.

I agree the effectiveness of expressing my discomfort can be attributed to how I delivered the explanation. Too often I hear about misophonia sufferers who bottle up their discomfort out of fear of coming across as "crazy" but all that does is build up the pressure of our trigger stresses to the point of exploding. I think people are much more compassionate and understanding about our condition when we talk about it in a calm and logical manner, instead of letting it build to the point of an explosive reaction - which can be very upsetting to anyone, regardless of whether they understand the condition or not.

I think that's another reason why I try to be proactive when I'm about to enter a situation where I may experience triggers. That way I can give someone a "heads up" so that they'll be more understanding, than if I were to be harshly reactive in an agitated triggered state after the fact.

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    About the Author

    Emlyn Altman has been suffering with misophonia for over 40 years, even though she only found out about the actual medical condition much more recently. As frustrating as the condition has been over the years, her heightened sensitivities across all the senses considerably influenced her talents within the visual fine arts (particularly sculpture), music (singing, piano, and many other instruments), writing, and culinary backgrounds, as well as professional achievements as an architectural lighting designer. Her goal in developing this website is to promote more awareness about misophonia and help other sufferers as well.


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