After a huge deadline at work this past Friday, this weekend was a whirlwind of activity in that I moved into a house on Sunday. For those of you who wondered how I could deal with such a horrific downstairs apartment neighbor, moving to a new house with no shared walls/floors/ceilings was my (drastic but effective) solution. Although the neighbor had been fairly quiet for the couple of weeks leading up to the move, as soon as the movers left Saturday evening (after packing my place up), I think they knew I was leaving and started blasting their Bose system. So, I picked up my bird, slept on an air mattress in the new place, and didn't look back. It was heaven!
Even after they moved me (an all-day event on Sunday), I found myself still in apartment mentality. Even though my neighbors didn't care about being considerate with their noise, I was always hyper-aware of any potential noise that I created. (Eg. Walking on hard surfaces with heels or dropping something heavy on the floor.) So, as I unpacked Sunday and occasionally dropped things, I caught myself thinking about if the people downstairs heard it and reminded myself, "THERE IS NO ONE DOWNSTAIRS ANYMORE!" (Hooray!!!) Yes, it was quite a strange feeling walking down the stairs for the first time after the move Monday morning. A good feeling, but strange.
So, although things seem to be coming together in my new place, I'm still struggling with my misophonia in my workplace environment. On top of the coworker behind me who ALWAYS plays music out of his speakers with the volume down instead of wearing headphones (creating a constant buzzing like a mosquito noise throughout the day), yesterday, the coworker who shares the cubicle with me decided to
Even after they moved me (an all-day event on Sunday), I found myself still in apartment mentality. Even though my neighbors didn't care about being considerate with their noise, I was always hyper-aware of any potential noise that I created. (Eg. Walking on hard surfaces with heels or dropping something heavy on the floor.) So, as I unpacked Sunday and occasionally dropped things, I caught myself thinking about if the people downstairs heard it and reminded myself, "THERE IS NO ONE DOWNSTAIRS ANYMORE!" (Hooray!!!) Yes, it was quite a strange feeling walking down the stairs for the first time after the move Monday morning. A good feeling, but strange.
So, although things seem to be coming together in my new place, I'm still struggling with my misophonia in my workplace environment. On top of the coworker behind me who ALWAYS plays music out of his speakers with the volume down instead of wearing headphones (creating a constant buzzing like a mosquito noise throughout the day), yesterday, the coworker who shares the cubicle with me decided to
open a flat shipping crate on the peninsula that connects our desks... With an electric drill! Yes, I understand removing all those screws manually would've been a pain in the butt, but why did she have to do it on our connecting desks? Couldn't she have put it on the floor or even walk to the printing room just 20' away to do it? (It wasn't a large box. Even with my bad shoulder, *I* could've easily lifted it.) As soon as they started unscrewing the box with the drill, the vibrations triggered my misophonia so badly that I had to get up and walk away.
When the noise of the drill seemed to stop, I walked back and asked if she was done. She claimed she tried to get my attention to give me a "heads up" by tapping on the desk but that I was plugged into my music and didn't hear her. (So why didn't she walk the five steps over to me and tap me on the shoulder or some other direct-contact way of getting my attention???) The situation was strange since last week she said to me, "Sorry, it's going to be loud." right before she started a Skype conference call through the speakers at her desk. I appreciate that she tries to be considerate of my condition, especially since she has a BIG gum chewing habit. (She has one of those big cylinder containers at her desk at all times.) But between situations like the crate opening incident, the buzzing noise of the softly playing speakers behind me, my direct supervisor's whistling and opening cans of his energy drink, not to mention other trigger noises that surround me at the office... For a place that has carpeting and acoustic ceiling tiles, this is probably the worst misophonia-triggering environment in which I've ever worked.
What's even more frustrating is that, despite my boss knowing I have misophonia, he's made no effort to talk with me about the renovations currently going on in the office. I've had other people tell me that the renovations are so that some people will be relocating their desks to the new renovated area, but since I don't know what kinds of changes are being made, I can't offer my boss suggestions on where I can be relocated to make my work environment more comfortable - like he told me to do when he said, for me to come to him with solutions, not problems. Kinda hard to propose solutions when I don't know what my options are! Yes, I know that some things about the renovations may be privileged information, but given my unique situation with environment stresses, it would be nice for some dialogue to occur. It's almost like as long as I don't broach the subject with my boss again, he'll assume that nothing's wrong and proceed with business as usual, instead of my discomfort and frustration being bottled up and growing... How can I approach him to discuss options when the last time I did that, he bit my head off?!?
[Sigh!] I need to deal with one hurdle at a time... Now that I'm getting settled into my new place, I can focus my attention to work environment matters.
When the noise of the drill seemed to stop, I walked back and asked if she was done. She claimed she tried to get my attention to give me a "heads up" by tapping on the desk but that I was plugged into my music and didn't hear her. (So why didn't she walk the five steps over to me and tap me on the shoulder or some other direct-contact way of getting my attention???) The situation was strange since last week she said to me, "Sorry, it's going to be loud." right before she started a Skype conference call through the speakers at her desk. I appreciate that she tries to be considerate of my condition, especially since she has a BIG gum chewing habit. (She has one of those big cylinder containers at her desk at all times.) But between situations like the crate opening incident, the buzzing noise of the softly playing speakers behind me, my direct supervisor's whistling and opening cans of his energy drink, not to mention other trigger noises that surround me at the office... For a place that has carpeting and acoustic ceiling tiles, this is probably the worst misophonia-triggering environment in which I've ever worked.
What's even more frustrating is that, despite my boss knowing I have misophonia, he's made no effort to talk with me about the renovations currently going on in the office. I've had other people tell me that the renovations are so that some people will be relocating their desks to the new renovated area, but since I don't know what kinds of changes are being made, I can't offer my boss suggestions on where I can be relocated to make my work environment more comfortable - like he told me to do when he said, for me to come to him with solutions, not problems. Kinda hard to propose solutions when I don't know what my options are! Yes, I know that some things about the renovations may be privileged information, but given my unique situation with environment stresses, it would be nice for some dialogue to occur. It's almost like as long as I don't broach the subject with my boss again, he'll assume that nothing's wrong and proceed with business as usual, instead of my discomfort and frustration being bottled up and growing... How can I approach him to discuss options when the last time I did that, he bit my head off?!?
[Sigh!] I need to deal with one hurdle at a time... Now that I'm getting settled into my new place, I can focus my attention to work environment matters.
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