Ever since I learned I had misophonia, I've been looking back at my past to try to figure out when the condition really kicked into high gear. Although I can recollect occasional instances throughout my teenage years and twenties, I found myself more and more sensitive when I left Philadelphia to move to DC. There are a lot of things that happened during that time: becoming older into my (gasp!) thirties, dealing with much more stressful work situations (including getting laid off three times over a period of ten years and working for a bully of a boss at one of them), but I think one of the biggest changes had to be going from the most fit time of my life to the worst shape of my life in only a couple of years. Yes, part of that had to do with those work stresses but it also had to do with a drastic drop in my exercise habits.
So over the past year, I've really been working hard to get back into shape in the hope that maybe getting back into better physical shape could help me deal better with these misophonia triggers. In addition to getting a new bike to take advantage of all the great trails in the area, I've also been exploring various gyms to find a good fit with one of them. (It helps being able to take advantage of the LivingSocial,com deals, since I really didn't know any of the gyms in the area and the one where I belonged in the east coast didn't have locations here.) A couple of months ago, I tried one gym and I wound up having to walk out in the middle of a spin class because one of the songs on the instructors playlist had a LOT of whistling. I wasn't prepared for that trigger and it was too much for me to focus on the class.
Yesterday, I was in the middle of a personal training session at a different gym and a song came on with lots of whistling. Even with all the fans and other gym noises around me, it was very frustrating. When I mentioned it to the trainer (because it's very hard to do bench presses when all I wanted to do is put my fingers in my ears), she said she thought the song was actually called "The Whistling Song," or something to that effect. It wouldn't have been so bad once I could get past that song until a little bit later, I heard one of the other trainers whistling that same song. Arrrrgh!!! She could tell I was having trouble focusing on my reps and offered to ask the other trainer to stop. I was so grateful, although a bit embarrassed too. I said that I'm going to remember to bring my earplugs to my next session (tomorrow). Hopefully, they'll help...
So over the past year, I've really been working hard to get back into shape in the hope that maybe getting back into better physical shape could help me deal better with these misophonia triggers. In addition to getting a new bike to take advantage of all the great trails in the area, I've also been exploring various gyms to find a good fit with one of them. (It helps being able to take advantage of the LivingSocial,com deals, since I really didn't know any of the gyms in the area and the one where I belonged in the east coast didn't have locations here.) A couple of months ago, I tried one gym and I wound up having to walk out in the middle of a spin class because one of the songs on the instructors playlist had a LOT of whistling. I wasn't prepared for that trigger and it was too much for me to focus on the class.
Yesterday, I was in the middle of a personal training session at a different gym and a song came on with lots of whistling. Even with all the fans and other gym noises around me, it was very frustrating. When I mentioned it to the trainer (because it's very hard to do bench presses when all I wanted to do is put my fingers in my ears), she said she thought the song was actually called "The Whistling Song," or something to that effect. It wouldn't have been so bad once I could get past that song until a little bit later, I heard one of the other trainers whistling that same song. Arrrrgh!!! She could tell I was having trouble focusing on my reps and offered to ask the other trainer to stop. I was so grateful, although a bit embarrassed too. I said that I'm going to remember to bring my earplugs to my next session (tomorrow). Hopefully, they'll help...
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