After weeks of constant rain, the clearer weekend was punctuated by a rainbow outside my window. So after the typical PNW (Pacific Northwest) days upon days of drenching rain, yesterday I woke up to a beautiful sunny morning and went to a local writers' MeetUp. It was wonderful to sit in the cafe, waiting for the others to arrive, feeling the warmth of the sun beating on my cheek and shoulder through the window. I thought about how much I'm looking forward to the writer's conference in Hawaii that I'll be attending this Fall - where I'll also be spending three extra days to attend a memoir writing workshop taught by award-winning memoirist and novelist Luis Urrea. (The workshop is limited to only 15 people, so I know I'll be getting a LOT out of the program).
Looking back at the past week, I've still been struggling with this persistent cough that I've had since the Christmas holidays which doctors haven't been able to figure out. (I've seen four doctors a total of seven times and will be seeing two more specialists over the next two weeks and none of the nine medicines they've prescribed seem to help). Misophonia-wise though, I still have the same daily triggers created by my coworker's need to eat every two hours. Yes.... I know so many nutritional programs say how important it is to eat every couple of hours to keep the metabolism going, and crunchy apples and yogurt cups (which she seems to want to scrape every last drop from the container) are healthy foods to eat, but does potato chips (or whatever she's eating from that large crinkly bag) really support that rationale too?
I also had a very uncomfortable moment at a major client meeting this week when one of the Owners (the clients of my company's client) sitting next to me started rubbing her stocking'd legs over and over and over... It's hard to describe the sound of it, and the repetitive motion doubled up the misophonia triggers that action created, but I was fortunate to take advantage of a brief moment when everyone was looking away from our direction so I could quickly insert an ear plug in the ear where that scratchy sound was emitting. (I swear... To me it's just as bad as nails on a chalkboard, even if the sound is much softer. The sound and feel of hosiery is one of my earliest (if not THE earliest) misophonia triggers I've experienced back when I was a kid.)
That's one of the difficulties with my new job as an "Owner in Training" for my company. Whereas in the past, I was just one of many "cogs in an engine," and able to mitigate misophonia triggers listening to earbud music while working at my desk: now I've got the bigger responsibility of being the face for my company so it's harder for me to mask potential triggers - especially during the moment they occur. This is definitely going to take some creative thinking on my part for how to deal with this new misophonia challenge...
Looking back at the past week, I've still been struggling with this persistent cough that I've had since the Christmas holidays which doctors haven't been able to figure out. (I've seen four doctors a total of seven times and will be seeing two more specialists over the next two weeks and none of the nine medicines they've prescribed seem to help). Misophonia-wise though, I still have the same daily triggers created by my coworker's need to eat every two hours. Yes.... I know so many nutritional programs say how important it is to eat every couple of hours to keep the metabolism going, and crunchy apples and yogurt cups (which she seems to want to scrape every last drop from the container) are healthy foods to eat, but does potato chips (or whatever she's eating from that large crinkly bag) really support that rationale too?
I also had a very uncomfortable moment at a major client meeting this week when one of the Owners (the clients of my company's client) sitting next to me started rubbing her stocking'd legs over and over and over... It's hard to describe the sound of it, and the repetitive motion doubled up the misophonia triggers that action created, but I was fortunate to take advantage of a brief moment when everyone was looking away from our direction so I could quickly insert an ear plug in the ear where that scratchy sound was emitting. (I swear... To me it's just as bad as nails on a chalkboard, even if the sound is much softer. The sound and feel of hosiery is one of my earliest (if not THE earliest) misophonia triggers I've experienced back when I was a kid.)
That's one of the difficulties with my new job as an "Owner in Training" for my company. Whereas in the past, I was just one of many "cogs in an engine," and able to mitigate misophonia triggers listening to earbud music while working at my desk: now I've got the bigger responsibility of being the face for my company so it's harder for me to mask potential triggers - especially during the moment they occur. This is definitely going to take some creative thinking on my part for how to deal with this new misophonia challenge...
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