Christmas Often Proves to Be a Living Hell for Individuals Living with Sound Sensitivity.
One young woman hopes for seeing her loved ones during the festive period, but notes a key strategy she'll manage to get through it is by using her earplugs - notably for the main festive feast.
For the 23-year-old, the holidays often feels like a especially challenging season as the auditory triggers of family members munching, drinking noisily and breathing heavily cause her intense distress.
"I experience this wave of immediate anxiety, my every muscle will just tighten and it seems as if I'm in peril, and I need to stop these sounds."
Lottie has lived with this condition from a young age and for her that makes the Christmas time "deeply taxing".
Misophonia is a decreased threshold to particular auditory triggers, especially noises made by individuals.
It's surprisingly common across the population. A study discovered a significant portion of people suffer from it.
Often it's sounds linked to eating or drinking that lead to discomfort, along with things like crunching, heavy breathing, and foot tapping.
Triggering Stress
She explains: "I face so many various auditory triggers at Christmas and that can be daunting and make you fear it.
"My family are understanding, but I'm very aware that I don't want to spoil the mood. It's like a internal conflict of enduring my distress to make sure everyone else is happy."
So it's clear why the most wonderful time of the year can rapidly become a stressful ordeal for sufferers.
Noises that may seem harmless, like someone drinking champagne, unwrapping gifts, or eating the holiday meal can provoke a visceral feeling that can even result in them skipping events entirely.
She, a 21-year-old student, who has struggled with sound sensitivity from childhood, says the approach she intends to use is to use headphones to cope. Typically, she would frequently go in a separate space to minimize problematic noises.
She says her misophonia is more intense around people she's closest to, so the holidays is always "challenging".
"There is pressure to spend time with family, and I want to, but it's draining.
"It's like this sudden rage comes over me, which can feel shameful, or I'll feel panicked and immediately start crying and then the stress response will kick in.
"To others it appears as if I'm being difficult and overreacting, but it's hard to explain if you haven't felt it."
Three Ways to Cope
If you suffer then there are various strategies you can try to cope the situation, according to experts.
- Picture an Alternative: Imagination is essential. Attempt to link the triggering sound affecting you with an unrelated image. So for example, try to picture someone's slurping is just a waterfall. By doing this is to retrain your mind that the sound affecting you is neutral.
- Make it a Game: Introduce playfulness and turn the annoying sound into a competition involving the source. For instance, if someone is crunching loudly try joining in. By joining in, instead of feeling like the sound is unwanted, you become an willing part. And the competition element should help distract your brain and make you somewhat less sensitive.
- Create a Scenario: One more method is to try to fabricate an explanation about the reason someone creating the sound is having to make that sound. So if someone was sniffing, perhaps they're not feeling well or could be emotional. The idea is re-framing the context of the sound. Although the sound stays the same, your understanding of it shifts from being annoying, to feeling a bit more accepting towards it.
