• Welcome to Autism Forums, a friendly forum to discuss Aspergers Syndrome, Autism, High Functioning Autism and related conditions.

    Your voice is missing! You will need to register to get access to the following site features:
    • Reply to discussions and create your own threads.
    • Our modern chat room. No add-ons or extensions required, just login and start chatting!
    • Private Member only forums for more serious discussions that you may wish to not have guests or search engines access to.
    • Your very own blog. Write about anything you like on your own individual blog.

    We hope to see you as a part of our community soon! Please also check us out @ https://www.twitter.com/aspiescentral

Anyone Heard of Misophonia?

I have for when I hear people chewing. It bugs me enough sometimes that I want to break or hit something.
I've heard that a possible cause of misophonia is that it's similar to synesthesia, only instead of a neural pathway between two senses, it's between the sense of hearing and the emotional centre of the brain. And considering how it's common for people with autism to also have synesthesia, maybe it's something similar? If not, then it may just be how we are more sensitive to sounds.

(also just curious, anyone else have synesthesia and misophonia?)
 
Doesn't everyone have this? Is there anyone in the world who isn't bothered by at least one noise? This seems normal, I'm really not seeing what's different about this.
 
unsurewhattoname said:
Doesn't everyone have this? Is there anyone in the world who isn't bothered by at least one noise? This seems normal, I'm really not seeing what's different about this.
Click to expand...
What's different is the intense startle and subsequent adrenalin rush coupled with anger resulting from an anomalous sudden sound. Something as small as the electronic tick noise just as the heater starts can cause it. Even common noises that are abrupt, such as a door opening, cause my startle and adrenalin.
When, long ago, my father-in-law popped a balloon near me I came close to punching him in the face.
TinyHatOnAPumpkin I also have synesthesia.
 
It's one thing to be bothered by a sound and, not wish to hear it, another to be so bothered that you cannot tolerate it, that the sound disrupts your day, causes you to panic or, causes you to become very angry.

I hate the feedback squeal when we are setting up the sound system and, it does physically hurt my ears but, it doen't make me have to leave the stage or studio. I think the OP is talking about when a sound all but forces you to leave the area of the sound because you react that badly or strongly to it.
 
Yes and that's what I'm talking about. It's normal to hate certain sounds. Everyone in the thread has it and I'm sure everyone in real life does too. Just is normal. Nobody likes the sounds people are describing. I hate noise in general, but certain sounds just make me incredibly angry. I don't see anything that's weird about that though.
 
The difference is that most of the time it's a slow build, going from the person being able to tolerate the noise to some degree to it becoming so annoying that one becomes angry. With those who have misophonia, any amount of that noise causes high levels of stress, anger and/or anxiety. Like for me as soon as I hear people chewing I'm clenching my fists and jaw and fighting the urge to hit or break something. I've even put earplugs in at the dinner table, or stopped watching a movie or something because there was chewing sounds.
 
My mum gets mad at me for chewing as soon as I start to eat. She is a complete NT. It's normal, everyone has their thing they can't stand. It's why everyone in this thread can relate. Because it's part of being a human.
 
unsurewhattoname said:
My mum gets mad at me for chewing as soon as I start to eat. She is a complete NT. It's normal, everyone has their thing they can't stand. It's why everyone in this thread can relate. Because it's part of being a human.
Click to expand...
Misophonia isn't exclusive to the autism spectrum--it is a separate condition, even if it might be more common to people with ASD.

I don't agree that everyone has a sound that is so intolerable they immediately feel enraged by it, even screaming or hitting / throwing things in response. My husband commonly asks me why I can't "just deal" with certain sounds because "everyone has sounds they hate and they just put up with it." But in my case, certain sounds trigger an instant, visceral reaction that is very hard, and sometimes impossible to suppress, even if the reaction is embarrassing to me. It's an extreme "fight" response.

Leaf blowers are one of these triggers. I have been known at my work to scream obscenities at the groundskeeper for running the leaf blower. I have nothing against the man himself and would prefer to keep a friendly face toward everyone at work, but the reaction the noise triggers is so extreme and instantaneous, someone asked if it was PTSD. That is definitely not an experience shared by everyone, and hard to explain to someone who hasn't been through it. Anxiety meds and mood stabilizers don't have an effect.
 
Naturalist exactly. Everyone has sounds the dislike, even hate or fear, that's normal. I doubt anyone actually likes mic feedback squeals but, not everyone instantly NEEDS to either get away, silence the sound or, attack the cause of the sound.

Yes misophonia can exist with or without ASD and, it's more than simply not liking a sound. It's an uncontrollable, instinctive fight or flight reaction to the sound.

As for med, even tranquilizers don't help, you can't disable your survival instincts and, that's what is being activated when you hear your bad sound, your basic instinct to survive. Logically we know the sound is not going to kill us, but our nervous system disagrees, violently, with what we logically know the instant we hear our bad sound.
 
Misophonia...? I don't like the sound of that...!
tapfoot.gif


[Greek misos "hatred" + phone "voice, sound"]
 
Last edited:
Wanted to join the conversation. I still find it hard to pin down all the sounds which I get anxious around so couldn't really decide if this was misophonia or sound sensitivity, but when I'm around my(pretty likely to be aspie) dad it's especially bad. He has asthma and his house is in such a bad state it's the only place I get asthmatic, making his wheezing worse, and I can't deal with the sounds he makes. Throat clicking, coughing, wheezing and whistling sounds put me on edge so I always have a part of me which hates him. But when I'm really tired a lot of different voices get the same reaction anyway. I do however hate that when I told him I thought I had aspergers he dismissed it completely yet he wants comfort from me for his perceived exclusion by friends. He stereotypes autism on some special needs kids he drives who he complains about.
 
Thanks for this thread. I haven't heard of misophonia before, but it makes perfect sense to me. All my life sounds have either scared or angered me for no apparent reason. Any type of crinkling noise can really annoy me. Eating noises and sometimes breathing can profoundly disturb me.

For years I wore earplugs during the day as well as night and would listen to gentle rain via my ipod just to keep calm and in my own little world. When I am tired my dogs' collar bells can irritate me when they scratch or move so I take them off in the house. I know I am highly sensitive to any type of noise, but I always thought I was slightly losing the plot and highly irrational to object to breathing, eating and crinkle noises. Oh, yes and people tapping gets me annoyed too, I can feel the anger rising - the same as you nosouvenirs.

I am glad to hear there is a logical explanation and I am not totally insane, lol. I have a microwave oven that beeps loudly five times when finished and it drives me nuts! Surely one beep would be sufficient - or even better, no beeps.

I think I must be the only person on this planet who's actually pleased I have tinnitus, as it blocks out unwanted noise:).

Great thread.
 
I think I have misophonia, based on your description in the first post. I, too, am bothered by coughing (I also get angry) and used to be startled by sneezing to the point that I turned my distaste for sneezes around, and now actually enjoy hearing them. As a child, I was scared of traffic noises, and I remember having to work with therapists on it. They would play tapes of traffic, and make me sit through it to condition me not to be bothered by it. So I can relate, and I do think it's probably related to autism.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

New Threads

Top Bottom