Misophonia

While we were in Virginia a former student of mine posted on Facebook about misophonia. I looked into it more, and I think this accurately describes the adverse reaction I have (physically and emotionally) to certain sounds (such as chewing or the bathroom fan). "MRI studies show abnormal or dysfunctional assessment of neural signals occurs in the anterior cingulate cortex and insular cortex. These cortices are also implicated in Tourette Syndrome, and are the hub for processing anger, pain, and sensory information." I thought it was just a "pet peeve," but it's a neuropsychiatric disorder. Go figure! The time of day when it is the hardest for me is after we put the kids to bed and Paul is eating chips (or something like that) while sitting next to me on the couch. I have tried covering one ear, but that doesn't help much. In a couple of places online they talked about a behind the ear sound generator (looks like a hearing aid) as the treatment. 

That gave me the idea that if I wore headphones and listened to music that would solve the problem. Now to locate a pair of headphones. The vast majority of the time I am not watching what Paul is on tv when I'm sitting next to him, so that won't be a problem. It's worth a try anyhow. If you want to torture me, chew a piece of gum and stand really close to me. If you really want to chew a piece of gum, please offer me a piece and then the sound won't bother me. If I eat while Paul is eating that solves the problem, but I am not actually hungry at that time of day, and eating a snack before bed isn't good for my waistline.

I had to wake all three kids up this morning. I think that's a first. Nadia woke Paul and I up at 5:00, but she went back to sleep. I let Nadia and Ian sleep longer than Oliver. He wet the bed yesterday morning, and I didn't want that to happen again so I woke him up. Nadia complained at 5:00 about her stomach, but she didn't throw up, and I thought she was just hungry because she had skipped dinner on Friday night and lunch on Saturday. 

But then she threw up at church (thankfully she made it to the toilet in time) around 8:45 am. Paul took her home. We always come in two cars because Paul leaves after the first service. Having two cars there came in handy today! Normally Paul, Ian, Nadia, and I attend the first service together while Oliver is in his classroom for both services. I asked Ian if he wanted to stay in his classroom for both services this morning due to Paul and Nadia leaving, but he said he wanted to attend the first service. This meant he had to sit by himself for the first 45 minutes while I was up on the platform with the choir (during the music, prayer, time of honoring the graduates, communion, announcements, etc.). He was absolutely perfectly behaved. I was so proud of my five year old! Way to go, Ian! I sat beside him during the sermon. Nadia seemed to be feeling fine since then. I hope she's feeling fine tomorrow because she's supposed to have her first ever tennis lesson at 8:30 am and her first Spanish class at 6:30 pm. The tennis lessons are only this week, but the Spanish class will meet once a week for eight weeks.