There’s one topic of conversation around our office that never seems to die. And that topic is misophonia. Yes, it’s a real word with a very real meaning. Misophonia is a form of decreased sound tolerance or quite literally hatred of sound. You might think we sound crazy, but just ponder for awhile. Can’t stand the sound of nails on a chalkboard? Or the sound of that sniffling person in line behind you? If so, we’re afraid to say it, but you have misophonia!
Now that we’ve cleared up what it is, you might be wondering why it is such a popular topic in our office. The biggest reason is because there are a couple of cases around here, some minor, some major. I (Melissa) personally suffer from a moderate form of the miso. It’s your basic mouth noises-crunching, chewing with your mouth open, smacking your lips too much when eating-that really grind my gears. There are also situational things that get me a little irritated if I’m already in a bad mood, but the mouth noises are generally the most bothersome to me.
Lacy has a pretty mild case of miso…whatever (she can never remember the name, so ever since the time that we had to tell her that it’s not mesothelioma, it’s just miso…whatever). Her miso…whatever might sound a little strange to some people, but she really hates whistling. We have determined that the reason behind this is that she is a wonderful singer, but she can’t whistle. Therefore, when us awful singers whistle to avoid having to sing, it drives her crazy!
Of course, we have left the best for last and that’s Shannon. Shannon has the worst case of miso in our office, by far! When we first started learning about her trigger noises, it sounded like she mostly hated the sound of crinkling, whether it be a plastic water bottle or a bag of chips. However, the longer I have worked here, the more I learn about the noises she hates. I noticed that if I tapped my pen on the desk, I would get a very slight dirty look. This made me wonder a little bit, because I wasn’t crinkling anything! It wasn’t until I noticed her staring me down as I sat there spinning around the little plastic circle on Shannon’s desk that I finally asked, “Is it EVERY unnecessary noise?!” Turns out that it IS every unnecessary noise, so being a fidgety person, this was quite the adjustment for me. I simply learned to never have anything in my hands when I’m around Shannon and life is easier for the both of us!
Luckily, Christina, Travis and Lee do not suffer from this noisy disease. (Our office can only handle so much crazy.) Do you or someone you know suffer from misophonia? Well, we can’t help you with that. We haven’t even figured out how to help ourselves with this issue in our office. But we can help with your marketing!
Get to know the Transformation team better in the rest of our Water Cooler Chat series!