Naming It

For years and years I have had an aversion to certain sounds like other people chewing or typing. My reaction went beyond annoyance. I used to share on office with two other people, one of whom typed very fast on a very "clicky" keyboard. I could not stand it. Most of the time I worked with my headphones on to drown it out. If I couldn't do that I would literally panic. All I wanted in the world at that moment was for the sound to stop. If I could have I would have destroyed her keyboard or jumped out a window. It was absolute fight or flight. Fortunately the office had a door so I used that to get away and calm down.

When I would express what was happening to me people would just say I was being anal or over-reacting. But I don't think so. I have researched this on and off over the years and recently I discovered a name for this: misophonia or selective sound sensitivity.

The first time I read an article describing my symptoms and giving them a name I wept. My condition didn't go away, but at least I knew I wasn't crazy. Okay, I am crazy, but crazy with a name is much better than just crazy.

The NY Times recently featured the condition in an article and it was on the Today Show.

If you're curious, there's more information here.

What it's All About

I saw a most horrific sight today when I dropped off my daughter at school this morning (and just for the record, I'm not one of those helicopter parents; we live across the street and I work from home so it's pretty convenient). Standing in front of a line outside a classroom was a first or second grade girl with a T-shirt proclaiming in huge lettering:

"ENOUGH ABOUT YOU LET'S TALK ABOUT ME!"

It made me throw up a little in the back of my throat. If my daughter wanted a shirt like that I would buy it just so I could burn it in front of her while casually explaining that, indeed, it's not all about her after all. Are we as a society so desperate to build up our children's self-esteem that we clad them so? How pathetic.

I want my kids to know that helping others, listening to others and thinking about others can be more rewarding than being helped, listened to, or thought of. My daughter is at the age where she should start being less selfish and think outside herself more and more. Giving her a shirt that encourages the opposite is deplorable.

It's going to be an uphill battle; me against society and the media. Last week I went to Corvallis and watched my beloved Beavers lose in OT to FCS Sac State. When I told my daughter that the Beavers lost she asked me if they got a trophy.

Sigh.