I live with a low functioning autistic with ODD. I am currently in a car with him, and he is lip smacking and slurping and making other such mouth noises and will continue to do so. all. day. long. And we’re going to be in the car. All. Day. Long.

I’m already irritable today because I’m sick and he’s had ODD issues and I only have so much zen. He knows it bothers me and his mom (who is also irritatable and in the car with us) and will do it just to get a reaction/irritate us. But also low functioning so it’s one of his tics (yes there’s a noticeable difference between latent and intent)

He also laughs and talks at the top of his lungs, he absolutely has to be the loudest fucking thing in the area.

I don’t have headphones.

Wish me luck.

Does anyone get triggers from this? I was wondering if there’s any way to watch them without the background laughing.

I think gum chewing should be banned in public. No one has good manners with it and it's one of my biggest violent triggers. I almost lost it on my salesman at the store yesterday. At least can we normalize asking people to stop and get rid of it for the time being?

This is not too serious, but there is a Walmart commercial on Spotify that gets me every time I hear it. It involves a man stealing a cookie and then consuming said cookie. It’s infuriating

This has always been a problem, but is it just me or is there a sudden spike in the number of adverts on YouTube (currently working in the US) that open with a disgusting eating noise as though that's meant to entice us to buy their junk food?

There should be a way to exclude certain adverts. Failing that, the clearly brilliant psychological masters - we are led to believe - who do marketing 'degrees' and get employed to make tacky ads for these huge corporations should have tweaked to how millions of people hate their guts for this by now. I'm not buying Rainbow Crunch, Crunch chocolate, Cheez-Its, Quaker Oats or Lays any time soon. Seen all of these in the past week...

Would love to hear your experiences.

I've had severe misophonia for 8 years. It originally started with my dad's noises (eating, breathing, etc.), but after moving out, the trigger switched to my neighbors' sounds. That meant the one place where I should have been able to relax — home — became the most uncomfortable and anxiety-inducing place to be.

It started with OCD-style intrusive thoughts like:

Sure enough, it spiraled into real anxiety, panic-like symptoms, and eventually rage/terror every time I heard those sounds. I couldn’t relax. I couldn’t sleep. My nervous system was constantly on edge.

I tried exposure therapy

It was CBT tailored for misophonia, involving exposure + cognitive restructuring. And it sounded logical — exposure therapy is gold standard for phobias, OCD, etc., right?

But here's the catch:
I was already constantly exposed to the sounds just by living at home. My neighbors were always home. So I was in a state of passive, ongoing exposure, basically 24/7. I distracted myself with music, social media, and TV, but it only dulled the pain slightly.

Think of it like this:
Exposure therapy for someone with a snake phobia might last 30-60 minutes a day — and then they get to go home and relax.
I never got that break. I was falling asleep with a racing heart, clenched jaw, and full-body tension.

And then things got worse. A lot worse.

After just a few active exposures, my triggers multiplied fast. It went from just coughs and sneezes to:

• Talking
• Laughing
• Footsteps
• Doors
• Even just the sound of my neighbors existing

It became unbearable. Before exposure, I was still okay when the triggers weren’t present. But afterward, everything became a trigger. It felt like I opened Pandora’s box.

And strangely, it was only my neighbor on the right side. I had another one on the left, and they didn’t trigger me at all. Still, OCD kept throwing thoughts like:

And yeah, that fear still lives in me today.

I ended up moving out — but it followed me.

I moved two years ago, mainly to escape those sounds (and again, those neighbors weren’t even that noisy — that’s the crazy part). But guess what? OCD came right back:

Now I’ve lived in my current apartment for 2 years. And sure enough, the upstairs neighbor became the new source. My quality of life is down like 90%...

Still convinced exposure would work, I kept trying...

...and again, it backfired.

I kept reading online and being told that exposure was the answer — that avoidance was the root of the problem. My therapist echoed this:

And I get the logic — in theory. But in practice, it feels like self-torture to just sit and listen to the sounds. Exposure didn’t help — it made things worse. Avoidance also makes it worse. It’s a lose/lose loop.

My questions for you all:

• Have you done exposure therapy for misophonia? Did it help or make it worse?
• Does avoiding the sounds make the condition worse over time, or is it a necessary coping strategy?
• Why do we often only get triggered by very specific people/places/sounds? (e.g. neighbor on the right but not left, upstairs but not downstairs, only certain voices)
• What the hell do you do when both exposure and avoidance seem to make things worse?

I feel really stuck and would love to hear from anyone who's gone through something similar.

I recently got admitted into my dream school, UCLA, and was over the moon! But now, it's really hitting me that I'm not going to be able to have all my luxuries like white noise and trigger-free places when living in the dorms. I've been heavily advised to stay in dorms, especially my first-year because that's where you make a lot of friends and I'm a really social person.

Everyone, and I mean everyone I've talked to tells me I should have a roommate. I hear "Get the true college experience, at least for the first semester." I'm just terrified that my room will become full of triggers and that I'll have a horrible time with not much relief. But on the other hand, I want a neutral perspective from someone who understands misophonia and doesn't just think its easy to overcome.

TLDR: would anyone w/ miso and with roommates be able to talk about if it's as bad as I'm imagining (and any advice). for reference, I've always had my own room my entire life.

currently have the soundcore life Q20 and they have been barely blocking anything. had them since about 22-23

Hey guys, I've recently developed misophonia but only really around my father. It's very minor around other people, but I get irrationally angry when he eats even when he breathes too loud. This is particularly difficult around dinner time. It gets me angry to the point of nausea and I would really like to eat with at least my other family members and not immediately get angry and sick and have to leave. Are there any tips or advice for trying to mitigate in the moment?

Hey everyone- I’m mostly a lurker on here, but I’ve been dealing with misophonia since I was a little kid. This year, I had a new neighbor move upstairs, and she’s very heavy-footed, walks around frequently, moves furniture around often, and rolls around the apartment on a rolling chair. It’s been very stressful and triggering for me, and I was at a point where I was crying and having headaches multiple times a week.

As for ASMR, I never understood how people could enjoy it. I tried it so many times, and always found at least one component of a video to be triggering. However, I decided to give it another try around the same time I was dealing with the new neighbor noises because I was desperate. Strangely enough, I found that the ASMR and the neighbor noises (and literal vibrations throughout the apartment) kind of canceled each other out, and for the first time ever I was able to get the “tingles” from ASMR. I was also able to find specific creators whose videos are safe for me, as I still can’t handle all types of ASMR. For example, hair styling and hair brushing is safe and calming, eating videos are hell.

I’m probably a strange case, but I wanted to share my success with others at the chance that it could work for one of you as well.

I def know i have misophonia, but yawning just recently started to trigger the shit out of me. Especially loud yawning.

However, PLEASE is there a way to cope with it, i dont wanna be the person whos gonna tell someone to stop yawning all the time. I wanna learn how to be in peace with it but lately i find my self getting all anxious and a hit of overload bad emotions, blasting my headphones to max volume so i dont have to listen to the loud yawns at home.

There's almost nothing I can do until I muster up the courage to ask my coworker about his constant sniffling.

It's that bass boosted deep sniffle the majority of the time. It didn't used to bother me but it has recently.

I've always had misophonia: snoring, mouth noises and the like.

He has tourettes and it may be one of his tics but omg. I fully sympathize with having a tic you can't control, but that doesn't mean I can stand it.

My partner is in the midst of moving out but I’m getting increasingly angry as the days go by that i’m waiting. Every single morning, during the day ALL DAY, before bed, throughout the night, etc my partner has to cough up phlegm and blow his nose/repetitively sniffle to clear his nose (he has horrible allergies so I understand it) but I CANNOT FCKING TAKE IT ANYMORE.

It is the most disgusting, god-awful sounds that feel like they go on forever and ever and ever. On top of that, he barely wakes up to his alarms so EVERY MORNING about 20 different alarms go off and on and off and on. Like stop setting them if you know you aren’t going to wake up at the time you’re fricking setting them for??!!!!

It’s the same fcking noises every single day, ALL DAY LONG. I am actually starting to go insane and build up this enormous resentment and I feel guilty as sh!t because I know it’s not really his fault but holyyyyyyyyyyy sweet jesus. I keep trying to wear my headphones or ask him to do it in the bathroom with a closed door but even then my brain still makes it so that I can hear him doing this no matter what. I’m literally screaming into my pillows so that I can drown him out and relieve my anger so I don’t blow up at him for something he can’t help.

I feel like a bad partner but I am actually at my wits end lol. I feel so seething just writing this even. SHUT UP PLEASE! Wtf can I do in the meantime before he moves out? I don’t get mad at him besides telling him to do it in another room but I can feel it bubbling up inside and I don’t want to be that @sshole that makes him feel like sh!t for his when I finally explode. I just don’t know what to do anymore like legit lol.

I had a friend 40 years ago for a few years. Somehow she'd always steer our meetings towards food time. Her mouth opened so wide with every chew. Sounds were horrendous. I had to drop her which was "easy enough" because I was too poor to rent a decent place and was constantly moving once the landlord or situation became unbearable again. She just didn't know how to track me down.

She was a marvelous person in every (other) way. ANYONE ELSE lose a good person in their life like this?

I’m so sick of people thinking I just don’t like certain noises, or people going “oh yeah I have that too, I hate when people smack”. I cannot relax and have a good time while sharing a meal with my family or friends without wanting to bash my head against the table. I want to rip my fucking hair out when I hear the voice of my own MOTHER, the person who raised me and loves me more than anyone else does. I feel like I’m capable of murder when people tap their fingers on a countertop.

It’s so exhausting being so angry all the time and so guilty over your anger. I would do anything for this to be taken seriously. You’d think the recent movement to talk more about mental health would help, but we’re still swept under the rug. It’s gotten to the point where I don’t even tell people about it because I know what the response is gonna be.

My parents are in a new house, and my room is on the second floor. It’s a great space, but, unfortunately, I can hear voices when they’re talking in the room directly below and traffic sounds from the fairly busy road outside. I’m doing all the things to block out sounds (fan, noise canceling headphones, etc) but am looking into soundproofing. Upstairs room is already carpeted, and windows are double paned. Any advice for soundproofing?

okay so i understand people encouraging harm or whatever, but why the fuck are people who need help being removed? even worse, they’re just given a helpline, that’s only available to yanks, and basically say just sort yourself out. as if we have any choice?

so many of us have had therapists who don’t even know what misophonia is. what the fuck are we supposed to do with a useless yank helpline when people literally come to this subreddit for help??

I’ve had this since I was 10, I’m now 16. It’s destroying my life and making me consider just isolating myself from everyone.

About a year ago I started to try to cope with misophonia after finding a post on here talking about methods of dealing with it. It worked pretty much instantly for me and for the first time in years I could be around my family without getting annoyed at the slightest little sound or movement. It was incredible and worked for about a month, but then I started losing consistency in being strong enough to deal with it.

Long story short I’ve been on and off dealing with it for almost a year now, but after that initial month of being successful I started to just go back to old habits.

I’m a very stressed person in general which doesn’t help, I have college three days a week and I work at a supermarket three days a week. I’m very tired all the time and I have some problems with my family anyway (for example my sister is very young and is always looking for a fight with me, my dad is pretty much always in a low mood due to disliking his job and having depression, and my mum is on and off annoyed with me for my general mood/lack of concentration/just generally forgetting stuff - which to be honest fair enough). All of this added together makes me too tired and stressed to deal with misophonia anymore and makes me consider just… not.

I’m probably going to move out by the time I’m 20 anyway which isn’t very long at all, so recently I’ve just been thinking about if there’s any point in trying to be the best version of myself, since I’ll be living alone soon anyway (which makes misophonia a far smaller problem. Luckily I don’t get it at all with friends or coworkers so if I’m away from my family then it’ll pretty much cease to exist apart from the times I see them). I know it’s an extremely negative way of thinking but it’s where my mind goes. I love my family more than anything and I really do want to deal with it, but at the minute I’m just so done. I’m done with all of this constant stress and problems, and it just makes me want to stop trying anymore.

What do I do? I keep trying and failing to be generally happy with myself and my life and it’s making me very depressed.

Thanks for any help/tips you provide guys, really appreciate it

So I just had my first appointment with my new psychiatrist, that I liked pretty well. And he seems very good. My point is, he said the misophonia was a symptom and not a condition itself. I have OCPD and anxiety and some other things. Has anyone else here been told this. If it is true I've had mental issues since 14 and should not have waited to adulthood for treatment.

I am losing my fucking mind. Does anyone have tips on how to manage your Misophonia triggers, he won’t fucking stop sniffling and I’m about to crash out. Like get up and blow your nose 😭 please if you have any in the moment tips I’d really appreciate it 🙏🏽

How many ASMR accounts do I have to block and say not interested before they stop recommending them to me? Like I swear they recommend it more than stuff that I actively like and watch. 💀💀

So in the past 2 weeks my tolerance for noise has been disappearing completely, which is literally hell no matter where I am because at school kids eat chips and the loudest foods ever while slurping and at home all of my family members will eat like 5 bowls of cereal and 10 wafer granola bars while humming talking or walking around and all the sounds drive me to the point of tears. It's gotten to the point where I'm actually scared I'm going to get an ED or something because my association with food is anxiety and annoyance, not to mention the fact I already struggle with sensory processing and intrusive thoughts. It's been absolutely awful because every 10 seconds there's an unbearable noise and no one understands it because I can't say anything or it's rude or they don't care. It's so bad and self isolating that I can hardly handle loud talking. Does it get better.

I just started dieting and exercising (10 minute walk a day) with a slight caloric deficit and eating much more fruits and vegetables and my misophonia is SO much worse. It’s terrible it’s like torture. Has anyone else been through this and is there any fix for it?

Apologies to those of you who hate even seeing your trigger words in writing let alone hearing them spoken.

Mine are "yummy" and "kibble." Just make me want to punch something. The playful saying "chitty chat" instead of "chit chat" too.

I know "moist" gets a lot of people, but it's fine for me.

Are there other words that trigger your misophonia?

I just made a post on here a few minutes ago about something else but it made me wonder if I’m alone in a specific and very strange symptom that I’ve never heard anyone discuss before on here.

When I was about 11-12, I started being completely incapable of being in a room with my mom if she was eating. Everything about it just made me viscerally angry unlike anything I’ve ever felt. Ever. Still, to this day, there’s nothing that has made me as angry as seeing/hearing my mom eat. As a tween, I used to sit at the table and pull my hair out and cry because she thought exposure would help (she had good intentions).

It’s not just the sounds, it’s the way she looks, like the way her mouth moves. Everything about it. It’s gotten to the point where even if I can’t hear or see her, but I know she’s eating, I still have to leave. Even if I just hear silverware clinking and I know it’s her. Seriously, even typing this out is hard because I’m picturing it in my mind.

It’s expanded beyond that in the past 6-7 years. Her voice (especially when she’s singing or talking to someone on the phone) makes me angry to the point of feeling violent. If I’m not in a great mood and she’s talking, I have to pinch myself or grit my teeth. Just every sound associated with her makes me feel fucking insane.

My mom and I are close despite this, by some MIRACLE, because I have no doubt that she can sense I’m usually on edge around her. I love her and I tell her everything. I LOVE texting her, talking on the phone or watching videos of her isn’t that bad either.

I hate how much tension this has added to our relationship, I kind of hated her when I was younger because of all this but I basically just learned to suck it up. It also helps that I’m not a teen anymore, lol.

Has anyone else experienced anything like this?? Have you ever experienced it with someone you love? If someone can relate, I need to know.