So I finally went to therapy. It's something I needed to do, and I'm glad I finally did. I have talked before about the possibility that I have misophonia, a disorder classified as a hatred of sound. While I think that this is a real disorder for some people, I believe that it is a symptom for me of something else.
My therapist specializes in dealing with victims of trauma. I called about 20 psychologists explaining my situation and she was the only one who said, "It sounds like you have trauma. I help people who have triggers." Ding ding!
Oh, I forgot to mention that I'm having this reaction to noise all over again in my new apartment. Yep. Wonderful. It gets especially worse around 3, although I can mostly distract myself for the afternoon. It's nighttime that kills me. I have a fan running right next to my bed, but every 5 seconds, I get up and turn it off because I think I hear something. Be it a kid screaming, music, a tv, people walking in from the parking lot...I hate it all. I FEAR it all. The vulnerability is maddening. What if someone decides to start playing music right now? It will invade my space! This is what goes through my head every day starting at 3.
3 is not my lucky number. 3 pm is when the kids came over to play basketball next to Gemma's room and didn't leave until 9 everyday. 3 is what time I started feeling invaded and unsafe. 3.
Right off the bat, my therapist said, "Well it sounds to me like you have PTSD." What? Me? I haven't been raped. I haven't been in a war. I wasn't abused. Me? Turns out trauma wears many hats. Living in that house for so long, everyday being so overwhelmed with anxiety and feeling that my safety was compromised may have put me over the edge. I know I've said before how traumatic that was for me. I'm not trying to beat a dead horse. What I'm saying is that I don't think that experience made me become inflicted with misophonia. I think that it caused me to have ptsd, of which mispohonia is a lovely symptom for me. The sounds are my triggers.
So there is good news and bad news. The bad news is that I have a lot of work ahead of me to kick this thing. The good news is that people have had documented success doing it, unlike with misophonia.
So here's hoping.
<3
