Hi c.b.
My odd experiences:
I'm taking a risk here, but I'll share my story, a little more than 11 years after yours was posted because Ii've only recently read it.
TV-it'd work for years and then not work. Because I was too poor to get it fixed I just wouldn't use it. And lo and behold a few years later it'd work. That happened to me at least twice, but they were used TVs so maybe that doesn't count.
Light bulbs-they would always go bad way sooner than they were supposed to. These light bulbs I use now are the only ones I don't remember it happening to. And I've used flourescent bulbs {all kinds really} bulbs before, and they too went bad very quickly. This has gone on for many, many years.
In about a year {I don't track time well} I've gone through four or five D.V.R.s. They just malfunction: recording a few minutes of a programed hour show, not taping a show at all, and other things.
Here's what I'm the most afraid to share. In the '80s? '90s? I would would program my VCR to tape an evening of TV shows {at least three hours} onto my VCR and they'd tape all right, but often in the wrong order. For example, what I programmed to tape at 7pm would have the 8pm or 9pm show first on the tape, which should be physically impossible. I'm only sharing this now because I now know that I can't be committed just for having that happen.
Is this the type of thing you were speaking about c.b.? Or have I just earned the weirdo label for speaking up? I know this is c.b.s question, but I'd sure appeciate hearing if anyone has examples like this. I hope this helps, c.b.
mary et al
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CB
I thought I was a monster because I go crazy when I hear my husband or daughters chewing. I want to scream and rage. I too have to leave the room because I have hurt my family's feelings too much by telling them to chew quietly. I have been in therapy for 8 months, and these feelings have intensified immensely as I work through memories.
Thank-you for sharing. I don't feel so alone and so crazy.
JB
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Hi CB,
Even though my response is coming so late after your original query, I felt
to write you a reply because I too have weird resonses to things. I've come
to see them as over-reactions caused by events in my childhood, especially the
feeling that I didn't/don't own my own physical space, or perhaps even my body
or my mind.
While chewing isn't a problem for me, other things are. :I have all my life
experienced the world as bombarding me with too much sensory and mental input.
That explains at least some of these experiences, such as: sounds that are too
loud, light that is too bright, spaces that are too overcrowded or too small,
doors that are not closed, (especially) speech that is too fast, written words
that are too close together (not enough white space); the subject of sex used
in commonplace, two-cents' worth jokes, and (especially) the expectation on
me not to be bothered by them; (most of all) being caught off-guard in a situation
where I instantaneously feel exposed.
Three things cause me physical pain: Being touched on any part of my body below my waist (including my legs), occasionally, on the toilet, when I have (all but?) completely emptied my bladder, there will arise a terrible pain which moves through my whole body. I think it has to do with the letting go aspect of it, but beyond that, I don't understand it.
The only other times when I feel such pain is when I am practising my deep meditation most effectively, and I have managed to let go *very* well. Like a fear that rises to stop me letting go more deeply, there arises, always very sharply and suddenly, a terribly painful sensation from around my lower abdomen. It too travels, but not upward. it moves down my legs, and I can do nothing while it lasts. Even then, if I try to return to my mediation, it returns and I can no longer continue.
That pain has stopped me from continuing the most successful practice in my life in terms of its effect mentally and its effect on freeing me of other "personalities" inside. I despair of ever being free of it.
For now, Have a Happy New Year!
Epifani
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For CB
when i'm not well, i have electricity in body and mostly mind. very dizzy.
anna
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Dear CB:
Yes that happens to me too. I am unnerved by the sound of chewing and sometimes
I can't even stand the sound of my own chewing. I just as I was reading this
had a brainstorm as to where this may originate (for us at least). Maybe it
kinda sounds like the sound made when oral sex was forced.
sierra
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I also have the same reaction you mentioned to the sound of chewing. I feel so angry and have an inner rage that feels like exploding or erupting like a volcano. It is also an emotional pain of some sort- why do you want to hurt me? That is the inner voice I hear. It is an over reaction as you have said- it is not an issue of poor manners. I am in my mid 50s and this has gone on since I was in about 5th- 6th grade. I also feel like slapping someone. It is so unbearable that I cannot eat at the dinner table- I need lots of background noises- preferably a movie on the tv. I have been working on issues for a long time now- sometimes the sounds are bearable -but if I am tired I have no tolerance for it. I also cannot look at the person who is chewing- the sight of the jaw moving up and down also makes me very angry. I do not know if this is helpful in any way- but it has helped me to find someone to connect with.
anonymous
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Dear CB - I am struck by reading of your difficulty with hearing people chewing. It sends me to a place I have never ever understood - aggravated, angry, agitated and aware of feeling totally helpless - I'm sorry my response isn't one that is of help, but more along the lines of - WOW, you aren't alone because I have to 'work' to barely tolerate it myself. How on earth do we begin to figure this one out? When I do begin to understand, I'll definitely pass on my awareness and maybe then, provide some insight that may be of help... Forgive me for being dumbfounded by this discovery that I'm not the only one who "struggles" with mouth/chewing noises that, at least for me, seem to resonate in a threatening way, the core of my being.
rjb
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In response to CB:
I think I can relate to your experience when you read something powerful. It happens to me mostly with music, but sometimes when I read. With me, I think perhaps it is a medium where my system has found comfort and/or complete escape in the past, so my system, or my brain, has enhanced it. It's like it recognizes something that has the capacity to give comfort or energy, and it does everything it can do to squeeze out every last drop. I think of the way I enjoy chocolate. My past experiences provide a lot of good memory and anticipation of MORE comes from that memory. It's just something the brain does on its own where it stores pleasure memory. So all of the pleasure I received in the past from eating chocolate is taken and used to make the experience, before, during, and after, seem like a lot more than what's real, a simple piece of chocolate. I can physically (inside) step into music, or a powerful piece of writing. It is exuberating, but also tiring. It's a good experience that my system is taking and putting into a pretty box, wrapping it in pretty paper, with just a touch of a beautiful fragrance and putting it in the window for me to look at and enjoy before, during and after. My system can make bad things worse. But I've learned it can make good things better as well. In response to what you experience when you hear someone eating. Oh my gosh. This has been something that makes me crazy for forever. I know though that it comes directly from my second oldest brother. He was a perpetrator, and he was disgusting. He breathed through his mouth WHILE EATING. It made the most unnerving sound imaginable. To this day I fill up with every emotion attached to that..........person (only because I'm writing to MV will I refer to him as a person). Anger, disgust, shame, contempt. All of these things, even though I know why I feel them and that it is attached to the brother, all I have to do is hear it and I can neither hear or feel anything else. I'm sorry to hear someone else suffers from this nasty abreaction.
anonymous Z
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Dear C.B.:
That electrical feeling is when contact is made with part of your inner self.
Many of us experience that in different forms. I call them moments of enlightenment.
It's is a great sign that there is a part of you that is really paying attention
and trying to let you know that this is what they want you to learn and remember.
For me it's sometimes like goose bumps that raise on my whole body and lifts
my spirit. I'm having that moment as I share this with you. There are so many
stages that I have gone through over many years and that feeling you are having
will in time be your signal and you will look forward to it as you travel this
road in recovery. As you learn more about your self and read more of other people's
stories this feelings will come to you more and more. Someimes they are not
things we are ready to address yet but as the inner self reads and knows that
they are not alone any more the process of exclusion among our many parts some
how start to share information and as they do life begins to take on new meanings
for us. This is normal and a great sign to look forward to rather the fear.
good luck on your journey.
Jacki
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I grew up in a family of 11 children. My father always had two jobs so he was only home for dinner which he demanded silence through. It was his only time of relaxation between jobs. I swore for many years that that man must have come to the table with 10 extra spoons by his side. He hated the sound of someone making any noise while eating.
I was one of the unfortunate children to be born with a defective jaw which caused my under bite to not grow out as far as my upper bite did. That meant that I only had two teeth on each side of my mouth that actually came together to chew my food. To avoid being hit in the head with one of these spoons, I had to learn to swallow most of my food whole, because there was no way I could keep my mouth shut and chew at the same time.
I would think that maybe there is some memory of something like that in your
backround that may cause these feelings. I am 49 now and I thank God my children
were all born with correct bites.That most likely saved them from me repeating
my childhood upon them. I hope that helps some.
Jacki
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In response to the second point of CB's question re the intense reaction
(irritation, anger) she feels when she hears people chewing (irritation, anger):
I also have a similar reaction when I hear people chewing. It irritates the
heck out of me, I sometimes want to slap the person making the noises, and often
have to leave the room. For myself, I understand these noises to be related
to sounds I heard within my trauma. I don't know how to respond discreetly or
without being offensively blunt, but I know for myself that the noises in the
present remind me of noises during abusive sexual activity in my past.
Anonymous
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Hi C.B.!
I'm not sure if what happens to me is what you meant, but there are times when
I feel all this energy and some electrical things in my apartment (or store,
etc.) won't work or create such static (radio/tv). I can't wear a watch because
it either stops or won't keep the right time. Recently, I' ve been experiencing
what I'm calling overstimulation. I was at the laundromat on a rare weekend
and the girl there had CMT (Country Music Television) on the big screen television
that they have there. Normally, I don't particularly like country music (Sorry
fans!) but this time, I thought I was going to go out of mind! It felt like
the music was in my cells and screaming at me. I had to get out of there and
sit in my car, and if I didn't really need my clothes, I would have left them
there. A similar thing happened while waiting to turn at a light. The car in
front of me had its blinker on, like normal, but, again, it seemed to get inside
me, and set off this . . . I don't know what. I mean, I know I'm normally hyper-vigilant
and hyper-sensitive, but this was way beyond that. I can't explain it, but I
hope, at least, that this will help you not feel so alone in what you experience.
Linda