Can't stand listening to people eat! (Page 4)

You have no idea how helpful this thread was to me and my wife. I have a VERY intense hypersensitivity to all of these things as well. I have no other real OCD tendencies, just a hypersensitivity to the sounds and sights of people eating. Like others have posted, it is generally more pronounced for me with people to whom I am close (wife, siblings, mother, etc.). Just hearing that I am not alone is a small help already. I have also noticed a recent hypersensitivity to loud noises like our vacuum. Any thoughts on that?

I started therapy last year and was informed that I have OCD. Although I am not a ''neat freak'' or have a need to be totally clean all of the time, I have OCD in a way that won''t allow my mind to think beyond what is annoying it. When someone is chewing or digging their hand into a bag of chips every 10 seconds, it''s all I can think about! ''Cognitive Therapy for dummies'' and an occasional prescribed zanax have been working wonders for me.

I''m the same way. When I listen to people eat, I get so pissed off and so stressed that I nearly start crying. I have constant anxiety attacks and I break out in a sweat. Anything that has to do with people eating or anything, I freak out. When I''m eating, it''s not a big deal but when it''s quiet mostly and I can hear someone eating, it drives me up the wall. I have to pop my back, neck, knuckles and wrists to try and calm down. I''m glad to know I''m not alone.

I'm 52 years old and have had the same problem since I was about 8 years old. My problem is people chewing with their mouth open, smacking thier lips, scarfing down their food, it drives me nuts. I since have learned to tone it out as much as possible, like mind over matter. I will still get so disgusted and lose my appetite. I remember watching my grandpa eating fat, yes fat, and scooping up the gel from canned ham. I hated steak when I was young because of the fat and the horrible texture. Another thing is people slurping soup or their coffee. Everything type of meat I cook has to be lean, and I can't stand chicken skin. I was a waitress for over 20 years and witnessed it all. People talking with their mouth full with food bites spilling out. I remember a customer that ate so loud it sounded like he had a mike on his table. Customers near him would get so annoyed they would ask to move to another table. I also get irritated when people don't use their silverware correctly. It's mostly men and they hold their fork or spoon like a two year old.

I have no idea how you were a waitress for 20 years. I too am disgusted by the same things and waiting tables seems like the worst thing for this. I couldn't do it. I think I'd vomit. Oddly enough, I hate talking on the phone to people I don't know (utility companies, doctor's offices, ect) and I'm a dispatcher. Go figure.

oh wow, so glad to not be alone! i always thought it was a pet peeve, but it seems like it's so much worse than that. it's HORRIBLE. i can't physically stand it. i have my ipod turned up full and i still manage to go psycho even at the sight of someone eating. a few years ago i literally slapped my friend because she did it on purpose to piss me off. i couldnt believe it! i am no WAY i violent person and especially not a person who would slap their best friend but it's like something snaps. it's attrocious help.

What is the solution?? It's so bad that I told my husband today, "If I don't hear another sound for the next ten years, it'll be fine by me, and that's not normal."

Is it OCD? Anxiety? An auditory processing disorder? I had always thought that it was my fibromyalgia and/or ADHD. I was told once that it was "a control freak issue" but I didn't buy that (still don't).

I take vitamins and such because some of my conditions can be caused or worsened by nutritional deficiencies. I'm open to trying other supplements if this could be from another deficiency.

I have kids, and they are the super-noisy variety. They are all Motormouths 24/7 (they literally talk in their sleep, and they sleepwalk, too, banging around at all hours). It's bad enough during the school year, when I have to put up with them for 6 hours a day, then overnight. During the summer, I have them 24/7 for 90 days solid. School just let out for the summer, and I am already insane from the noise. Please give me a rubber room, or sever my auditory nerves, or something!

Do I leave my family and try to find someplace that is silent? I don't think silent places exist. Do I tape their mouths shut until they learn to shut up? I'm already planning to ask the doctor to increase their ADHD meds, which will help them calm down some, but I know from experience it won't be nearly enough.

I cannot get people to understand that noises physically HURT ME. If they are loud, I reflexively cover my ears and duck my head. I always have to fight the impulse to knock off the head of the person who is hurting my ears. It's as if my instinct is to make the pain stop, and make it stop NOW, no matter what. I hate that, because I love my family. I don't want to feel any kind of violent impulse toward them.

Sounds that continue, whether they are repetitive sounds (tap, tap, tap), or just a series of sounds (like people who keep talking), hurt me, too. It starts with my ears and/or my eyes, and spreads to my head, neck, shoulders, back, and eventually, my entire body. The longer the sounds continue, the more the pain spreads.

I love people, but I often can't handle going to church or social functions, and certainly can't stay long. By the end of a noisy day, no matter how much fun it was, my entire body hurts like I've been hit by a truck.

If anyone has any ideas, please help me. I can't stand the noise, and I can't stop the noise. I have to find some way to deal with this, or to get away from sounds.

Thank Goodness for the internet I always felt I had a mental issue and suffered in silence...I can't stand anyone chewing gum and eating food with their mouth open. No one in my family understood so I really had to keep it to myself for as long as I can remember. I used to get in trouble for asking my dad to eat with his mouth closed. I also hate the TV and radio on in the house or outside the house unless I'm in the room. But if it's on, I can't relax. Has anyone tried hypnosis?

i am just going to say the same thing...thank god i am not alone. i have always been made to feel like i am a terrible person for my issues with people chewing. told to "get over it" on a daily basis, but these have all made me feel some much better.
i am not sure what i can do about it, but at least i am not alone. thank you all for sharing.

the sound of swallows, sips, lips smacking, chewing, crunching, teh visual act of chewing (esp with an overbite) and repulsion over stuffing face with food or food dropping out, licking finger to turn pages, turning of pages, running of fingers on paper, people chewing gum or their cheeks, biting nails, picking fingers, picking feet or any nails spots scabs esp if eaten, mouse cliks, typing on keyboards, cats or dogs cleaning themselves, dog eating, general male dogs (but not cats) gentalia, picking noses, scraping of cultery on plates or pans, rough hands, sharp rtoenails, farting, (but not burping), stirring of tea in a cup, sometimes boiling liquids, jaws clicking when chewing

I was sexually abused from a young age this noise thing became a problem about the age of 7

BUt - why doesn't the sound of my own eating upset me? I dont notice it?

It has effected my relationships a lot in the past and my current boyfriend is the most intolerant of my problem. I have stormed out from rooms when my mum is eating. I do consitantly ask my boyfriend to close his mouth when he chews his food and he also has his habit of inhaling food off the fork/spoon. I'm surprised he doesn't choke. It is a mixture of disgust, repulsion adn irritation at general bad manners. I'm not what you would called laid back adn I wonder how many of us have problems with anger, irritation, tolerance, even control?

I think it is sexually related, manners and just something physiological. Wet moist unpleasant dry scrapey...uuggggthhhhhh!

It does make me want to punch people. This really has ruined a big part of my life. NEVER have I received sympathy for it (not surprising really is it when all of a sudden you and your boyfriend are talking about, I don't know, lets say your birthday present and the next minute you have your jaw clamped shut and are giving them 'that look'). It's great to fine this site, in fact I have really laughed out loud at a lot of it. But I do feel a bit pessamistic about it all, I can't imagine help will come in my life time (I'm 32). I haven't got kids - lucky for them eh? - I want to kill my boyfriends male (entire) dog it stinks and constantly licks itself - I love my cat but have to put her out because she is long haired and likes to groom a lot. My house and whoever I've lived with has always been a place of tension. I have had depression on and off and other mental health issues but I can't help but think it's all related and a solution I think would help more than just the noise problem but general acceptance of all irritating things.

I haven't googled the suggested disorders yet, as no one has really come back with any feedback from them I'm kinda guessing there is no real help for us. Amazing that this thread was started such a long time a go. What led me to googling this problem is my bf is fed up of me and I am trying to sort myself out... but how can we?

SOME RESEARCHER IN MEDICINE/PSYCHOLOGY H E L P U S P L E A S E ! !

Some links! As I am new to his forum, I'm not sure if the links will show. However, it does feel a relief I am not alone, my boyfriend seriously has left me and I'm trying to say I will calm down.... I am about to try adn find/start mindfulness based stress reduction program, hope it works. Good luck everyone... lets all have meal together shall we? lol..seperate rooms? Can't see that a wikipedia page is going to save my relationship tho.

I thought this was interesting as I am dyslexic and there are some traits, but I personally really don't think it explains this problem we all have.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auditory_proc essing_disorder

This describes the probelm well (sorry they are wiki refs!)

There seems to be some but not many similarities with OCD - well, in my case anyway!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ocd

Me too...

The worst I think is a bowl of cereal. But anyone audibly chewing drives me up a wall.

hey all!
i have this same problem. To bear the voice of someone chewing hard is so irritating. I am glad to know, i am not alone. But i do not feel bad for those who eat with manners. but people who make noises while eating are unbearable to me.

unreal. why didn't i ever type this into google years ago? i get so grossed out. yes, i think something to do with sex...and the savageness of people eating, not enjoying their food but shoving and scarfing. i hate it when it's just me and one other person, and no background noises...i have to turn the tv on, or radio, or ... and toasted crunchy sandwiches are my worst to listen to ..

Well, I talked to my bf about this and he was totally unsympathetic. So what. Everyone's got a disorder. Aren't you sympathetic I asked? No. was the answer.

He is now an ex for reasons very similar to this.

I also began with this desperate feeling of fury when hearing people eat around me - cinemas were the worst. My bf thought I was mad when I would go sit in the bathroom at the movies rather than have to endure the munching sounds.

Now, 30 years later I have added to the list of fury factors - the sounds of my children tapping on laptops, the sounds of colleagues eating, clanking of cutlery on crockery. Anyone sneezing, coughing, clearing their throat and I want to run screaming away or shriek at them to shut up. I manage it at work by walking away or escaping to find a few moments peace in a storecupboard, and at home by leaving the room and going to my bedroom, or for a walk with the dog till the fury goes. The funny thing is, I am still taken by surprise when it happens. I can be chatting with my daughter quite happily one moment, then she starts to text someone and I am like a crazy person inside, trying desperately to hold in my mania.

Awful. I am already on Prozac so I guess I have issues, but until this day, and reading these posts I never knew there was a word for this monstrous condition. I simply thought I was a nut - it feels like most of the time I just don't have enough depth of skin to cover my nerve endings.
CY

I was absolutely shocked to read all of the accounts of people mirroring exactly what I feel. I can't believe that it isn't just me, and cannot believe how similar some of the accounts sounded to my own.
I hate chewing. I hate hearing other people chew, seeing people chew, I don't even want to hear or see myself eating. The blank look in their eyes, or worse: that of concentration. The atrocious expressions that they are entirely unaware of. It's an almost subhuman action and it seems as though no one understands how ridiculous they are acting. I can't ever remember not feeling this way, and it seems impossible to describe. It's almost an ignorance, and arrogance when people look around calmly while eating. A cockiness: "I'm chewing and enjoying this food, you go on with your life and if you hear or see me, I don't care." They try to play off this wretched primitive action as casual, but to me and you it is a BLARING disturbance. It is a DEEP, horrible anger for this ignorance that causes us so much pain. I don't even like to hear the word "chew". It's a babyish debauchery of human capability. "Are you done chewing?" "Chew that all the way." It reminds me of a woman breastfeeding in public. I don't want to see it, you don't need to share it. I know that "people need to eat so get over it" but I DO NOT want to be a part of anyone else's (and if I can see or hear my own) eating.
I have always searched for an answer to this. Those around me notice and have forced me to listen, to stay at the table, to ignore the issue insisting that I have created it. That only makes me angrier. I have tried forcing myself to listen, and ended up in tears. I have tried pretending that the sound is something else, I've tried making it funny, thinking about it on a larger scale ("How incredibly ridiculous for you to think when you have a family and a place to live").
NOTHING ever worked. This was me.
Until I read all of these posts. I thought: What if all of us could come together and say, No.
I wanted to help all of you, because I know what it is and how horrible it has been for all of us. I wished that there was some way.
We could sit at a table together, and understand exactly what happens, what we all feel, and eat together.
What if we could just GET OVER IT, I thought. Wouldn't it be liberating, beautiful? I then thought: there has to be a way. Literally, there has to be a way. I am going to DO IT for the sake of everyone else. If there's a way, DANG IT, I am finding it, for me and for you.
Tonight, like every night, I dreaded dinner. I have eaten at record time and have become the world's most refined excuse maker my entire life. But, as always, I had to sit down.
Corn. Steak. Beans. Sickening. Anger. Blank eyes. Dirty looks shot at me eating rapidly. Exaggerations to make sure I was still listening. That resigned look once one part of the plate was finished, on to the next. I boiled, I writhed, I felt the indescribable tension.
I then imagined someone from this forum sitting next to me. Watching me. Suddenly, every imagined image of all of you appeared around me. You were nodding, you knew how I felt. You were telling me that you had tried everything, that we couldn't win. I then said to myself, I am going to find the way tonight. I don't care how many other things I have tried, I am going to stop this tonight by sheer willpower. I won't let myself give up. For you guys. And I listened to my dad chew. That's right, CHEW. I sat there, with you all, and I heard it. But I didn't hear it like I had before when I forced myself to listen. This time, it was there, but so were all of you, and so was I. I felt a spark of hope, that I could stand it without that horrible anger, but then I felt the anger again. It crept back in, as usual. At that moment, inside, there was a strong person, and then there was this anger. It was no longer about the chewing. It was about me. So I looked the anger in the eye in my mind and destroyed it with strength, one slow, slow moment at a time. I think you can feel this power too. One second at a time it will be a horrible battle, but you have GOT to be the victor, for no one but yourself. Recognize the anger, and remove it by conscious force. Sit there in your own body and physically fight that anger away. Don't take the deep breaths or try to tune it out. Take it on, head on. Invite it in and then crush it to the ground with the truth that there IS a way to get rid of it, one moment at a time.
Tonight I was on the verge of tears at the table, but it was not because I hated the chewing as usual: it was because I had the weapons to remove the horror from my mind. It was not me versus the chewer, it was me versus the anger. I got away from the table and went and sat down on the couch once I was "done enough" eating to leave. Sitting there, I imagined myself stronger than anyone in the world, with everyone here behind me, and decided that if I wished to help everyone on here, I'D HAVE TO PROVE IT BY FIRST HELPING MYSELF. I thought, "If i can beat this RIGHT NOW, maybe someone else can too. It has to be possible, so guess what? For me, for them, I'm doing it for real, I'll even do extra. THAT'S how strong we are. TAKE THAT." I imagined you all watching me, and in my mind at looked at you all and said, try this.
I then got up off the couch, and with strong steps I walked BACK to the table and sat down. I listened to another ear and a half of corn being chewed. I sat there. I challenged this horrible force. And suddenly my heart started to race. I had broken through, I had beaten it. It was there, but I was there ten times as strong.
Tonight was a terrible battle for me, but guess what? It was THE battle I've been afraid to fight my WHOLE life, and with no fancy concepts or reason to make a change RIGHT NOW, I made the change. On this ordinary day, I decided that dang it, this is over, so I can be a strong person. No ceremonies or certain days, it's done NOW by STRENGTH.
I'm a sixteen year old girl. If I can do it, so can you. Try it tomorrow night. For no reason other than that it IS possible if you're strong enough, and YOU ARE. And if you don't feel like it, I'll be there with you. I'm just writing here to say that it is possible. Before tonight, I wasn't sure it was, but it is. There IS an answer, we CAN do it. It's about proving it to everyone else here that you can do it too, so get out there and try it.

Hey check this out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Misophonia

This actually has a name, I thought I was the only person, it has only been getting worse over the last year or so.

I am so happy I found this forum! This is the first time I thought to look up this kind of noise sensitivity, prompted by my dad coming into the room and talking to me while chewing. My whole being just changes, my ears start on fire, and I feel insanely angry, sick, and desperate to get away.

My experiences are so similar to many already described here. Reading some of the descriptions of people eating and the word "gullet" make my insides churn. To cope with the problem, I wear earplugs all the time and can no longer function without them. Another area of noise I can't stand is when two sources of music or television/movie nosies come into conflict with one another. If I can hear any of these things, I turn off all electrical equipment near me and attempt to shut down my ears by pressing earplugs further in and keeping my hands there.

This started from as early as I can remember. When I shared a room with my sisters, I'd hear their smacking and breathing noises in the night. I found myself unable to stand it and resorted to sticking anything in my ears to make it stop. I absolutely loathe eating in groups due to the sounds and sights. Crunching carrot sticks, chips, slurping, sucking, smacking, kissing sounds - all of it is so deafening and nauseating. In turn, I often find myself at a loss when eating with any other person (quiet or not) because I am so aware of my own sounds and actions. Around age 11, my difficulty with tolerating conflicting sources of television/movie/musical audio was exacerbated.

Now, I wear soft wax earplugs at all times and sit in rooms with a good deal of white noise to drown out sound. I am so so so happy to see that I am not alone with this issue! It is awful and controls just about every part of your life.

I personally can't stand to hear the crunch of chips or ice or anything of that matter. I have to tell my kids to eat with their mouths clothes, not because of good manners, but because I can't stand the crunch or open mouth chewing. What's funny is if I do this, it does not bother me, but hearing anyone else would drive me crazy. I have no idea what kind of problem this is.

Hello,

I suffer from the exact same thing. I don't have much to add to the previous comments except that once I got irritated by my own chewing sounds. In fact, I got so angry that I punched myself in the face, then smashed the bowl on the floor.
I hope I'm not crazy...