Hello!

I'm Ashley and I don’t have misophonia, but I do get overwhelmed easily by stimuli. As a spoonie, I've learned to avoid most situations that will drain me. For example, if the movement of air or the presence of light irritated my eyes, I will either close my eyes or entirely cover my upper face with a scarf or my hands.

Often when we mention avoidance, there are fears of developing unhealthy coping mechanisms. However, a distinction must be made: avoiding entirely any potentially difficult environment (not going somewhere) is unhealthy whereas simply withdrawing from part of the environment (i.e. covering my eyes) is healthy.

Regarding auditory stimuli and stimuli in general, here are a few suggestions:
- taking sensory breaks: in the event that you cannot avoid parts of the harmful stimuli, having moments to recuperate is very very important. In highschool, I overtaxed myself attempting to talk more to people (which was probably not noticeable from their perspective) and I ended up non-verbal most of the time. So I would end up lying on my desk listening to music very loudly to block out all unpleasant stimuli.
- which leads us to the following question: there are surely types of stimuli which you enjoy. On days which you know will be especially taxing, you can surround yourself with them (ex: soft clothing, nice smells).
- removing other irritant stimuli even if they are unrelated to misophonia. What challenges me the most is the cumulation of irritants along the day, which contributes to my general distress.

Also, there may be accomodations that could be made with your employer, such as changing the seating place or allowing you to wear nose-cancelling headphones.

Best wishes,

Ash