Brooklyn Disch’s Story:
Interview and Write-up by Sara Bidler
Dec. 2023
Brooklyn Disch (she/they) endured severe misophonia for approximately 20 years, starting around the age of 7. She successfully cleared misophonia in February 2023 and is now dedicated to helping others find their way to freedom from this condition. She rates her misophonia at a 12 on a scale of 0 to 10 in severity before her breakthrough, with it now being at a 0.5.
In describing their relationship to sounds/triggers now, Brooklyn notes “It’s not that there’s never a moment of annoyance with sounds, but (former) triggers no longer cause me to feel like I’m in danger or to feel disgust, anger, fear or anxiety. If I notice them, it doesn’t take me out of the moment. It’s just something I notice. Most of my previous triggers I don’t even notice at all.”
Their main misophonia triggers included mouth/breath sounds as well as certain consonent sounds. Classroom, home and work settings were challenging, and everyone triggered them with these sounds, remarking “If the person knew I had misophonia, it triggered me more because it felt like they should know better.”
Through a combination of various modalities including Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT), hypnotherapy, Rapid Resolution TherapyⓇ (RRT), meditation and Neuro-linguistic programming (NLP), she rewired her brain's response to trigger sounds, with RRT being the most influential modality.
Brooklyn trained in these modalities originally for her coaching business and was also applying them to improve many aspects of their life. It was some time into practicing them that she thought to apply them to her experience with misophonia, noting:
"Then I had the realization that misophonia is a developed pattern, just like anything else. Our unconscious mind interprets a sound as danger, creates an emotion in us such as disgust/anger/fear to get us to take an action to eliminate “a threat” (that action can be putting in ear plugs, leaving the room, asking someone to stop, etc.) and the more the cycle continues the more we feed into this pattern, through no fault of our own. We’re just doing what the unconscious mind thinks we need to do to survive. But the more we feed into the pattern the stronger it becomes and the more intense our reactions get because these things are becoming encoded as more and more dangerous, and of course we’re developing more and more triggers at the same time."
Brooklyn did specific work on rewiring her brain’s response to triggers but she did not have to do work on each trigger individually for all of them to clear. In fact, the misophonia rewiring work helped with their fear of spiders (despite no conscious focus on this fear).
Upon deeper contemplation, Brooklyn ponders whether the self-development efforts she undertook before discovering RRT established the groundwork for RRT's effectiveness in addressing her misophonia. She feels none of it was a waste of time because “it’s all a learning experience.”
Here are some things that possibly set the stage for Brooklyn’s relief, in no particular order:
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10+ years of psychotherapy (starting at age 15), which didn’t make a noticeable difference with misophonia but did give them a lot of life coping strategies and validation of her experience.
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Having a supportive parent: “My mom has been in my corner and is always an advocate.”
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Sertraline, which was prescribed to address Brooklyn’s generalized anxiety, as she was experiencing symptoms that mimicked multiple sclerosis.The sertraline didn’t help with misophonia, but did give Brooklyn a “better foundation” to then engage in the work to lessen misophonia severity.
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Strengthening family and other relationships; setting boundaries where needed.
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Switching from shaming herself when outcomes are less than ideal self-compassion and reflective learning.
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The use of EFT/Tapping to release emotions, including those experienced after being triggered by noises.
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Shifting their perspective about misophonia from, “Nothing will ever work; I’m stuck with this for the rest of my life” “I don’t deserve this, it isn’t my fault (or anyone’s fault) and also ”
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Anchoring into something bigger than herself and tapping into her intuition.
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Having an understanding partner and daily time free from triggers to reset and practice the skills they were learning, while also understanding that “avoiding trigger sounds all together wasn’t the answer because it reaffirmed in my mind that these things are dangerous.”
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Asking for help and being open to receiving new ideas.
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Journaling to their younger self and reflecting on whether the original function/belief of something still applied to their present-day life (this is along the lines of trauma work).
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Learning to advocate for herself.
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Clearing reservations about lessening their suffering from misophonia, which included possibly losing acceptance in the misophonia community and naysayers potentially saying, “See, I told you so, it wasn’t real.”She also faced the question, “Who am I without misophonia?”, as rage and frustration were her primary emotions most of her life. She used hypnotherapy to detach from the misophonia identity.
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Transitioning from being a “very pessimistic, depressed, and anxious” person being “an optimistic positive person”, which was kicked off by facing their fear of flying and traveling with strangers on their first ever solo abroad trip to Egypt. The trip helped her see how strong she really was: “It gave me a lot of my power back. I realized I can do it.” This experience empowered them and led to leaving an unsatisfying job to start their own company.
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Interrupting the thought spiral of, “Why is this person making this noise? Do they know how annoying this is, etc.?” which led to avoiding certain people based solely on the sounds they make. Replacing with a reminder that these thoughts aren’t serving her, and she can dismiss the thoughts and choose something different.
Because there seems to be a theme of people with misophonia being empathetic and/or highly sensitive, here are Brooklyn’s responses to those questions:
Do you consider yourself a Highly Sensitive Person (HSP)?
“Growing up I was a highly sensitive person. My mom had to cut off the edges of my socks. I wouldn’t wear jeans until I was older. Those experiences came up in the work.”
Brooklyn finds herself to be more aware of the energies and moods of others than the average person, noting, “I can walk into a room and tell something is off.” She considers herself a very spiritual person and being very in touch with energy and the things around her.
Do you consider yourself an empathic person?
When they took the Clifton Strengths Assessment (for which there are 34 themes), empathy was their #2 strength.
Their mom has always described Brooklyn as a very empathetic person. Now they’ve “learned how to turn it off” as needed. RRT was helpful to her in that, as they “talk about empathy a lot and when it’s helpful and when it’s not.”
In terms of maintenance efforts, Brooklyn reminds her mind that feeling calm and at ease around noises that used to be triggering is safe to experience. She also mentioned that while serving her clients, her mind is soaking up this rewiring work in the process.
Brooklyn's story emphasizes the power of introspection, reprogramming, and a multifaceted approach to healing, not only from misophonia but also from ingrained and problematic relational, cognitive and behavioral patterns. She now stands as inspiration, helping others navigate their paths to freedom from misophonia's grip.
You can learn more about Brooklyn Disch and her coaching services at:
Brooklyn also hosts the Let’s Ditch Misophonia Podcast.