This blog post is based on a section in Jaelline Jaffe’s upcoming book, “These Sounds are Driving Our Family Crazy” Guidance for Parents of Children with Misophonia. Dr. Jaffe is a licensed marriage and family therapist and Misophonia Association board member with 50-plus years of experience as an educator, psychotherapist, and coach.
Having worked with hundreds of families and children over the past few decades, I understand the difficulties associated with parenting a child with misophonia. There is little assistance available for young children, in large part because their understanding and ability to manage their frightening reactions are limited by their brain development. I have written this book to help parents better understand and engage their little ones with less reactivity and more responsiveness on both sides. The process starts with helping children recognize their part in managing their extreme physical and emotional reactions to triggering sounds. The goal is to empower children to gain control, instead of hoping, expecting, or relying on others to solve this problem. This blog post is adapted from a section of the book, which is expected to be published in the coming months.
A Huge First Step
The first big step for your child to get back in control is a crucial, yet difficult one. In the early 1900s, the famous psychologist Jean Piaget described four stages of cognitive development:
- Sensorimotor stage (0–2 years old)
- Preoperational stage (2–7 years old)
- Concrete operational stage (7–11 years old)
- Formal operational stage (12-15 years old and beyond)
The ideal time to implement misophonia interventions is usually during the formal operational stage, when young teens begin to develop the ability to engage in abstract thinking, logic, and reasoning, including discussing hypothetical concepts and a variety of possibilities. This is why most of the therapists working with misophonia generally do not see kids younger than 15, and some not until they are 18. However, younger children are not yet at that stage of brain development.
When I am seeing kids, I often start with a metaphor about climbing Half Dome, a mountain in Yosemite. I describe four major steps needed to reach the point where they are ready to adopt strategies that will help them cope. For our purposes in helping younger children, we will focus only on the first step: Acceptance and Acknowledgment. This one is critical to building the foundation to managing their reactivity.
It will likely take several reminders for these concepts to begin to “stick.” To make sense for your own child’s situation, personalize this description to include [actual names of people] and [specific sound issues] that are your child’s challenges.
When your child first started having these problems with [sounds], it naturally seemed like the problem was [the other person]. Your child believed that what [that person] was doing was creating this problem. And if [that person] would just stop doing [that thing that they are doing], they’d be fine. Ask your child about this: Do they feel that way? Does it still seem that way? Does it maybe even feel like [that person] is making [that sound] on purpose, just to make them mad?
Stop and discuss these ideas, acknowledge how your child feels, empathize with how it seems to them, and encourage them to explain what they are thinking. Depending on your child’s age and ability to process thoughts, you may need to stay on this part of the process for several days.
Then move to the next stage, asking your child if they notice that nobody else seems to be bothered by [that thing that’s bothering them]. This, of course, assumes that is true. I have heard of several families in which someone else has commented on that sound. In fact, it might have been the source of the issue for the child: “Mom keeps telling Dad he’s chewing too loud and now I notice it all the time.” Or “Mom keeps telling my brother to chew with his mouth closed, and now I am watching him chew all the time.”
But if that sound actually does not seem to be a problem for other people, you might continue by suggesting that maybe it isn’t [that sound over there] that is the problem. Maybe the problem is what happens when [that sound] gets into your child’s body and head. Ask what happens to their body when they start noticing [that sound]? What do they feel? Where in their body do they feel it? Stop and discuss the responses. It may take several days for your child to identify what they feel and where they feel it. Help them explore different words to describe what they are experiencing. Then you can go on.
You can point out that it seems like the problem your child is having looks like it’s over there, where [that person] is, but actually, the problem is happening over here, in their body. It starts with [that sound] that [that person] made, but [the sound] itself isn’t actually the problem. What’s making them so unhappy is how their body feels when [that person] makes [that sound].
Stop and discuss this idea. Again, it will likely take several days for it to start making sense. It’s a very abstract concept, difficult for teens and even for some adults to acknowledge, and certainly challenging for a younger child to grasp. When it seems they at least kind of “get” it, you can go on.
If your child eventually can agree that the problem is not actually [the sound] itself, but what happens in their body when they hear [that sound], then the problem is not for [the other person] to solve, because it’s a feeling your child has in their own body. This is a very hard concept for almost anyone with misophonia to accept. It makes people feel very angry, very sad, and often guilty. And for young children, the problem is compounded by their reluctance to do anything about it – they just want the other person to stop doing the thing that is so upsetting.
Moving on, if it’s a feeling they have in their body, that means they don’t have to wait for [the other person] to stop [doing what they’re doing] or to change the way that they’re behaving in order for your child to feel better. They can learn to do that for themselves, and then they can get on with their life, regardless of whether [that person] keeps [doing that thing].
This concept will take a while to process. Be patient and help your child find the words to explain how they are feeling. I have seen some adults who go through their whole lives waiting for others to change their behavior, which isn’t going to happen – especially if those other people are doing something essential for life. Those adults are generally pretty angry and miserable, mad at the world and at people around them, and they usually have significant issues in personal and work relationships. It would be better if they were able to say, “Okay, I hate that other people make those sounds, but I’m the one suffering, and I’m the one who has to find a way to do something about it.” It’s a hard pill to swallow: recognizing that their brain processes things differently. That’s a huge first step.
You can tell your child that you know this process is difficult, and your child would rather [that person] just stop doing [that thing]. You can tell them that maybe others can adjust a little to help, but they might not be able to. Besides, that would mean that your child is giving up all their control while waiting for that other person to change their behavior, which may or may not ever happen! Suggest that your child would like to have some control and make some decisions for themself. They can make a huge difference by learning how to take back control and stop waiting and hoping that [person] will fix this problem.
It will probably take several days, or even weeks, for your youngster to acknowledge that the problem is not what that person “over there” is doing. The problem is what their body and brain do in response to what the other person is doing.
It is really important for both you and your child to understand that this situation is nobody’s fault. It is unlikely that you did anything to cause this problem, and your child is not doing anything wrong. Everybody’s brain is unique, just as fingerprints are different from one person to another. This just happens to be the way their brain is currently processing certain sounds. There are, in fact, some things about their brain that make it very special and powerful.
I can’t tell you how many people I know who are stuck on these steps, and they don’t have any energy left to help themselves. So I want you and your child to keep moving and use tools and strategies to help climb “Misophonia Mountain.”
© 2026, Jaelline Jaffe, PhD.
“These Sounds are Driving Our Family Crazy” Guidance for Parents of Children with Misophonia
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