LITTLE HOUSE ON THE PRAIRIE Star Says This Diagnosis ‘Changed [Her] Whole Life’
By Movieguide® Contributor
LITTLE HOUSE ON THE PRAIRIE star Melissa Gilbert is opening up about her misophonia diagnosis.
In a recent interview with PEOPLE, the actress shared that even small sounds could make her upset as a child.
“If any of the kids chewed gum or ate or tapped their fingernails on the table, I would want to run away so badly,” Gilbert said. “I would turn beet red and my eyes would fill up with tears and I’d just sit there feeling absolutely miserable and horribly guilty for feeling so hateful towards all these people — people I loved.”
She called it “a really dark and difficult part of my childhood.”
It wasn’t until years later that Gilbert was diagnosed with misophonia, “a disorder where you have a decreased tolerance to specific sounds and things you can sense related to them,” according to the Cleveland Clinic.
The Cleveland Clinic added that “misophonia may affect approximately 1 in 5 people during their lifetime.”
“I sobbed when I found out that it had a name and I wasn’t just a bad person,” Gilbert said, explaining that, for years, she had thought that she was just “rude.”
She has since received treatment at the Duke Center for Misophonia, an organization that, according to its website, is “actively conducting clinical research on misophonia, providing education to the public, and evaluating adult patients with treatment and management recommendations about misophonia.”
“Given how little is known about misophonia, the opportunities for discovery and improved care are virtually limitless,” the Center continued.
At the Duke Center for Misophonia, Gilbert underwent Cognitive Behavioral Therapy to help her manage her condition and urges others with misophonia to do the same.
“This is an emotional issue. It’s about self-regulation and self-control,” she explained. “Now I have all these tools to enable me to be more comfortable and less triggered. It made me feel in control…It’s changed my whole life.”
Movieguide® previously reported on Gilbert’s life post-LITTLE HOUSE ON THE PRAIRIE:
LITTLE HOUSE ON THE PRAIRIE star Melissa Gilbert shared details about her new book, “Back to the Prairie” and her appreciation for a simpler life.
The actress and her husband, actor and director Timothy Busfield, made a home in the Catskills, leaving Hollywood behind and embracing nature.
“I grew up on a set that was a farm,” Gilbert laughed. “I got to play it out quite a bit and then go to our nice home in Encino at the end of the cul-de-sac with all of our modern conveniences. But I’ve always loved being in the outdoors. I’ve always loved being around animals. I think this was who I always was at my core. I just happened to grow up in urban cities.
“Once we got up here, once we got our land and started to look at all the things we could do with it, and then when lockdown happened, it unleashed all of this stuff inside me,” she continued. “There was a person who was dying to have this [new life]. I still can’t believe this is what my life is like now. It’s heaven. I’m just so blessed.”
