Melissa Gilbert’s Neurological Disorder Caused Problems on the Set of ‘Little House on the Prairie’
Little House on the Prairie star Melissa Gilbert found fame and success as a child star on the popular series. However, things weren’t always so easy on the set. Gilbert found herself getting annoyed and angry as a child when listening to certain sounds like people chomping on gum. Years later when Gilbert was an adult, she learned that the uncomfortable feelings she was experiencing were actually a neurological disorder called misophonia.
Misophonia causes someone to experience emotional and psychological reactions to sounds or visuals that the person is triggered by. For instance, Gilbert explained, “If any of the kids chewed gum or ate or tapped their fingernails on the table [in the on-set schoolroom], I would want to run away so badly. 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.”
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It was a sigh of relief when Gilbert discovered the cause for these feelings and was eventually able to get some help. While there is currently no medication or cure for misophonia, there are therapies that can help deal with the uncomfortable symptoms. Gilbert recalled that her symptoms seemed to get worse when she reached menopause, but Dr. Zach Rosenthal, the head of the Duke Center for Misophonia, was able to give her a lot of tips to help her self-regulate and control the symptoms and feelings.
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“This is an emotional issue. It’s about self-regulation and self-control,” added Gilbert. “I realized I could ride out these waves but that they’re not going to go away. They never go away. But now I have all these tools to enable me to be more comfortable and less triggered. It made me feel in control.” She now works with the Duke Center for Misophonia and Emotional Regulation at Duke University’s School of Medicine to raise awareness about misophonia. Have you ever heard of this, or do you suffer too? Let us know in the comments.
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