Parents talking with their mouth full

[Mmmpomello]

This is way longer than I thought!!

My dad is becoming increasingly aged. We cannot figure out if it is just learned helplessness and laziness coupled with him being a bit deaf (but not letting on, so will respond 'appropriately' even if he hasn't heard) or if it is something more serious. It may also something to do with major arterial surgery he had to correct an aneurysm, which I have read can cause demential-like symptoms due to plaque being shifted about.

I really struggle with some of this, particularly his growing phone addiction and ignoring, and there is definitely an element of "I'm old, you do it" despite being capable of building a campervan and working at events!

Anyway, one thing I am really struggling with is his constant talking with his mouth full at meal times. This is in public too, and almost comical in that you cannot tell what he is saying, it's just food sounds. I find it really repulsive and can't tolerate it. He also talks with a throat gurgle because he can't be bothered to clear his throat, and other things because he can't be bothered to blow his nose etc. I just cannot cope, it almost makes me panic and I come across as snappy just tying to get the noise to stop..

Without fail, when he is given his dinner, he'll say 'this is yummy thankyou' with a mouthful which honestly just puts me off my food. I don't start conversations now when we eat, and I do ask him to please not talk with his mouth full. But then I get sulking and silence and 'it doesn't matter', and told that I'm rude and disrespectful. I really respect my Dad but I should be able to pick someone up on basic etiquette regardless of them being 'higher' than me as a parent. I honestly have tried to tolerate it but I can't.

Both of them seem incapable of changing some things, for example, we often talk on the phone, with me on speaker. My mum will shout in the background, which I either can't hear or get deafened by feedback squeal if she's next to the phone..EVERY TIME I ask them to please not do this, but it never changes.

I am ND which plays an element here in terms of my sensitivity to ickyness. I am really trying to be understanding and sympathetic, and I love him dearly. But it is making me not want to be around him sometimes which is really sad, and I am embarrassed when we are eating with friends etc.

How do I deal with this?? I can't seem to navigate this parent-child aspect even though I am 37!

Anyone?

It sounds tough. There's an elderly parents board which might beget you better answers if you have this moved.

FWIW, I can't stand people talking with their mouthful. MIL does it all of the time. I actively try and avoid sitting near her if at all possible.

My DC are pretty good but I do call them out on it. I'm secretly waiting for the day one of them calls her out because I don't dare do it myself!

Sorry, no reply answers.

Fat fingers - sorry, no really helpful answers!

Turn up after dinner and tell him why. Age isn't an excuse not to be honest...

I have misophonia with certain noises and it sounds like you have too. You might have synaesthesia because they often go together. The only solution I have found is avoidance.

For example, don't have meals with your dad any more. Make an excuse to leave the room when he's eating. The actual duration of eating during a mealtime is surprisingly short so you can still be with them during a mealtime, just not for the actual eating part. Even leaving the room for 5min intervals during the meal will be enough to disrupt conversation. You can make up for it by properly engaging in conversation before and after the meal.

Don't do speakerphone conversations any more. Request that they take turns to talk on the phone (passing it over). Explain that the feedback noise gives you a headache. If they can't do this you'll have to switch to emails instead of calls.

No doubt I'll get comments that this is uncaring. But misophonia is just so mind-blowingly awful that your relationship will actually be more damaged if you just keep trying to endure it.

In my case for example, dh leaves the room to eat an apple. I can stand my dd eating apples, but when my dh does it, it's honestly like a crack of thunder, it's astonishingly loud and sharp sounding and hurts my brain.

@Mummy08m yes I think this is it. My partner can't cope with chewing noises and I try really hard to avoid that. With my parents I feel like I'm just banging on and now it's me being rude etc. It's really hard when you're made to feel like the bad one when you call people out on bad behaviour.

R.e. the speakerphone issue, I tell the EVERY TIME. And they still do it. It's always excuses "but she's over by the door doing something" or "she's on her computer" and if I don't have them on speaker they complain that they haven't been properly informed or not included. "This is the first I've heard of it" etc.

I think if I left the room when my dad was eating, e.g. I have them over and we are eating a takeaway/cooked meal together, or we're out at restaurant, or I've come home and mum has cooked dinner - it would go down like a lead balloon and I would be seen as extremely rude and unreasonable.

They are NEVER wrong and there is always an excuse. I have pretty extreme ADHD to the point where I need physical help with lots of things and they make zero consideration. It's always 'but why can't you just....'

Argh.

If he’s going deaf he might not be able to hear himself chewing etc like before.

I’m sure you’ve tried but it’s really important to get help with hearing… untreated hearing loss increases your risk of dementia / makes it develop faster.

My PILs have appalling table manners -- by which I don't mean sitting with their elbows on the table or holding their knives strangely, I mean chewing with their mouths half-open, talking with their mouths full and doing things like using a knife they've just licked to help themselves to butter in a butterdish or a communal dip. When I was pregnant (and very easily nauseated), I literally couldn't sit at a table with them without feeling as if I were about to throw up.

I just avoid eating with them these days.

Don't eat with them anymore.
Don't phone them anymore.
When they ask why you have stopped let them know and if they care enough they will try to do better, if not then..

I think it's an elderly parents theme.

Mine does the speaker thing and it drives me round the bend. I now do a "take me off speaker or im hanging up"
He does a phone round of his friends during the day and I hear him repeating himself, and then when I'm near him, I can see that hes got his bloody phone leaned against his stomach/chest talking into it like something out of the fucking apprentice. Nobody can bloody hear him clearly and yet still he persists.

He also does a weird mmm mmm mmm grunt thing when eating and then has the FUCKING AUDACITY to accuse ME of being the one making the noise because he doesnt realise hes doing it.
Meanwhile im white knuckled at the end of the table.

He also suffers from learned helplessness.

I moved in with him to keep a literal eye during covid as he went mostly blind through glaucoma. He has some sight, but in low light or glaring light his vision is compromised. Apart from that hes fit and independent at nearly 80.
We both had covid recently and he had a cold for a couple days and I was wiped out for a fortnight because I tend to run on zero a lot of the time.

As well as working from home I am his tea-maker, his dogs dinner maker, his dogs letter-outer and his dogs water bowl checker.
I have a dog myself so it doesnt really put me out as I feed them together and let them out together. Dad has a hired dog walker who comes daily bar the weekends and I walk my own during the week and both at weekends if im here.

What really gets on my tits though is that because I always sort the water bowl for both dogs, if I go away for the weekend which I do 90% of the time, I come back and the bowl is bone dry and he just says "oh I forgot", so now I have to text him with WATER BOWL whenever I am away.
It's just another thing that goes on my plate and im full time employed with a long distance partner and generally spend my life running about after SOMEBODY.

We have a cleaner but because hes blind he makes a mess when making food etc so I do a lot of cleaning up after him. I am semi resentful because I work on the principle that if he can take stuff out of the fridge, he should be able to put it back but he leaves bacon etc out all the time so when I hear him cooking while im working I feel compelled to go upstairs when hes finished to put everything away for health and hygiene reasons.

This all sounds like hes very reliant, doesnt it?

He goes for a walk and a gossip with his pals every day so makes a vat of tea or coffee which he sticks into 3 different thermos cups, makes some sandwiches and adds in a couple of biscuits etc, sticks his hat on and goes for a walk and a picnic down the local prom by the sea.
Got a new wifi deal the other day so he pottered round the house setting up 3 new routers and quite literally built a shed in the garden this summer.
He also does his own laundry because he "doesnt like how I hang things out to dry"

Do not tell me you cannot make your own beverages, tidy a kitchen worktop, let your dog out to relieve himself regularly and put water in your dogs bowl! And dont tell me you cant hold a phone to your ear either!

Thank you for the rant opportunity OP.

I know this is hard but sometimes you just have to accept being unreasonably accused of being rude (I myself do not think you're being rude).

For example you can say like a pp said, "take me off speakerphone or I'm hanging up" - if your parents respond, oh you're so rude and demanding, so what? Let it go down like a lead balloon, if it must. I'd rather be considered rude than have to endure my misophonia.

All my mates know about my apple crunching aversion thing and they tease me about it and dh rolls his eyes but at least I don't have to endure it. I'd rather be considered unreasonable than have to endure it. As it is they still love me, they just know it's one of my little quirks. I have other ones too like I hate light being shone in my eyes, I sometimes prefer to have no music playing, and I have a really strong response to beeping (eg the beeping you get when the dishwasher stops).

Avoidance of triggers is the only solution I've found. I'm willing to accept downsides like occasionally seeming unreasonable or demanding.

It could be way worse, both my dad and sister basically live like hermits (separately, alone) partly because of similar sensory issues (among other issues).

Ps you've just reminded me of something funny.

One of our best mates just came back from a long weekend visit with a couple we know (but aren't close any more). He told us he felt the wife was a bit unreasonable at times and he felt sorry for the husband - for example he told us of this moment when the husband was eating some crisps and the wife suddenly turned to him and said sharply "after this last crisp, don't have any more".

I cracked up and said that's just the kind of thing I'd do because of my misophonia and dh just nodded and we could see our mate, who is single, just pondering on wives in general. Lol! There was definitely this look on his face like "I thought mummy08m and dh were a happy couple and now I imagine he lives a life of fear unable to eat apples or crisps" 😂

"I thought mummy08m and dh were a happy couple and now I imagine he lives a life of fear unable to eat apples or crisps"

Thats funny. I regularly threaten to break DH fingers if he doesn’t stop tapping the back of my chair. (Light hearted before anyone accuses me of domestic violence).

@DuploTrain he has hearing aids but won't wear them. It's long term from working on a printing press and being a bit of a raver/mod in his youth, coupled with, ironically, a slight obsession with sound quality and vinyl. He'd rather be deaf than have 'compromised' audio quality.............

@verv I hear you loud and clear!!!!