Can you describe your sensory overload and/or shutdowns?

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From everything I've gathered, I would agree that this was a stupid thing for that psychiatrist to say, because even right here on WP there are people with classic autism who are classically/severely affected, yet they can and do perfectly well articulate things they go through and describe their mental and emotional processes.

It seems like he was suggesting the most severely affected autistics can't and don't do this, and "high functioning" Aspergers-end-of-the-spectrum people can, but this doesn't seem to be true at all.

This seems to come under the category of how even some professionals have very outdated ideas about what people on the autism spectrum can or cannot do and think and be aware of. It's even why some diagnoses are denied, because the person is deemed "too aware" of themselves and their own reactions. Yet part of the very meaning of the term autism is "self" and a suggestion of inward-turning and inward looking -- there can almost be more awareness of one's own processes than that of the outside world's and that of other people's, certainly.

Yes, he was definitely using outdated information/ideas when he diagnosed me. He is an ADHD specialist/psychiatrist without a special interest in ASDs. When he wrote up my diagnosis paperwork he wrote that I could not be autistic because I had no speech delay, and wrote that instead I have a whole slew of other things, which he concluded meant I had Asperger's instead. He titled this section of his diagnosis "DSM-5 Diagnoses" but in reality the DSM-5 allows for an ASD diagnosis without a speech delay, and it does NOT include Asperger's anymore at all.

Regardless he diagnosed me with Asperger's just last month, which we all know is called Autism now, so I'm autistic or an Aspie, either way is fine with me. But I had to roll my eyes at him for saying that you can't be diagnosed with ASD without a speech delay, and people with ASD can't articulate their inner emotional and thought processes. Really annoyed me but at least I got the diagnoses that I was paying for him to evaluate me in regards to (it was cash out of pocket for these assessments and if he had gotten it all so very wrong as he did AND also said I wasn't on the spectrum at all, I would've been very upset, because clearly I am on the spectrum given that he said the only thing holding him back from a classic autism diagnosis was my lack of speech delay, and so he was essentially down-grading me to Asperger's. )

Shutdown- after 3 hours or so, I just can't be social anymore.

Exhaustion- I just get so tired. I have to get home ASAP.

Can't really think- brain fog

Headaches, headaches and more headaches

Near constant stimming- I stim anyways on a daily basis but especially during overload

Noises- my sensory issues are mainly about noise.

Catatonic state- thankfully this doesn't happen much. It goes away after a nap.

I have panic attacks as well as sensory overload, and when it gets really bad I almost feel like screaming. When I have a meltdown I'm all over the place with my emotions, and I try to go to my room and hug my stuffies.

Sound overload: can't think, can't breathe, intensely agitated

Visual overload: dizzy, overwhelmed, blurry, motion-sickness feeling

All-day exposure: muscle aches, headaches, exhaustion

Most often, overload is bought from fatigue instead of sensory overload. I get tired and snappy, irritated and often yelling at people. Unfortunately, nobody in my life seems to realize this means I need to rest. They seem to think it's a character defect.

I feel like I'm going that way now.
Like so much sh*t. If I look at things it might seem like too much information for me? My skin feel so more sensitive so I notice things that touch but at the same time I feel pain less. If i got injured it would be sore but i prob wont care. I might just go more in a shutdown and everything i cant process and i only feel pain properly later. My thoughts change most though and I'm feeling like what is happening in my thoughts is happening right now and my imagination can seem real.

If someone tells me something that confuses me and I cannot work out it or its suprising I can shut down and my mind is stuck only on that one thing. In severe cases I can be mute and I freeze in position. Sometimes cry. Feels bad.
My sense of time dissappears and it's scary because it's like nothing is real and nothing exists. All mental information feels like too much and then I feel worse so I mustn't do much. For me it's not really sensory though but more mental. Idk if this is due to ASD because it's not totally like some of you guys I don't think.

Last edited by starfox on 03 Nov 2015, 3:48 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Sometimes I can fight back the feelings if it's in early stages by grounding myself and being focused on something around me but not thinking too much. If I don't stop myself getting that way early when I know I'm feeling bad then I can't stop it. Some things can make a shutdown or meltdown worse or last longer but I cannot stop it even if I want to. I'm kinda screwed by my own brain and have to just be that way. Even tho its the worst thing.

I get angry. I feel sick. I have to bury my head into the pillows to drown the noise out. I become exhausted and feel psychically ill to the point I lose verbal skills and say stupid things. There's a lot more to it than that but that's what I can come up with off the top of my head.

When I'm overloaded, I go quiet and can't force myself to talk or listen to people. I become hypersensitive to light, sound, and smell. I freak out when people touch me.
My meltdowns are similar to panic stacks, except I'm angry instead of scared. I cry, hyperventilate, lash out at anyone who tries to talk to or touch me.

Replying to easily access the thread to read in more detail later...my shutdowns begin as panic attacks and if it goes long enough i cannot speak. also have trouble processing sounds and speech around me. I close my eyes and shut out the world. I describe it as "going inside and shutting the door." As in, going sort of inside my mind for lack of a better description.

I just had a full-scale shutdown a few days ago, though they're usually less severe than this.

In a really crowded place, the sensory overload was way over my threshold. I started focusing on one spot on the wall until I felt like I was in that spot. Then my body started going numb, and all the sound in the room became muffled. I could tell that people were talking to me but didn't know what they were saying, and was saying "yes" and "no, I'm fine" to them even though I didn't know what I was responding to. Then I decided to remove myself from the environment, and walked outside and all the way to my car in a catatonic state. I started yelling to try to wake myself up, but that didn't work. Then I totally lost the ability to speak. For the next 30 mins I could talk to people via text message but couldn't verbalise. After that I could zombie-talk for the rest of the night but was still almost catatonic and barely following what was going on.

My usual reaction to overload stops short of the catatonic state. I go to a small, dark room and breathe by myself.

Unless it's a tactile overload. Unfortunately I'm a puncher.

My overloads tend to lead directly to headaches and migraines, they also tend to lead to a meltdown

This describes my triggers pretty well. Also a lot of chaotic activity can trigger it, unless i am in a position to help bring order out of the chaos. Then i can focus on what job i need to do and do that.

But crowds are the absolute worst. I was raised going to church, and want to do the same for my kids. But the church we attend has changed a lot in the last 5 yrs or so and the music is loud, crowd is larger, and services are held in the gym instead of the church sanctuary due to the crowd. So everything echoes including my head, and i get totally overwhelmed within the first few minutes. This is not a worship service!! !! not to someone with ASD. At some point i may need to find a new church. For now i avoid the loud portion of the service.

Screaming kids, especially in large groups, are also horrible. One crying baby can totally ruin an otherwise pleasant experience for me.

Also a lot of activity with my family when they get loud and i have had a long day--it's just too much. At those times i freeze, almost unable to move, and have a very hard time speaking as i said before.

After an overload/shutdown, i am exhausted and shaky. Feel like somebody put me through the wringer. A nap or good night of sleep is the only thing that resets my brain. Sometimes, if it is bad enough, i can't sleep well either. If i get to that point, takes several days/nights of a non-overstimulating environment to get me back to normal function.

Like I have no skin? Well maybe not quite that painful. But everything is like a direct body blow. Sudden events, be they noises, motion near me, temperature changes, contrasts, or light changes all feel like they've somehow struck me physically. I flinch or jump. I can lose my balance or get dizzy, sometimes I drop things. It feels like I have a bad flu or am really hung over. I act distant or absent usually. People ask if I'm all right, and I say yes, because explaining this is impossible.

Since I removed gluten and dairy from my diet, and cut way down on alcohol, caffeine, and sugar, this doesn't happen as often and isn't as severe.

The triggers, though, are social situations with lots of people, lots of uncertainty, or a lot of intense emotion.

Uh. I can sit and talk to a select group of people for longer periods of time, but since most of the hanging out goes on in a bar it tends to end abruptly. It's never really about the people I'm with, but what goes on around me. Someone playing really crappy music on the jukebox, people getting a bit louder or someone not from 'my group' tries to join in.. Well. The first step is just not responding to anything and going into listening mode, then it just starts being too hot (I generally start sweating), then anxiety starts building up.. and I'm gone!

Whenever someone I don't know comes to talk to the people I'm with I generally just go completely silent. I tend to be able to speak to people after I've seen them 2-3 times. And even then it's super hard.

Lights and loud noises trip me out. The standard headache/ear pain for those I guess.