Meltdown (what is a...)

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Almost every poeple here mentionned, at one time or another, that they have "meltdown". I put that into some translator but the traduction is about melting something. I'm sure that's not the meaning here. Can someone explain what is a meltdown ? Thanks.

I've had one, but I am not really good at explaining it. I just looked it up on http://dictionary.reference.com/ to see if I could put it in simple terms. They say it's an 'emotional breakdown'.

Not just emotional but also mental breakdown or meltdown. A feeling of going CRAZY.

I describe a meltdown as a disintegration of one's sense of being [Self] in terms of time and space - in other words one's perception of a coherent reality or environment surrounding one and one's Self being intact in reference to that coherent external reality. I know that when I am starting to lose a sense of coherence in the setting in which I am operating and thus my sense of Self begins to disintegrate, I must leave the setting as soon as possible to find a less stimulating setting in which I have some control. As "I" [the sense of Self] begins to disintegrate, I perceive a sensation of falling, but cannot tell which way I am falling as all [external] reference points blur together. I see similar patterns of disintegration in my many low-functioning autistic clients when the stability of known and safe settings is destabilised around them and they slide through anxiety into panic and even terror.

Jim Crawford.

Jim Crawford,

You describe very well what an Aspie's experience of a meltdown is like.

Can anybody else here match or beat this one? I dare you!

I've had a few meltdowns. Mine happened when I was totally overwhelmed or felt a situation was out of control. I basically just feel like I am coming apart and I become very verbal and animated. I can't control myself anymore than I can control the situation that caused it. Sometimes it is almost a blind rage, the feelings just have to erupt.

there are different types of meltdowns.

i've always had migraines, all the overstimulation and anxiety and nervs and everything just become too much and i have a migraine attack. i see it as an internalized/physical meltdown.

In somewhat more simple terms, for me a meltdown is the noisy, invasive manifestation of overload of the senses or emotions. The quieter version is sometimes referred to as shutdown.

Getting so emotionally worked up that after you get all angry or panicked then you are drained of physical energy.

That is one of the best ways I can put it.

On what a meltdown might look like from the outside:

One of the main reasons I started to suspect that my hubby has AS (as opposed to *being*an*ASS*) was that during our worst quarrels his facial expressions and some of his words / sentences are so uncharacteristic for him as a person. We've been close friends for over twenty years and a couple for over fifteen, so I tend to believe that I know him, and some of his behavior under strong stress simply does not compute.

(I have an ADHD diagnosis, but I suspect that I have some aspie traits as well)

For example, if he raises his voice at me, and I then get really angry and accuse him of stupid things (I try not to, but it happens sometimes - I passionately hate being yelled at), he does not point out the absurdity of what I just said, he does not yell "unfair" or anything like that (which would be consistent with his real character), instead his eyes stare, his face becomes mask-like, he nods stiffly and makes "a-ha" noises, almost as if he was agreeing to whatever stupid I said. Afterwards he can remember nothing or very little of the quarrel beyond the point where he raised his voice, and seems confused, scared, suspicious and drained, in short very disoriented.

One of the worst things that can happen is that something at home changes while he is away on a business trip, and I want to tell him about it straight away when he comes home. This has almost never lead to a good result - at best he forgets completely that I've said anything about the issue, at worst he immediately has a meltdown about the change or soon about something else.

He does not like changes when he is under stress, and the harder the stress the fewer changes he can handle.

I sometimes wonder if his changing tasks (not employers, just tasks) a couple of years back was such a good idea. The work is very interesting and motivating, and he got a big raise, but the number of people he has to deal with daily increased clearly, he has to travel more often, and he got a much more serious / senior responsibility profile. I sometimes think he should have gotten a sensory deprivation chamber as a benefit, to compensate for the additional stress...

- Athena

I think there are varied degrees of meltdowns and shutdowns...depending on how well a person with AS has learned to manage their symptoms and how symptomatic they were to start with.

When I have a "meltdown" I often have violent outbursts of anger. I never understood how I could be so patient about some things, but other things would "overload" me and I'd just go to pieces. I thought I had a short fuse, but the not everything triggers it. Of course, I was wrapped up pretty tight as a child, so emotional outbursts that come close to classic "meltdown" was never allowed to happen...this often lead to shutdowns.

A "shutdown" for me is when I feel trapped between two or more options and my logical mind can't process the options. It's like being trapped in a GOTO loop (computer code reference) where my logical mind runs in circles unable to act and I sit there frozen. At the most, I get the presence of mind to try and move away or remove myself from the trigger, but I become largely unresponsive to others.