Sensory Overload Question

Post Reply New Topic

Hi all! I am know that sensory overload is a big part of the autistic spectrum. I was wondering if i could get some feed back on how it happens for everyone else. I'll list the questions so they are easier to read. Basicly i just want to get a better understanding of me and see if it acts the same way as everyone elses.

When and how does it happen?

How do you feel and at what point?

How long does it take you to recover till your functional again?

Are there any tricks that help you recover faster?

What is the begaining, middle and end like for you?

I've been kinda feeling alone in this, and i have a hard time describing this to my family, friends, and girlfriend. Thanks in advance for sharing

For me, I get sensory overload from combinations of social interaction (especially with strangers), sound, light, smell and movement (in that order). The worst combination would be something like a rock concert just after it rained, when everyone's body odour is strong. The senses are made stronger when they are related to humans - I have no problem with the same sensory input from wild animals, or from machines. I suppose that there is a level of subconscious fear of social conflict, which you don't get from animals or machines.

I feel stressed, anxious, maybe irritable or angry, nauseous, then detached from reality. Sometimes I can only see what is directly in front of me and have trouble understanding sounds. Afterwards I can feel physically painful, like having been run over.

Now (having worked on it), I get over sensory overload within an hour, or a few hours. I also avoid uncomfortably stimulating places much more now that I understand the triggers. It is notable that the feelings are almost identical to the extremely pleasurable experience of music that I like, or a perfect meal, or sex, but with danger instead of safety. For a really bad episode, I can be emotionally flat and unresponsive for days, but that is rare.

Preparation is important for recovery. Anxiety management techniques like breathing exercises, yoga, mindfulness, progressive muscular relaxation and proper (aerobic / cardiovascular) exercise all help to control the physiological responses to stress and anxiety. The physiological responses feed the emotions and the mental images of anxiety, in a vicious cycle. Controlling breathing etc tames anxiety.

Drugs like can help with anxiety, especially in small doses or with infrequent use. Regular anti-anxiety medication will just lead back to the same (or worse) stress levels once the body is habituated to the drug.

I was wondering if i could get some more feedback on this question. Pretty please? with sugar, sprinkles (not bright colored ones mind you) and a monochrome cherry on top?

[quote=ShadeX]I've been kinda feeling alone in this, and i have a hard time describing this to my family, friends, and girlfriend. Thanks in advance for sharing[/quote]

Before I say anything else, are you asking us these questions out of curiosity and was this bit above just thrown in there, or are you planning on using some of our responses to aid you in describing what it is for you?

A bit of both. Curiousity on what others go through, think and feel, and i'm also wanting to seperate what part is me and what part is common with other people with aspies. I'm also trying to learn first hand, because alot of the research i've read and doctors i've talked to where very vague and not helpfull at all.

When I am walking down a busy street is the only time when i get it.

I've never have meltdowns ONLY for sensory reasons. If someone is bugging me, surrounding noises make it worse, though. Otherwise when overloaded I automatically zone out or become dizzy.

I'm confused. isnt someone bothering you part of overstimulation?

Yes, but it takes an emotional part so it's not purely sensory.

i can respect that do you find you get aggressive or extremley impaitient,

Also I found this thread asI wanted to ask if anyone gets a siilar problem to me, when I get a physical contact I experience mixed messages, for example someties when I am touched on my arm or shoulder and I havent been able to expect it like someone from my side or behind, I can experience a taste or change in audible sensory levels.

taste like metallic (iron) or if I am eating something like beef it makes it taste like celery (that was my last vivid event )

Yea come to think of it, some of my worst meltdowns are when they are fueled by emotion....IE pissed of girlfriend, mad parent, upset friend....

Hi,

I get an overload, when I had a too long stress periode. It is like NTs gets a burnout depression, but I get it in a lot shorter time periode. Maybe shorter... I cannot compare it realy. I lost my last job, got a sponsored education to learn and do examen Microsoft MCTS Certifications for reaching the MCITP, beginning 07/2010, ending 02/2011. because I got my overload in the middle of this professional education training, in August 2010, I got a lot of migrane attacks and was not able to reach the 76% results in order to pass the upcoming exams at that time.

I went home, sit on the couch and it took just some minutes to fall asleep! I tried to learn and practise for the next examen as well as for the one I did not pass, but I did not have the needed energy for it, so failed the next exam as well.

I made some deep pause /brakes, tried to get my brain off all of these failed examen, distracted me as well as slept much more, was hardly able to interact with my wife or other people. I got migrane attacks about 2 to 4 times a week! Normaly I get them only about 2 times a month, mainly by strong weather changes.

I got perscription by my doctor buying triptane drugs against migrane cheaper (in fact getting these pills without having to pay a dime for it!) and I had to find some solution to get me charged and my brain off the problems around me.

How did it feel? Like awaiking in the morning and having a fog between me and the outside world! Being sleepy all day, lacking energy for even small things to do. Yelling at my wife too strong for tiny misstakes or just when she did not do what I was expecting her to do... I had very short nervs at that time. I was not able to act NT like anymore.

Somehow I was able to overcome that. I got into the classroom training again, learning at home, the next part was an easier one and I had the energie again. So I passed and that gave me the energy to carry on.

The last two month of the training was for getting to the exam and through it for CCNA, it was rather optional for me. Nice to do, nice to pass, but no must have for me. I knew I would probably not have the needet energy anymore. So it came that I was reaching my 78%, but to pass it, I would have to reach 86%! !! ! No way I would get there! Just no energy left at all!
I know, if I would have more energy and would get into the learning and practise again, I would have a chance to pass that exam. Well, maybe later in my life...

Ok, since February 2011, I am at home, not being able to do much. Simple things are very diffecult to do. The housework needed to do and finish every day / every week. In May the Fokoshima exident happend, it got me totaly off my feed for a full month and seemed to be a real deep depression! I am 35 and can remember 1986 Chernobyl. I was a kid still, but it did something to me! I did not know how strong a impact it had to me, 'till the Japan radioactive powerplant reactor failures happend! Sure it is a looong way away to me, grate distance between Japan and Germany. But that realy hit me!

After that I had all day and all weeks for a full month, even some time longer to get me into controle again! Could not sleep, was writing a real lot in internet communities about it, did research all over the internet about powerplant reactor technics and so on. I got obsessed by it in order to stomache it.

I could not talk to others like NTs do, I was not able to act like NTs and my wife was on the border driving me to the hospital and pushed me to get a psychiatrist appointment. Well, here in Germany, one has to wait about 6 month for the next appointment date! So my turn will be in October this year!

All the time I tried to get back to training and learning for my MCITP by selfstudy. But I realy miss the every day routine to drive to the training facility and being there for hours at a server. At home, I cannot get me to do the exam questions like back in the facility last year, cannot get me to read the book for prepair me to the next exam I have to retake...

But I got some energy back to be able to apply for a new job. I did send many applications and had 6 personal interviews in two weeks. But still no one seems to need me.

Sometimes I think I have a depression, but often I lack all the signs of it, just having a few. So I think I enjoy a sort of bunrout an overload from all this stress.


Cu, SiCwan

Hi ShadeX

Sensory overload is, for me, usually set off by chaotic sensory input: sudden, random, discordant.

For example, the sound of a crowd of people talking in an echoing hall, I find stressful.
If I were to describe what happens, I would say that my heart rate climbs, I begin to fidget, and appear tense and irritable to other people. I often sweat, and my conversation becomes erratic. It is not the people who I find stressful, but the chaos. If the people were singing (in tune, of course), the overload would not occur.
Overload also results in other sensory inputs becoming distorted (eg. heat, light, smells) such that some are emphasised and others diminished. This adds to the overload.

If I must remain in that environment, I am able to repress my stress response, but for a time afterward I continue to be shut off. It is as if I lack filters on my input channels: either I am full-on or full-off.

Sensory overload is somewhat like a bad LSD trip, where the physiological responses are involuntary and confusing. Often, time is what is required to "come down": the overload/drug must be processed by the body.


I think that Sensory issues are closely linked to emotional regulation issues in ASD, and more research on this subject would be useful. A lot of information is available about reading facial expressions, and how ASD impairs the processing of visual cues, which in turn impairs the understanding and response of the ASD individual to the emotional states of others. While this is a reasonable explanation, it focusses heavily on interaction with others, and little on interaction with self. "Feelings" are physical rather than visual, and it is the physical cues in our own bodies that we need to understand.

The coincidence of sensory and emotional regulation issues in ASD, is no coincidence at all.

I think this, because emotional "feelings" are physically experienced, just as sensory "feelings" are. A person learns to recognise, communicate and regulate their emotional state by identifying how they feel (in their body). For example, when a person feels angry, they feel things in their body that are associated with anger. When they feel happy, they experience different bodily sensations. I'm not sure what these sensations are! And it is only at the age of 28 that I read about how people feel their emotions in this way, and that is how they know what they are feeling.

The problem for me, is that my "sensory feelings" are so variable, and so integral to my experience. My "emotional feelings" are difficult to differentiate. When I look at striped curtains, for example, I experience actual physical sensations in my body. These are good sensations. Is that the same as feeling happy? How can I tell if I am emotionally "happy", when I experience the same sensations, as a result of looking at the striped curtains?