Coping with Sensory Unfriendly Places

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I just found out today that I forgot another one of my son's doctor appointments. If it happens again, his doctor will close his case, which is fair. I have no complaints about this policy. I knew about it from the beginning and accepted it. My problem is that I keep forgetting. I note his appointment on the calendar, keep the appointment card where I can see it, set up reminders on my computer and the doctor's office calls me the day before to remind me of the appointments. It's not the only set of appointments I keep forgetting. I also routinely forget my psychiatrist appointments, despite every way I can devise to remind myself.

I have no problem remembering other appointments: my therapist, my doctor, my son's dentist, my son's ophthalmologist, my son's parent-teacher conferences. It's just the two that I keep forgetting: my son's doctor and my psychiatrist. So I figured there's something I'm avoiding with these two places. It's not the people. My son's doctor and my psychiatrist are friendly and give amazing care. The staff is friendly and helpful. But then I realized what I don't like about these two places. The buildings themselves are not friendly. My aversion to my psychiatrist's office started when they put in an intercom system and fluorescent lighting. My aversion to my son's doctor started when they changed locations to a new building that has fluorescent lighting and where the acoustics are way too good--any sound produced bounces around the room like a Ping-Pong ball. In short, both buildings are a sensory nightmare. It's difficult to focus and I have a hard time understanding what people are saying. It sounds distorted, like a radio stuck between stations.

In the past, I've coped with places that cause me pain and confusion by avoiding them. This has worked fine when it comes to choosing a grocery store, restaurant or church. But it will not work when it comes to my son's doctor and my psychiatrist. These are necessary things and I have to go. I could change providers, but I believe this would be detrimental in the long-term. (What's that saying my grandmother uses? "Like cutting off one's nose to spite one's face.") So this brings me to the crux of the matter: what other ways could I try to cope with these buildings?

i am sensitive to fluorescent lighting also, and my solution is to wear polarized sunglasses indoors. there is no law against such. as for the echoey reverberant ambience, i'm afraid that the only thing helpful would be to wear headphones with white/pink/brown noise playing on them [there are several websites which let you download such noises for play on your MP3 player or such]. this will take the edge off of the harsh building ambience you noted, but with open-air headphones will still let you hear what you need to hear. i wish you the best of luck, and do consider writing your appointments down on a large appointment calendar, it works for me.

Could you get an FM System and some noise-cancelling headphones? Theoretically, the echoing ambient noise would be blocked out (i.e. all the echoes and stuff) and you'd just hear the person talking to you.

I too have always been sensitive to bright artificial light. Especially florescent light. It makes me feel edgy and gives me a headache over time. Too much background noise can do the same.

So I wear shaded glasses in such environments. And I always have a mini iPod with ear buds. The iPod helps me the most in noisy public restrooms.

The shaded glasses I settled on are KD's biker shades. They look good on women too. But most importantly they sooth that florescent glare. Only $8 on eBay. They come in smoke, brown, tan, green, blue, purple etc.

I think they should be the Official Aspie Shades

I have to find something to focus on when I'm in a place like that. The one division I worked in at the Factory (before I got transferred to the part of the building with less lighting) had garish bright fluorescent lights, which about blinded you and that horrible noise they make, even the machines can't drown that out. In order to override this, I would focus on watching my machines and play around with random parts laying around. I really like fiddling with this little guy

The way it feels when I run my fingers along the sides draws in my mind to the immediate sensation and not the unpleasant sensory stimuli.

tinted and/or polarized sunglasses work a bit versus fluorescent lighting, and making sure you are at the peak of day means that there is less difference between the lamps and ambient lights from outside, i will assume that the doctor wants to open up the shades to let in more daylight, if you ask.

the intercom buzz (and that of the lighting) can be cancelled out by wearing regular (non-closing) earbuds with a grey noise soundfile on repeat ('radiostatic')


the above is what i always have within reach, just in case, and it works for most such situations. if i explain that it is a coping mechanism that doesn't significantly impact my percepstion, most officials dont object.

In the US there's a provision in the Americans With Disabilities Act that fines places $2000 for each violation. I may not be totally correct, but there was a local guy who would go around in a wheelchair, measure the distance from the floor to the bottom of the bathroom mirror and note whether there was a grab rail installed. If the mirror was placed too high or some other violation occurred he would blackmail the mostly small businesses. I would love to be able to inform a store manager that their lights, music, cramped aisles, long lines and customers talking loudly are assaults to my nervous system and to collect the appropriate punitive damages. Excessively idling trucks and buses with their back-up beepers fall into this category as well as violating the Clean Air Act.

Maybe if every eligible person here informed these places they could be in breach of federal law they might tone things down, so to speak

In England, since December 2006, there has been a legal duty on all public sector organisations to promote equality of opportunity for disabled people. This is called the Disability Equality Duty. It means that public sector organisations have to consider the impact of their service on disabled people and because of the Autism Act this includes us. This means that if the organisation cannot meet a person's needs because of the sensory issues they are effectively excluding the person from the service and should not be excluding people who cannot keep an appointment because of this. I do not know where you are from but if you write explaining the issue, perhaps the service will make accommodation for the issue by using another venue or finding a quiet room with suitable lighting. Many large organisations are not aware of this duty and do not comply with it, especially where the disability is invisible.