Easily startled

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Do you have an exaggerated startle response?

Has being startled ever caused you to do something you otherwise would not have done?

Being easily startled is one of my biggest issues which affects my life. I become avoidant of sudden loud noises that I know may occur. The only way to stop myself being startled is to put my hands over my ears if I know the noise is going to occur, but I don't like looking different either, so I'm caught in that catch-22.

When I was a kid I was terrified of dogs because of their barking, and my fear always drew them to me even more, which heightened my fear to the point where I would scream if a dog came near me. Thankfully I've grown out of this by learning the body language of dogs and knowing exactly when and why they're going to bark.
But there are other sudden loud noises that I still go out of my way to avoid. Like at work when people blast the horn on the buses when they are reversing. It doesn't bother me if it's outside and I'm not standing too near, but if I'm inside the garage when a bus is reversing out I have to go outside or get into another bus to avoid being startled by the horn blasting, which is such a horrible sharp sound that physically hits me.
I also get frightened of sudden hissing noises. Like at work near the door to one of the garages a tank thing at the back makes a sudden loud (and I mean LOUD) hissing sound every 15-20 minutes, so whenever I go towards that door I involuntarily brace myself for it, which will only make me jump even worse but I can't consciously take my focus away from it. I don't want to walk along there covering my ears because I might look autistic and I don't want others to guess that I'm on the spectrum. Covering one's ears at a sound that might occur is one giveaway of autism.

Sometimes when a sudden loud noise has occurred I've been started so severely that my brain literally switched off for about half a second or less, meaning I temporarily lost my vision (only for like less than half a second, very quick). It's like my nerves jerk so bad that my brain kind of jerks as well and I very temporarily for half a second lose some of my senses. It's a horrible feeling. I think my exaggerated startle reaction to sudden loud noises will probably be the death of me when I'm older.

Trouble is, society relies on sudden loud noises all the time. I just wish these noises were programmed to start off quietly for the first two seconds so that it feels less frightening. Yes I know that every second counts when it comes to fires and other danger but I'm sure it can still work.

Sudden loud noises are offensive and upsetting to people with autism, ADHD, some other neurological disorders, elderly people, small children, people with pacemakers, and animals.

I got bullied a lot for this in elementary school. In particular people flicking their fingers towards my eyes until I either couldn't be startled any further or was so worked up that a physical response was guaranteed.

I’m easily startled, but I think it’s primarily PTSD related.

There's a guy at work who likes to startle me because he thinks it's funny. "You're too easy to scare!" then stop? "but it's too funny!".

He has eased off a little recently.

I especially hate it when someone does that mock-punch and I flinch then they get offended. 'why did you flinch? You know I wouldn't actually hurt you, right?' then don't joke about punching me.

I hate when people sneak up on me like that because I can't relax properly for ages afterwards.

When I was a teenager this horrible girl would come up behind me, clap her hands near my ear and yell "bang!" and if all her friends were with her she'd add "I bet that made you s**t your pants!" and they'd all laugh at me. It never made me jump though. It was just humiliating for me more than anything else. I hate bullies.

I have an exaggerated startle response when I am in a world of my own 'away with the fairies' and get brought back to reality by someone talking to me who I hadn't realised was there.

I suppose I wouldn't normally flap my arms if someone walked into a room I was in and asked if I wanted a drink.

I'm somewhat ashamed to admit that if she had done that to me, it would have been one and done after I beat the ever living snot out of her. Eventually, I got to the point where I realized that nothing was going to be done to the bullies and started just fighting back. I legitimately forget how many fights I was in, but not having much of a resistance to pain and nothing in particular to live for is really hard to defend against.

I like to think that these people eventually got their heads straight and are living lives that are more kind, but who knows. I just know that over time I've used those experiences to try and live a life of kindness and good deeds, even if I have occasionally failed to live up to my expectations. It's really not how good the things you do are that make somebody a good person, it's how much better they are than the bad things they could choose to do that matters in that regard.

Yesterday I walked into a vet's waiting room and there was a small dog that I didn't see. It was extremely silent in there even though there were a few people and animals, and it was echoey. As I was standing at the reception desk the small dog let out a high-pitched yap that was so unexpected that I literally jumped out of my skin and involuntarily yelled "Jesus!" (yes, thank God it wasn't a rude word, but still). And then I felt everyone in the room staring at me because I was so startled, and having scopophobia and social anxiety it wasn't a pleasant situation to be in.

This is what happens when you have an unintended exaggerated response to sudden loud noises. It can be embarrassing.

Relatable. That person who likes to laugh 'haha, made you s**t your pants' won't find it so funny when you remind them it's only been a month since you left them twitching in a puddle of their own piss.

I'm sometimes easily started & I think PTSD could sometimes be a factor. I used to be started by loud noises but I worked in noisy environments & I kinda learned to tune loud noises out. The main way I'm started these days is if I'm at my computer with my headphones on & my girlfriend comes in the room. I think the reason that bothers me is because when I lived with my parents I spent quite alot of time at my computer with headphones on & I usually could not hear my parents knocking on my bedroom door. A lot of times when my parents would come in my room I had adult things up on the screen I didn't want my parents to see & I had to had to quickly close/minimize things. That response is a habit I still often have even if I'm just playing old video-games on here, when Cass comes in I'll quickly minimize the windows. A lot of women would probably find that very suspicious but luckily me cheating isn't one of the things Cass is insecure about.