Noise Issues: "Did you hear anything I just said?"/Everything is too loud!

[allison7887]

Along the lines of concentration issues, I vacillate between possessing the ability to zone out everything in the environment (much to the chagrin of friends and family members attempting to facilitate conversation with me) and being utterly unable to block out any sound at all. I love being around people, but people are really noisy, and love to play bad music, horrific television programs and talk about themselves incessantly for hours on end--very loudly. All of these things (which I do myself on occasion, of course) can make me feel like my spine is attempting to burst up and out of my back "Alien" style and land smack dab in the middle of the flat screen on top of Snooki's (Jersey Shore, MTV) pompadour. If you have this sensory issue, how do you cope? And if this topic has been addressed before, can you do the work of researching similar posts and link to it here?

 

[Geordie]

I can't concentrate - but I'll think of the pleasant people around me.

 

[epath13]

My issue with noise is not as severe like in some people when sertain sounds cause physical pain but when I am in a contained environment with lots of disorganized sounds, moving objects and lights I feel like (depends on intensity of sounds and lights) as if they are all sort of mixing together of or sort of bouncing of me. If I have something significant to focus on I might be able to withdraw from the noise but if not I just have to deal with it. I just accept it, tell to myself that I recognize that I feel this way and it's ok, it's just a part of who I am, I just try not to get frustrated and go with a flow. If I need to move, shake my legs or something, or look around from object to object, I'll just do it, it might look a little weird but it's fine, it's not too extreme. What helps me a lot - holding something in my hands. I noticed it once, I was in a busy coffee shop with a few women. I was holding and turning a coffee cup in my hands all that time it helped me a lot with concentration on the conversation. I experimented a little a put a cup down for a minute and right away my ability to focus reduced I could barely grasp what they were saying. I have no clue why it worked but it did

 

[NeverEnder]

I have various noise issues at times. I do have the ability to zone-out, often, but when the bad noises strike I cannot avoid my nerves getting quickly frayed.

I cannot bear the sounds of people/pets chewing food, car horns, loud talking/yelling, or certain types of music.

I am a very talkative person, actually, but I am rather quiet in my tone and expression, usually. I do not like the dynamics of large, group conversation where one has to compete to speak. I usually in that case just sit there, quiet.

 

[CJinherPJs]

I've been known to just zone out at times, sometimes to the point of blanking people completely because I was oblivious to the fact that they were talking to me. Other times though, when there's too much going on all at once, I find the noise pretty much impossible to ignore. It's worse when I'm trying to concentrate or do something because I tend to focus on what's going on around me instead of what I'm doing. Also, I don't like it when two or more people try to talk to me at the same time; I find myself having to focus on one person at a time and I'm always conscious of the other person thinking I'm ignoring them.