sudden cases of sensory overload

[Dr. Smart]

I'm 24 years old and most of the time i don't have much trouble with noise except for breaking glass sirens power tools and loud engines etc, recently though a couple of times i was at work and experienced what i assume is sensory overload.
The first time i was in a backroom with a coworker and his walkie was turned up, someone started talking on the walkie and it was very staticy and loud which isn't out of the ordinary, a friend of mine poked his head into the room and jokingly used a high pitched voice to say something i couldn't make out, this also isn't uncommon, but between the noise and me trying to make out what he was saying I suddenly felt... idk like i do when someone touches me i guess, i had to grasp my ears and felt horrible and frustrated for that moment, the whole thing lasted only a few seconds but it was enough to make me uncomfortable and on edge...

a few days later i was in the lounge on break listening to a conversation between some coworkers, there was another conversation down the table and it was a little noisy but i normally drown that kind of thing out, suddenly someone started pulling a noisy cart (again a normal noise at my job) through the hall and between the cart and all the people talking i suddenly once again felt frustrated and had to grab at my ears...

This isn't common for me, i am sensitive to some noises, but i usually don't have issues like these during the day like that and i'm not sure if this was really sensory overload or if i was just somehow on edge or something on those days or something but it seems weird to me that i would suddenly suffer a symptom i usually don't have, is that common with autism? to have a symptom just show up that you haven't had to deal with too much? or am i just overthinking

 

[tfwo]

This isn't common for me, i am sensitive to some noises, but i usually don't have issues like these during the day like that and i'm not sure if this was really sensory overload or if i was just somehow on edge or something on those days or something but it seems weird to me that i would suddenly suffer a symptom i usually don't have, is that common with autism? to have a symptom just show up that you haven't had to deal with too much? or am i just overthinking

I'm not sure if or how this ties in with your situation, but I had what I called a breakdown years ago. I posted a thread about it here... https://www.aspiescentral.com/threa...shattered-was-it-asd-or-something-else.15019/

At the time it I didn't suspect that I was on the spectrum, and had no idea what was happening to me, or why. I had never experienced anything like it before, but I now realized that this was because I had developed coping skills that were embedded in my living routines. It was when my living routines were changed that I had to develop different means an patterns of coping. What I would look at closely is what has changed in your living/working/coping routines and strategies, over the past several days, weeks, or months. I believe that stress from these changes can have a cumulative effect if not compensated for, and can sneak up on you if you don't pay attention to the warning signs.

 

[Progster]

Yes, I think that is some kind of sensory overload. That happens quite a lot to me, particularly with sounds and in circumstances similar to those you describe. It can happen with visual stimulation too, when there's TV in the room and someone starts to talk to me or I'm in the car and someone asks me to do something. I can't do stuff in the car at all.

 

[garnetflower13]

This happens to me when my upstairs neighbors keep walking around in the room over my head, causing the floorboards to squeak and squawk. If it continues for any length of time I feel like melting down badly. Last night they came home really late; like two am and proceeded to walk around in their bedroom for nearly two hours. I put in earplugs, but could still hear the floor boards every time they passed over where my bed was. As a result, today I am shaky and weak from lack of sleep and I sincerely hate them. It's the repetitiveness of annoying sounds that really get to me, because I keep getting snapped into a state of alertness, over and over.