It can feel uncomfortable or even scary, but it's a natural reaction to an overactive brain. Sensory overload is an experience shared by people with PTSD and all different sorts of trauma. It can sound silly to people who don't understand, but what's important is if it works for you. ![]() If you're at work, sit in a bathroom stall and cover your eyes and ears for a couple of minutes. If you're at a social event or party and are feeling overwhelmed, step outside for a few moments. Anything from a bathroom stall to a corner of the room can be a quick respite from the noise and activity of your surrounding environment. ![]() The biggest thing that helps me when I'm experiencing sensory overload is finding a quiet place to be alone. It's not always easy to do this, but you can get creative when you need some alone time. By being prepared for it, I've made navigating my day-to-day life a little easier. Over time, I've come to accept that sensory overload due to PTSD is a part of my life, and I know the times and places when it is likely to happen. The best way to deal with sensory overload is to be prepared for it. It's an experience shared by many types of people, and there are tools and resources that can help reduce the anxiety it causes. The good news about sensory overload in PTSD is that there are a number of ways to deal with it. How to Cope with Sensory Overload in PTSD It's very uncomfortable, and it makes dealing with public settings much more difficult. Conversations around me become louder and louder until I feel like I need to cover my ears to make it stop. The lights start to seem too bright the noises, too loud. When sensory overload hits, it feels like someone has turned up the volume in my life. This happens in crowds more often than not, where there are so many sights, sounds, and smells that I can't process them all. Sensory overload tends to happen when my brain is struggling to take in everything I'm shoving at it. For people with PTSD, every situation demands that high alert, whether or not it is actually needed.īeing on guard 24/7 is exhausting. Because I look and listen for danger all the time, I force my brain to take in massive amounts of input every day. There are times when it is normal and appropriate to be on high alert, such as when you're walking to your car alone late at night. People with PTSD are always searching for signs of danger. It's more than just being jumpy or easily startled. One of the main symptoms of PTSD is hypervigilance, or constantly being on guard. What PTSD-Related Sensory Overload Feels Like Much like those with autism or ADHD, people suffering from PTSD can experience sensory processing issues as they navigate their day-to-day lives. With so much going on inside the minds of people with PTSD, it's natural for them to feel overstimulated by the outside world. The thoughts, worries, and instincts circling through your head can get so loud at times that it makes you want to cover your ears. I often describe PTSD as a brain at war with itself, fighting and pulling different parts of your mind in all directions. I can only think of one where there was no smell involved.Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) results in sensory overload and is exhausting. It took me until I was about 45 to realize that I'm hypersensitive to smells, and that pretty much every meltdown I've had, had a very strong smell as part of it. They are just examples, illustrating my point, which is that if you're just focusing on sounds, you may actually be missing what's triggering his overload. Or, maybe someone yells before barging in his room, and he's getting overload with people being in his room.īoth of those examples probably aren't it. Maybe someone yawned on him who had really, really bad breath, and maybe it's actually smell that's triggering his overload, and he's somehow linked sound with bad smells. That explains a lot of us autistic folks' "weird" behavior, like always wanting to wear the same clothes.because we know we don't get overloaded in those specific clothes.Īlso, you seem to think that he's sensitive to sound, because he's reacting to sound.BUT, that's not necessarily the case. To answer your never goes away, but he'll learn methods to deal with it better when it happens, and he'll develop various coping strategies to help him avoid situations that cause overload. So I'd recommend helping him feel comfortable, and helping him as much as possible stay out of overstimulation, until he recovers. ![]() The actual event, or series of events could have been February or March. I mention that, not to answer your question (yet), but to say that he probably hasn't recovered yet from whatever happened in April.which was just a couple months ago. It hadn't been that bad since I was a kid. I'm 50, and it took me over a year to recover from sensory overload that I had about three years ago.
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