Um… Can You Stop Yelling? Neurodivergent Sensitivity Symptoms

Trauma changes the brain, quite literally.

Though, when you’re younger, you’re not aware of these effects or how they influence your daily life. So, when you become an adult, certain things may bother you more than they might have otherwise. These things may throw you off balance for the day … or even longer.

I’m a firm believer that many mental disorders could really just be traced back to trauma, even inter-generational trauma, but that’s a topic for another day.

How we came to be neurodivergent likely stems from multiple causes. Our experience of different ways of thinking/being should be validated and attended to.

Many things that neurotypical people take for granted can cause huge distress within the neurodivergent community. I’ll take some space now to elaborate on my own experiences. 

Exaggerated Startle Response

My beloved college roommate is one of my best friends. She delights in scaring me, still does. Most of the time, me jumping and others finding it comical doesn’t bother me. But this can happen at inappropriate times. Case in point, at the gym when I’m walking around the track and someone approaches me from behind, I may “jump” or stiffen noticeably if I didn’t hear them coming (which I normally do). This is exceedingly embarrassing, and it seems like an automatic physical response that I have little control over. Even when I’m grounded and in the best of moods, it can still happen.

At times, this startle response will activate a trauma response (fight or flight) that doesn’t go away quickly.

This may leave me feeling on edge for prolonged amounts of time to where I may find it hard to concentrate and need a cool down period, usually where I would need to be alone. This more extreme example thankfully only happens for me now when I am very stressed already, for the most part. 

Sensory Issues

If someone’s tone toward me changes or I perceive it to (I may misinterpret), I often hear them as though they are yelling at me. My ears are pretty sensitive, often having excruciating pain in airplanes if I don’t take the right medications. Anyway, at times when I am in a crowded space like a bar or restaurant and someone is trying to talk to me, I will perceive them as yelling, and will consequently get scared or even angry.

There is also this really hard to describe phenomenon that happens to me at times when I’m in a noisy space. There is a certain pitch or tone of voice that people will hit when trying to talk over other people and talk to me that sounds like… static from a tv, that’s the best way I can describe it. And I immediately get hot, get a headache, and get viscerally angry.

I know intellectually it makes no sense, these are usually my friends who are talking to me, but that doesn’t stop my body from reacting how it does. It’s rare, but it is taxing keep up the effort to look as if I’m having a good time. 

One Foot On The Gas, The Other On the Break

“Having a trauma response activated or experiencing extreme anxiety can make it hard to work. Being around people and the unknown that that brings can be absolutely exhausting.”

Some people may perceive you as whiney or lazy, but I keep having to remind myself that if they were in my mind and body and experienced what I experience on days when my trauma response is relentless … they may think it a miracle that I even got out of bed at all. On those days I’m afraid of everything and everyone. Simultaneously energized by anxiety and weighed down with crushing depression. I’m suffocating myself internally.

Usually sleeping can help to bring me out of it, but if you’ve ever experienced this phenomena, it’s the real deal. You want so much to work and function without issue. Some people won’t see that, and that’s ok. What matters is that you take care of yourself, stay with yourself through the episode, and ask for any help you need from people you trust.