What a meltdown feels like.
This is a link to a perspective on meltdowns. I'm... uncertain as to whether I've ever had a full scale meltdown, but I suspect the answer is yes and I simply didn't identify it as a meltdown.
I can kind of identify with the first sentence of the article: "it's never just a sandwich." Big things, like someone dying or my car needing major repairs (thus putting a huge strain on my finances) get me down, like anyone else. But they don't usually destroy me.
The best way to destroy me? Heap a zillion little terrible things on my mind. Start with burning breakfast, or having a hole in my favorite shirt, or tripping on the stairs. Add in my car being almost out of gas, or a new squeaking sound while driving, or someone lighting off fireworks at night. Add in my tablet running out of batteries because the charger wasn't plugged in. Or my internet is broken because the provider is fixing phone lines. Or the government is doing yet another stupid thing that probably won't go anywhere but the consequences are really distressing if it did.
Get about 20 of these individually little, mostly inconsequential awful things, and that's what really ruins my day and my sanity. They all heap up, the straws on the proverbial camel's back, and weigh me down until I stop being able to move.
The article goes into discussions of various coping/meltdown behaviors kids (and adults, really) may manifest. Weighted blankets, or washclothes over the hands if there's a biting behavior. I'll have to defer to someone more knowledgeable than myself about the usefulness of the suggested actions, because I've never had anyone to do those things for me. Mostly, if I was utterly miserable/out of control, I was completely alone. I will cautiously say that it doesn't sound like most of these would hurt, though. And the writer is a fellow person on the spectrum, so it's probable that these are, in fact, good tactics.
This is a link to a perspective on meltdowns. I'm... uncertain as to whether I've ever had a full scale meltdown, but I suspect the answer is yes and I simply didn't identify it as a meltdown.
I can kind of identify with the first sentence of the article: "it's never just a sandwich." Big things, like someone dying or my car needing major repairs (thus putting a huge strain on my finances) get me down, like anyone else. But they don't usually destroy me.
The best way to destroy me? Heap a zillion little terrible things on my mind. Start with burning breakfast, or having a hole in my favorite shirt, or tripping on the stairs. Add in my car being almost out of gas, or a new squeaking sound while driving, or someone lighting off fireworks at night. Add in my tablet running out of batteries because the charger wasn't plugged in. Or my internet is broken because the provider is fixing phone lines. Or the government is doing yet another stupid thing that probably won't go anywhere but the consequences are really distressing if it did.
Get about 20 of these individually little, mostly inconsequential awful things, and that's what really ruins my day and my sanity. They all heap up, the straws on the proverbial camel's back, and weigh me down until I stop being able to move.
The article goes into discussions of various coping/meltdown behaviors kids (and adults, really) may manifest. Weighted blankets, or washclothes over the hands if there's a biting behavior. I'll have to defer to someone more knowledgeable than myself about the usefulness of the suggested actions, because I've never had anyone to do those things for me. Mostly, if I was utterly miserable/out of control, I was completely alone. I will cautiously say that it doesn't sound like most of these would hurt, though. And the writer is a fellow person on the spectrum, so it's probable that these are, in fact, good tactics.
I feel the same, death by a thousand cuts. Thankfully I haven't had a melt down at volunteering but have come close a few times. I am Mt. Saint Helens, perfectly fine keeping everything in, and then kaboom! I suspect if I had a meltdown at volunteering I'd get dismissed and then I'd have to tell people I knew that I got fired from volunteering.
ReplyDeleteI did head butt when I was 2 or 3 (banging my head against the solid floor) but my parents never saw it as a symptom of me being on the spectrum. They liked to attribute anything odd about me to the visual impairment.