The stress you are under in itself may be the issue of greatest concern. It sounds like you could be headed toward human exhaustion. Just the fact that you have Autism and work in a call center is stress enough, but with all the other factors, it sounds like you are overwhelmed, and most of the source of your stress is not something you can currently control.
You sound like you are in constant fight or flight mode; where your adrenaline is stuck in the on position. I experienced all the symptoms you mentioned, startled by the chirps of birds, not being able to stay asleep, and reactive high blood pressure, but it was only the start of a two year process leading to human exhaustion; not the kind one easily recovers from.
Hans selyes theory of General Adaptation explains the process well, I think. Combat fatigue, Burnout, Adrenal Fatigue, Fibromyalgia, auto immune disease, and many other stress related conditions may be related to it. You may already be aware of it, hope you don't mind if I share it:
Quote:
Going through a series of steps, your body consistently works to regain stability. With the general adaptation syndrome, a human’s adaptive response to stress has three distinct phases:
ALARM STAGE -
Your first reaction to stress recognizes there’s a danger and prepares to deal with the threat, a.k.a. the fight or flight response. Activation of the HPA axis, the nervous system (SNS) and the adrenal glands take place.
During this phase the main stress hormones cortisol, adrenaline, and noradrenaline, is released to provide instant energy.
If this energy is repeatedly not used by physical activity, it can become harmful.
Too much adrenaline results in a surge of blood pressure that can damage blood vessels of the heart and brain – a risk factor in heart attack and stroke.
The excess production of the cortisol hormone can cause damage to cells and muscle tissues. Stress related disorders and disease from cortisol include cardiovascular conditions, stroke, gastric ulcers, and high blood sugar levels.
At this stage everything is working as it should – you have a stressful event, your body alarms you with a sudden jolt of hormonal changes, and you are now immediately equipped with enough energy to handle it.
RESISTANCE STAGE -
The body shifts into this second phase with the source of stress being possibly resolved. Homeostasis begins restoring balance and a period of recovery for repair and renewal takes place.
Stress hormone levels may return to normal but you may have reduced defenses and adaptive energy left.
If a stressful condition persists, your body adapts by a continued effort in resistance and remains in a state of arousal.
Problems begin to manifest when you find yourself repeating this process too often with little or no recovery. Ultimately this moves you into the final stage.
EXHAUSTION STAGE -
At this phase, the stress has continued for some time. Your body’s ability to resist is lost because its adaptation energy supply is gone. Often referred to as overload, burnout, adrenal fatigue, maladaptation or dysfunction – Here is where stress levels go up and stay up!
The adaptation process is over and not surprisingly; this stage of the general adaptation syndrome is the most hazardous to your health.
Chronic stress can damage nerve cells in tissues and organs. Particularly vulnerable is the hippocampus section of the brain. Thinking and memory are likely to become impaired, with tendency toward anxiety and depression.
There can also be adverse function of the autonomic nervous system that contributes to high blood pressure, heart disease, rheumatoid arthritis, and other stress related illness.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
http://www.essenceofstressrelief.com/general-adaptation-syndrome.html
This happens most when people are in a stressful situation they can't escape. Human exhaustion often leads to clinical depression; it may be part of the reason,worldwide, why depression is the greatest cause of disability in the world at this point in time.
Midlife exhaustion (burnout, and all the other names for it) among autistic people is a growing problem, because life as we know can be more challenging at times for an autistic person. And stress has a cumulative effect over a lifetime.
I hope this does not disturb you and cause you additional stress, but I wish someone had provided me this information before I hit the exhaustion stage, and experienced autonomic dysfunction. In this condition blood pressure and heart rate get out of sync, and the blood does not flow like it should to the brain under certain physical and environmental conditions.
Some of the first symptoms are cold extremities as the body shunts blood continously to internal organs; a person can experience a chilled filling from a breeze on a Summer day; then the blood vessels no longer constrict as they should and the blood pools in the legs, no longer reaching the brain as it should, potentially causing pre/syncope and/or fainting.
If I had known more about the stages of general adaptation, I might have taken a leave of abscence sooner from work to rest, recover, regroup and seek some kind of answer to protect my health.
Only a couple of months before I reached the exhaustion stage I was in the top ten percent of the military aerobic fitness scale. Two months later after exhaustion I couldn't walk ten feet without getting light headed from the autonomic dysfunction. I was in the fight or flight mode you describe for a continuous period of 2 years.
After leaving work I was able to recover enough to ride a bicycle ten miles, three times a week, but walking long distances still make me dizzy, because there is more work for my heart to bring blood to my brain.
Perhaps, the worst thing is my once almost photographic memory is only a shadow of what it was.
I think the Psychologist suggestion to request an accommodation at work is a good idea. The thought of leaving work was more stressful for me than staying, but after one reaches the end stage of exhaustion, it is no longer a choice.
Good luck to you, I hope you recover from the stress, and the hair loss reverses itself, if the cause is stress and/or the other losses you have experienced.
28 Jun 2011, 6:39 pm
