Difference between a meltdown and sensory overload???

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i guess i figured out early on that if i started feeling badly because of too much going on around me, i would feel better walking out of the situation. it's been a great coping strategy for the most part.

so i've always suffered from sensory overload concerning the television. if i am sitting and watching a show(not for very long though because the commercials make me nuts) or a dvd(no commercials, so i can watch two movies) it really isn't too bad. but if i am not watching and trying to do something else i start getting overload. there is nowhere i can go in the house to get away from teh whine it produces either.

the other night i went to a place where there was live music. it was a family event. so some folks brought their little kids. i started getting overloaded i guess because the kids were dancing like maniacs not with the music like adults do. i had to leave. i didn't really understand why i had to leave, i just did. sucks because the band rocked and was better live than on their cds.

Sensory overload to me is being in class and called upon and forced to give a response while staring at a bright light and attempting to look the teacher in the eye. What results is a complete shutdown and losing all sense of thought and slipping into a state of semi-consciousness. When function is regained you become unaware of what had happened.

Meltdown to me is becoming totally frustrated or feeling like you have no control, which results in getting upset, whining, crying, ect.

The only meltdown I ever used to get was violent. It's sorted now though

That's basicly how I handle it and the few times the family come to the house they know I might just get up and leave. They also understand it isn't that I wouldn't like to go to a function, I just can't take all the mayhem. That's one side of the family, the other side doesn't understand at all. That's their problem, not mine. It isn't healthy for me to shoulder all the guilt.

With tv ads, I've learned to play a game. I try to figure out how they are selling a product. Are they telling me I'm not cool. Are they telling me I'm not good looking enough. Are they telling me I'm hungry. Are they telling me I have a sickness that I need to worry about. Then I take it to, how are they selling me the message, a lot of it is based on fear. Is the message for males or females or both. Males tend to be faster camera work, less color. There isn't that much on tv that interests me anyways. I like the ads better then the shows most times. You can do the same thing with music videos.

postpaleo

I'm good at the whining. lol.

There's a period in the day, a hour before I go home from work, when the overload starts, and about half an hour from work, the meltdown starts. It's gradual and really annoying and in some cases painful

for a period of a few months, i was seated in a metal walled cubical just down a hallway from two large printers. the hallway is lined completely with metal faced filing cabinets.
i found that i would just start curling up in a fetal position in my chair. and the noise was worse in my cubical than it was outside it.
i had mentioned the noise issues to the people who decided to put me there but they were pretty busy and didn't get back to me.
then my fiance dumped me, and i went in to work the following monday and told my boss that i was now on the verge of jumping off the 18 story building if something didn't get better somewhere really quickly.

i guess that is as close to a meltdown as i have ever gotten.