Exaggerated Startle Response

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Yeah. This happens to me too. I make an anxious face and my body jerks a little. My family thinks I'm being dramatic or overreacting when the reality is that I can't really control how I feel. It happens all of a sudden.

Yes

Heart murmur

20 / 20 hearing

Social anxiety Disorder

Depression

I'm a jumpy person...maybe not "exaggeratedly" so, but I tend to twitch and flinch a lot.

Every once in a while. But usually not. Often too wrapped up in my thoughts to notice if an airplane crashed into the house.

This thread is several years old. As several noted back then, the exaggerated startle response is a hallmark of PTSD.

Definitely, it's one hallmark of PTSD. You can only imagine how jumpy I was when I suffered a stroke subsequent to C-PTSD.
Thank goodness, the stroke jumpiness ended after six months or so. Now I'm just my usual level of ... startled.

It depends. I remember when I was a kid and had a bunny that used to make lots of random jumps and for some reason that always startled me and actually made me scared (who gets scared of bunnies???).

A while ago when my friend and I were second hand shopping, we met our former art teacher who was on her way to the same store as us. My friend had to lock her car or something, so I followed her and the teacher went in before us. Then when we were in the store and I was busy looking at the clothes, suddenly I see the teacher standing beside me and it really startled me so I said "oh f**k that scared me" I should probably have said "hi" or something... Oh well.

But then other times when other people usually get visibly startled (like when watching a scary movie or someone comes up to intentionally scare them), I'm a walking stone-face. I remember in high school when I was walking in the hallway with some classmates and other classmates sometimes wanted to scare us for fun and jumped out in front of us. The others usually screamed and jumped, but my reaction was pretty much -> "...oh?"
It could even take a second for me to realise what happened, so my (mostly lack of) reaction was a bit delayed lol. Has this ever happened to anyone else?

It’s very interesting to see this thread again, especially the remarks about PTSD. I was diagnosed last year with PTSD stemming from an event that occurred in my early childhood. I suppose my exaggerated startle response could be attributed to that.

Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! that's why! lol I have complex PTSD but never realised that's the potential cause of why I'm so jumpy. Makes so much sense. I'm glad this thread was revived so I could learn that.

I'm pretty sure I don't have PTSD, but I have a stronger-than-average startle response, especially when my concentration is broken. I think the cause is just an autism-related difficulty in shifting my attention from one thing to another.

every since i could remember, i've had an exaggerated startle response- i attended a military funeral one time, and i was conspicuously jumpy every time the rifle salute fired, nobody else moved at all.

I have an exaggerated startle response, as well.
I read that this is indicative of CPTSD but I don't know about that...maybe it could be residual from a time where I had that.
I don't think it automatically means you have definitely CPTSD. Maybe it's just a residue from when you might have had it. Otherwise,....an exaggerated startle response is a sign of constant stress in the body.

For me, it all has to do with whether it's unexpected. I actually like certain loud noises, IF I'm expecting them. But anything sudden (as you said), be it noise, touch, etc... can elicit a violent response. I won't mean to, but it won't matter.