For people with Asperger Syndrome (AS), this stress can be particularly difficult to manage. On a daily basis people with AS must fit into a world that seems totally foreign to them and this can increase feelings of alienation and anxiety, making life's challenges especially hard to cope with.
Thus, they see only their way of doing things as the correct way and often get angry when others have opposing views and ideas. Individuals with ASDs often become stressed by things that may not upset a neurotypical individual or their level of emotional response may seem exaggerated.
Behavioural responses to stress can include shut down such as a flight response, or a meltdown explosion such as a fight response. Here, the student starts the day highly aroused and certain events, whether sensory experiences, changes in routine, or frustration, can create explosive responses.
Unexpected events or sudden changes in plan may cause a lot of stress, leading to a shutdown. Autistic people may find themselves shutting down in social situations. They don't navigate the unspoken rules of conversation as naturally as neurotypical people, so their brain has to work extra hard.
Behavioral Therapy for Anxiety
16 An analysis of 14 studies involving a total of 511 youth with "high-functioning" autism found that individual and group CBT therapy worked to reduce anxiety symptoms by a moderate amount.
Strategies to consider include distraction, diversion, helping the person use calming strategies such as fiddle toys or listening to music, removing any potential triggers, and staying calm yourself.
Meltdowns can look like any of these actions: withdrawal (where the person zones out, stares into space, and/or has body parts do repetitive movements) or outward distress (crying uncontrollably, screaming, stomping, curling up into a ball, growling, etc.).
Overstimulation (OS) occurs when there is “too much” of some external stimulus or stimuli for a person's brain to process and integrate effectively. This leads to an unpleasant sensation of being flooded and an impulse to escape the stimulus – or, failing that, to cry or scream or thrash about.
In fact, many feelings – such as fear, anger and joy – seem to be experienced more intensely by those with Asperger profiles than by average people.
Overreacting to the situation. Being unable to calm down on their own but also being too upset to listen to calming suggestions. Engaging in self-harm behaviors, for example, head banging and hair pulling. Engaging in self-stimulatory repetitive behaviors, also known as “stimming,” like hand flapping and clapping.
Preliminary findings indicate that people with ASD may be at high risk for experiencing stressful and traumatic life events, the sequelae of which can negatively impact mental health through the development of comorbid psychopathology and/or worsening of the core symptoms of ASD (Mehtar and Mukaddes 2011; Taylor and ...
Asperger's syndrome is also known as high-functioning autism. People with this disorder have difficulty in a variety of situations and, as a result, they are prone to angry outbursts. These outbursts generally happen because the person has trouble identifying their emotions or expressing them.
Clumsy, uncoordinated movements, including difficulty with handwriting. Difficulty managing emotions, sometimes leading to verbal or behavioral outbursts, self-injurious behaviors or tantrums. Not understanding other peoples' feelings or perspectives. Hypersensitivity to lights, sounds and textures.
Aspies tend to express love through practical actions, whereas NTs are more likely to express love through words or symbolic actions.
Hypersexuality. Core symptoms of autism, such as hyposensitivity and hypersensitivity, as well as repetitive behaviors, may also influence sexual behaviors. A 2017 review reported that autistic people may experience hypersexual and paraphillic fantasies more frequently than allistic people.
Sensory Issues
Many people with autism experience sensory processing disorder. This is more commonly known as sensory overload. Noise, crowds, bright lights, strong tastes, smells, and being touched can feel unbearable to someone with HFA.
Summary: Autistic Burnout Symptoms
Autistic burnout can look like many things, but most commonly, it shows itself as extreme exhaustion, increased sensory sensitives, loss of executive functioning skills, decreased ability to manage emotions, difficulty adapting to change, and depression.
What is a meltdown? A meltdown is where a person with autism or Asperger's temporarily loses control because of emotional responses to environmental factors. They aren't usually caused by one specific thing. Triggers build up until the person becomes so overwhelmed that they can't take in any more information.
The most common causes of autistic meltdown are almost always sensory related, this could be being anxious in a new environment, the sounds are different and for those with sensory processing challenges they can be frightening and painful, there are different smells, different people, different lighting, different ...
If you have a child with autism or ASD, what is often perceived as a tantrum is actually a sensory meltdown triggered by an overload of their sensory system. Read on to learn how to manage and reduce the occurrence of emotional outbursts and de-escalate them if and when they do occur.