Triggers for Meltdowns

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Here's one that people can't seem to grasp: Others. My family accepts no responsibility for their actions, which provoke meltdowns.

One thing that really iritates me to a near meltdown is mouth noises. To be more specific someone very close smaking their lips. Or the sound your tongue makes, when pull it apart from the roof of your mouth over and over. These noises irritate the HELL out of me, and though I've never had a meltdown, it's only been prevented because I've left whenever those sounds were being made.

My sister. From what I've collected, some people who aren't autistic (some who are can also do this) can feel what ticks someone off. It's like she has a blueprint of my mind and precisely tunes her voice to be extremely agitating to me. This does not only trigger meltdowns, but also fuels them before they start.

When people interrupt me when I am in deep thought or wanting to be left alone.
When people annoy me by asking me too many questions.
When people piss me off.
When I play a video game and I keep dying.
When my mom yells at me and I am angry too.
When I have too many things to do at once or when people rush me.
Sometimes when certain people correct me when Im already correct or especially when they start changing how I'm doing something or tell me to do something a certain way, or like start taking over something I'm doing.
When people accuse me of doing something I didn't do.

But I only go under meltdown at the very last resort, when any of the above happen to me when I am not aggravated, I just hold in my anger and it goes away soon afterwards.
But if it happens for a long time or over and over again then I do go under meltdown, but it's becoming more rare as I become more passive.

I was reading through the thread waiting to see if someone said exactly this. The critical thing is you don't often realize that the stress has been building until it's too late. I try to make my life as simple as possible for this reason and I no longer have this game with myself to see how much I can get done in the least amount of time. I started doing this because of my diagnosed Major Depressive Disorder and as a part of recovery from alcoholism. I guess you could liken it to watching your calorie intake. It's very easy not to notice until you get on the scale. Apologies if someone later in the thread made the same observations.

When someone belittles me or when someone refuses to help because they don't want to get off their lazy butt (Mom's the biggest culprit for both of these.).

There are so many things that can cause me to melt down.

Noise will cause me to 'shut' down because it stops me from being able to think. I carrry wax ear plugs with me everywhere for emergencies...

The rest of the list is quite long.....

i can have severe tantrums, but they rarely get to the stage of a "meltdown"

for example: i will often descend into a tantrum if people are slow and dawdling in front of me in a queue when i am in a hurry. especially at the "self service " checkouts at supermarkets where people scan their own goods.

last week i had a tantrum at the supermarket because everyone was paying by credit , and their signatures were rejected by the machines they were at, and they had to have help from the store staff to clinch the sale of their goods and it took too long.
i became irate and blurted out "oh for christ's sake!! !"
....other people looked at me as if i was about to erupt in a psychotic episode. i was very angry that people were using credit cards to buy their food when i had cash, and i looked dimly upon them. i breathed in an angry way and i stared with extreme dissatisfaction at the people who's credit cards were rejected.

that is not a meltdown though. meltdowns are like what a nuclear reactor does if it loses coolant.
i do not experience meltdowns in the main part of my life, but i
did go rather beserk a few weeks ago.

i will try to explain.

i have a very fresh and low mileage mercedes 560 sel that is a 1990 model car.
it ran out of registration for 2 weeks, so i had to go to a service station that issues blue slips (there are only 8 in sydney). the service station i went to denied me a blue slip because i have a compartment in my rear window sill that indicates it contains first aid items like bandages and disinfectant etc.

there is no first aid kit in the rear windowsill any more and i was annoyed that i had to have one to get my car registered considering that no other cars had first aid bays in them and they get registered easily.

so i got one ( a medical kit) and my girlfriends father said he knew of a mechanic that could give me a blue slip no matter what state my vehicle was in.
i stupidly accepted his offer and i drove to where that mechanic was.

the appointment was for 11 am and i got there at that time and i waited until 4pm for him to look at my car!! ! i got rather disgruntled many times during the waiting period, but tammies father hosed me down by saying "mate...if you lose it now you'll have wasted all the time you've spent here" and i took his advice and remained "calm".

when the mechanic looked at my car finally, he asked me to turn my steering wheel
left and right, and he passed my car.
he spent ages writing his report on my car after that and i was at bursting point when he finally said to me "ok have you got your card?" and i asked how much it would cost me, and he said $700, and i thought that that included insurance because a normal blue slip costs only $52, so i said "ok".

i was not happy and when i went out to my car i read the receipt again and i did not see any reference to insurance so i said to tammy's father who asked me "are you happy now?" "absolutely not!! !! !!"

i wanted to confront the man who charged me $700 just to look at my car and i wanted to pull his scalp off.

so i sat in my car for about 30 mins and i did not start the car, and i clutched my head in my hands tightly to stop from making a seriously bad scene.
i had to curl up and hold my legs or i would have got back out of my car and i would have got into serious trouble.

I have a MAJOR problem with people who say that they'll do something, and then not do it, especially when it was their idea to start with, and I didn't prompt them to come up with the idea.

The reason is I think why the heck did they voluntarily SAY it to start with?
It's just a waste of breath for them to say it, let alone my time being wasted
- being surprised
- thanking them
- waiting for it to happen

The worst one is people who come back to me after a period of time, just to say that they'll do it later. This can carry on for ages. What the flip? It wasn't my idea to start with, and I wasn't chasing them for it. Do they not have hobbies or something?

I don't get angry when I have a meltdown. I become very hurt, I break down and I cry.

The real trigger of meltdowns is a buildup of emotions. People with Asperger's tend to not express their emotions, so they build up. One small thing can set cause emotions to build up to the point that they just flood out. So, small things have triggered a meltdown in me.

I agree with this. Fully.

Also for me one constant thing is changes in my environment/house. But then again it's random. Like repainting the wall didn't bother me at all, but when they change the shower-crane thingy, from a vertical to a dianogal water stream, I snapped.
I don't know why the shower made me snap & changing the furniture doesn't.

The other weird thing is that these meltdowns tend to happen 98% of the time in privat space (house), and almost never in public. It happens, but a lot lot less. Maybe some mechanism of self-controll watches over me.

I would have a meltdown when my computer is taken away or when it gets damaged so i cannot use it. I know i would because some years ago my grandparents did not allow me to use computer anymore because i was too obsessed with it. Without a computer it feels like half a life is taken away.

Can I just say all of the above?

The worst for me is someone yelling at me. Then there is sudden changes, extended social thingys, crowds, really loud noises that I can't get away from, feeling stressed and people won't leave me alone, new doctor(s), people making noises while eating or drinking, etc The list goes on...

Usually only associated with being bullied IRL by someone close and coupled with being at a disadvantage verbally.

I have tantrums when peple are mean to me.

If something I do just isn't good enuf for
someone, that is not my problem, but they
keep wanting it to be, then I tanturm and
they get "shocked" looks on their face.

What did they expect? a big chocolate biscuit?

Strangely enough, eating/smacking noises
seem to cause me to make a loud snorting noise,
I can't seem to stop it, it doe snot bother me
any, but the snort makes the smackers wonder
whats up. I just do it, and I can't make it stop,
they smack, I snort.

Scraping noises or repeating scraping boises
meake me bang things like the wall in my sleep,
I wake myself up to me banging the wall because
a scraping sound was going on.