Behold, the meltdown

Our old friend and occasional nemesis. For those of us blessed (or cursed, depending on the day) with autism and/or ADHD, these episodes are less of an inconvenience and more of a built-in feature. It’s as if our brains came with a factory-installed “Chaos Mode” that activates at the most inopportune moments.

What about our autistic meltdowns? It’s like our sensory processors suddenly decide to play a cruel practical joke. The world transforms into a carnival of overstimulation, each input more jarring than the last. We find ourselves unwitting performers in a one-person show titled “Sensory Overload: The Musical”—except we never got the script, let alone rehearsal time.

Now, for those of us with ADHD, our meltdowns are a different beast entirely. Imagine our executive functions—those supposed guardians of order and productivity—deciding to take an impromptu vacation, or most likely go on a strike. Tasks multiply faster than rabbits, each one screaming for attention like a toddler in a toy store. It’s cognitive whack-a-mole, and we’re armed only with a rubber mallet.

The mental gymnastics we experience during these episodes are truly Olympic-worthy. It’s as if our minds have embarked on an existential journey but forgot to pack essentials—like logic, or emotional regulation. For us neurodivergent, it feels like being thrust onto a stage to present an expose about quantum physics, despite our only qualification being that we once watched a documentary about space.

Those of us with ADHD find ourselves in a paradoxical state that would make Schrödinger’s cat look positively decisive. Are we overwhelmed or underwhelmed? Overstimulated or understimulated? The answer is a resounding “yes” to all of the above, often simultaneously!

And let’s not forget the cherry on the cake, the delightful aftermath of our neurological adventures. We’re left feeling like time travelers who’ve accidentally stepped on a butterfly in the Jurassic era. We piece together the events through the bewildered expressions of those around us, all while trying to maintain the composure of someone who totally meant to have that public display of emotional fireworks.

In essence, our meltdowns aren’t just momentary lapses in composure—they’re integral chapters in our personal narratives. They’re our bodies’ way of freaking out, just when we thought we had this “functioning in society” thing figured out. It’s cognitive dissonance as performance art, leaving us to navigate the world with all the grace of a cat on a freshly waxed floor.

So the next time when in the throes of a meltdown, let’s remember: we’re not losing control, we’re starring in our own neurological epic, because the world is definitely OUT OF CONTROL.