When you become overloaded, it can feel near-impossible to “just calm down.” That is because what you are experiencing isn’t just emotional – it’s biological, and it’s physical.

They say flooded for a reason. The tsunami of emotions can engulf you, making it difficult to make sense of them all. 

• Stuck in survival: Minor events can have major physical responses.
• Difficulty identifying and naming emotions: Emotional build-up becomes a generalised overwhelming physical panic.
• Intolerance of uncertainty: Difficulty processing ambiguity or unexpected changes to routines or expectations feels like the last straw.
• Difficulty with daily tasks: Poor memory, time blindness, and organising tasks can leave you feeling stressed out by the amount of work ahead and fear of forgetting or failing to do something.

If you are neurodivergent, you can find that everyday life often introduces unique sensory and social pressures that can add another layer to anxiety, which can compound the stress on the nervous system. I often find my neurodivergent clients experience an explosion of thoughts and feelings. Feeling as though the entire universe is in their heads, burning through internal resources:

• Masking and camouflaging: You may suppress natural behaviours (like stimming) to mimic neurotypical behaviour, which can be mentally draining.
• The “Double Empathy” problem: Misunderstandings between neurodivergent and neurotypical communication styles can leave you feeling judged, isolated, or unsafe.
• Trauma from invalidation: Years of being told by systems that you are “lazy,” “too sensitive,” or “dramatic”.
• Vague language and unwritten rules: Feeling bewildered by ambiguous communication, implicit expectations, or hidden social codes that require constant decoding.

• Sensory processing differences: Environments with loud noises, bright lights, crowds, or specific textures
• Energy crashes and burnout: Experiencing sudden, overwhelming drop-offs in your energy and ability to cope after periods of intense masking, sensory processing, or navigating an overwhelming world.

Your nervous system is not designed to process emotions or calm down. Its job is to react instantly to physical or emotional threats or whatever it perceives to be a threat, even if it isn’t.

Sometimes, that threat is simply an overwhelming environment. If a space is too chaotic, too loud, or too demanding, your brain can’t assess the situation effectively, so your nervous system kicks in, as that’s safer than presuming all is ok.

Whether you are neurotypical or neurodivergent, anxiety can often become so overwhelming that you become anxious about being anxious. Fearing the physical reactions in turn, you might find yourself avoiding situations that may trigger them.