My Sensory experience from 4 to 40

I want to share something deeply personal - my lived experience as an autistic person with Sensory Processing Disorder. I hope that opening up about my internal world might resonate with someone else, offer some validation, or help others understand the diverse ways neurodivergent brains can work.

My neurotype isn't just one label; it's a complex interplay. While Autism and ADHD shape my focus, interactions, and energy levels, my sensory differences add another layer, primarily affecting my visual and auditory senses in ways that can be hard to explain.

When people think of auditory sensory issues, they often imagine finding things "too loud." For me, it's rarely about volume alone. It's the amount of simultaneous audio information. My brain struggles to filter it, like trying to tune into one specific radio station while dozens are blaring at once. It becomes an overwhelming wall of sound.

My visual sense is perhaps even more complex. It's intrinsically linked to my thoughts. Thinking about something triggers vivid visual information. When I hear music, I don't just hear it; I see it being played – the instruments, the finger movements. As a child, I even theorised this was my brain's way of helping me decode music faster, by tapping into that strong visual connection.

But this visual intensity has a challenging side. Overload feels like blasts of visual information hitting me. It's not hallucination, but more like seeing the persistent remnants, the after-images of things, spinning and exploding in front of my eyes. Imagine holding your fists about 12" (204mm) from your eyes, and suddenly they're blasting rapidly changing, overwhelming patterns of light and colour – so much that it blurs into incomprehensible noise. Closing my eyes doesn't stop it; it's like being plugged into a high-speed presentation, flashing 20 abstract slides per second.

One thing I need to be very clear about is that this isn't something that started at a certain age. It has always been my reality. As a child, though, I didn't have the vocabulary or the frame of reference to explain these experiences. This led to immense frustration, especially at school. Well-meaning adults – SEND teachers, educational psychologists – would listen, but they often misinterpreted. They'd try to reframe my experience: "So, what you're feeling is this..." and they'd almost always be wrong. It's crucial to remember this: When talking to a neurodivergent child about their experiences, understand that their normal is the only normal they know. They don't have a baseline of "typical" to compare it to. 

My first inkling that my brain processed things differently wasn't from direct interventions. It was subtle. It was the way visitors to the classroom – other teachers, specialists – would observe me. My friends might be colouring, and the adults would glance over. But when I did the same things, their interest felt as if it intensified. They'd watch me closely, point me out, and comment to each other things like, "Ooh, that's very interesting, I've read about that," while I was, for instance, meticulously copying another child's story, but writing it perfectly upside down on my page as if everything was normal! This was around Reception and Year 1. It wasn't about what I did, but the intense focus on why and how I did things they perceived as unusual.

The first time I tried to verbalise sensory overload, I was about six. Overwhelmed and distressed, I cried to my Nana, sobbing, "Nana, I just want to poke my eyes out! Make it stop!" My nan, understandably upset, hugged me tightly and said, "Oh John, you don't want to do that, we love your eyes." Those tight hugs, from her or my Mum, were often the only things that could soothe the visual and auditory storm. They provided deep pressure, a grounding sensation that cut through the internal chaos.

My visual overwhelm sometimes manifested as a kind of tunnel vision. It wasn't a blackout of peripheral sight, but rather my focus narrowing so intensely that everything outside that narrow cone just... ceased registering. The numerous childhood scars on my forehead from walking into lampposts are a testament to this. When I eventually described this to school staff, their immediate reaction was fear – they called my Mum, worried I might have a brain tumour. This resulted in three-monthly specialist eye examinations for almost my entire childhood. Every single time, the report was the same: "Eyes are perfect." What wasn't being understood was that the issue wasn't the hardware (my eyes) but the software (how my brain processed the visual input).

Finding Lifelines: Music, Numbers and a great primary school head teacher!

Busy, loud playgrounds were predictably challenging. I would often retreat into my head to cope, focusing on numbers and music. I loved playing the guitar, and I must state this clearly: The guitar was probably the most important thing that saved me during my childhood.

Because my overwhelm often led to meltdowns, I was frequently wasn't allowed in the main classroom. I'd sit in the hallway, lost and dysregulated. That's when my headteacher, Mr. Watson, intervened. He took me into his office, gave me a guitar, and dedicated hours each week to teaching me chords and just talking to me about music. Guitar became my anchor, my passion, and my complete focus well into my late teens.

Back in the playground, numbers were my sanctuary before the guitar fully took hold. I developed a fixation on the number six. Seeing it, counting in sixes, thinking about it – it made me feel safe. Around age eight, I realised this obsession sometimes got in the way of friendships. I distinctly remember that in a conscious effort to adapt, I decided to switch my favourite number to three – logically, half of six. Music reinforced this; I was already into heavy metal and classical music, and the rhythm of triplets (three notes) and double triplets (six notes) was everywhere. I could hear and feel that rhythmic picking in so many songs I loved.

The Limbo State: Not Fitting In, Anywhere

Fast-forward to age 12. This marks one of my most memorable realisations. I was placed in a smaller class with perhaps a dozen other children, many with significant intellectual disabilities requiring substantial support. I remember thinking, clearly and distinctly, "I am not like these children. I can think critically, I'm curious, and I want to understand the world." Then, one day after a meltdown, my teacher temporarily placed me in a mainstream classroom with children a year older. The contrast was jarring. "Wow," I thought, "These children are just sitting quietly, copying from the board, doing their work, not interacting." And the realisation hit me again: "I am not like them either." I felt completely adrift, stuck in this strange limbo state – unable to relate to the peers in the supported classroom fully, yet fundamentally different from the "typical" students in the mainstream setting. I didn't seem to fit anywhere.

Adulthood: The On/Off Switch and Finding My Flow

Looking back, I realise my brain has always operated on an "on or off" switch. There's very little middle ground. At school, I believe my brain wanted to be "on," but the environment often wasn't stimulating enough in the right ways. This lack of engagement caused me to retreat into my own world – my special interests of music, guitar, and the number six.

Living with my combination of Autism, ADHD, and SPD is a continuous journey of self-discovery and adaptation. It's not always easy, but understanding my neurology has been key to finding strategies and environments where I can not only cope but genuinely flourish. These days, I can generally detect when I'm becoming overloaded, and I utilise mindfulness techniques to pause, give my brain space to process information.