Autism

People grabbing my attention takes energy from me, and it takes me effort to get back into my thoughts. I can tolerate a lot of it on good days, but at some point my reaction is just resentment and anger. What you describe feels pretty similar?

For me it resulted in basically me being reclusive, and one pretty harsh breakup. My partner at the time would get anxious if she wasn't constantly noticed was what it felt like. Like, blurting out thoughts, out loud from the other room if needed. And asking me to drop what I was doing to come do some token task of showing attention, like moving a small chair or holding a spoon. Some people just function like that, and they are happy with other people who are like them. It drove us both to depression.

I found happiness with picking pretty much like-minded friends, and a life partner who is pretty much allergic to small talk. We talk a lot, but it is different.

If what we have is similar enough, that's the best advice I can give: Seek out other "quiet" people. Don't try adjusting yourself to be with chattybatters, and don't try to make them change.

I'm kinda frowning at the thought that you requiring time to yourself and taking care of yourself is avoiding demands. If my therapist told me that I'd rip him a new one. Thankfully he doesn't and actually encourages me to remove myself from unhealthy situations.

My social battery isn't endless. My processing ability isn't endless. I recharge both by spending time alone in my thoughts and hopefully getting into a flow state with whatever I'm doing.

I'm lucky enough that I have a job where that happens - I'm partially able to offset the social and mental cost of a job by simply working. But other than that I allow myself to not be productive.

My awesome therapist once prescribed me to get bored. Sit on the couch, stare out the window and try not to do anything. My brain needs that time to process everything happening during the day. Scrolling the web, comics, news that interest me? Also helping to process and get lost in a flow state.

Once I started allowing myself that, I fell asleep much better, because the input throughout the day gets processed througout the day and not at night. If you always keep busy, try to always be productive, the whole input waiting to be processed builds up like water behind a dam. Once you lay down, the dam breaks and you can't stop. It's not a bad habit to break. It's just a necessity for your brain to do.

If you're anything like me, the only thing you're doing "wrong" is not creating little islands of boredom and flow. If people refuse to accept that, they are the problem. They are crossing boundaries without a second thought. They may think they are helpful but they are not. To me it sounds like you are having your best interest in mind and acting on it despite this weird feeling of "but they love me, I should be grateful".

Love is about a lot of things, and respect is a big one. If boundaries are ignored, these people are acting toxic. I know this feels unhelpful, because you want human connection, but imho these people most likely took more out of you than they gave you. Maybe your friend has his own issues that make him not able to shut up, but it can't be you who pays the price. Maybe that girl thought you need someone to take care of you and who knows better than you and guide you through life, and that's why she nagged.

Long story short: no matter the intention, not everyone who cares about you will be actually helpful. Not everything is your fault. Keep doing you, identify your needs, communicate them (it sounds like you already did that, which is huge) and then enforce them.

From what you mentioned, I actually think you're doing great. Took me years of therapy to get to that point.

Meta note: It’s become obvious that RkWgorza is a troll. They’ve admitted that they’re not trained in anything, despite claiming to treat clients for disabilities, presumably mental disabilities. If true, they are practicing unlicensed medicine and guilty of several felonies. In any event, it’s evident that they’re just here to spew nonsense and to bully this community.

Until they are banned, it may be best to avoid feeding the troll. Block them and move on.

Since you're already getting therapy, I have just one idea that's far out but might be cool:

Learn sign language. Deaf people don't speak, and while they can interrupt and demand attention similar to the way hearing people do, it seems like your main problem is sensitivity to sound.

What I try to do is take care of myself as much as possible, sleep, exercise, etc. so that I can handle the demands. It’s hard and to some extent I think it just always is, my kids have interrupted me plenty as I try and write this. One thing that has helped is having a board where I can stick a yellow or red magnet on when I’m having trouble. I also sometimes use text to let my wife know I’m ok/not mad at her when I don’t want to talk. Your mileage may vary of course. I have a hard time when Im tired but have a pretty good reserve at the beginning of the day.

Sounds pretty familiar. Relationships take energy for everyone but for some it's a bigger burden than others.

It seems that you are taking the appropriate steps in seeking different friends. Do you understand the mechanism of this sensitivity? For instance, say a deaf person were to interact with you via sign language, would it make any difference? Are you bothered by electronic messages, how do you manage a barrage of texts?

I had a big problem with sleep hygiene as well since I often would turn in early at night to rest when I lived with others in order to be in a quiet space where I will likely not be disturbed until morning. I found that I had to set some rules for myself if I wasn't feeling tired enough to fall asleep. My rules were: 1) do not go under the covers, 2) since i hate wearing socks to sleep I made sure to keep them on until I was ready to get under the covers, 3) make sure I feel relaxed. I often have to have a hot shower before bed to raise my body temperature before I get into bed because the feeling of my body temp dropping makes me sleepy.

As for the tolerance issue, I would say that there's a lot of factors in finding success for it. Someone else in the comments said that you have to change. I think maybe there's some skills for you to work on, but fundamentally I don't believe you need to change. I think that I can sense a feeling that your friend and former girlfriend didn't seem to respect what you were requesting of them. I can understand how that can be a tough subject to tackle, especially when you're actively overwhelmed. With the people I care about, I have discussed with them that there will be times where I can't really speak or be spoken to and that I'll give them a signal/codeword so they understand when I am in that state. I bring some earplugs with my everywhere to help against overstimulation since I am particularly sensitive to sounds. Most people seem to respect when I request some quiet. I often will discuss with them after the overwhelming feelings pass about why I got overwhelmed, if I know why, so that if it was something that they did that we can talk about how to avoid that going forward. Though I do believe that this makes me hard to be around as it makes others feel like they walk on eggshells around me, at times.

I believe that there's a few things that you should talk over with your therapist about. The first thing that I found helped me a lot was getting better at recognising my limits. I know it night not be the case for you, but for me I really struggled to recognise getting overwhelmed until it was too late and I was melting down. This skill is necessary for the second thing to consider. The second thing to talk about would be gaining some more effective communication skills. Of course, it takes two to have a conversation, but doing your best to convey your thoughts, feelings, and intentions is important.

Let me know what you think. I hope something in my comment helps!