I Can't.... Sorry, What Was That?

I've heard from numerous sources that the male brain is capable of thinking about absolutely nothing. I'd like to challenge that: so's mine.

When my anxiety gets too high, thinking stops being an option. I'm on high alert and my (fight or) flight instinct kicks in and nothing else could possibly be worth considering.

I first noticed this when working at [national fast food / coffee chain], I'd be trying to take orders and it would go something like this:

me: Hi there, what can I get for you?
customer: [says something clearly & audibly that I just plain don't hear]
me: [looks at screen to type in order] .... I'm sorry, could you repeat that?
customer: [says literally the most common order]
me: ok.... sorry, that was a large coffee, anything in it?
customer: [repeats themself again]

And it's not that my brain considered this customer a threat. It's that my brain was processing every possible sound around me equally, and fast food places are not quiet environments.

But then, it also happens in quiet environments.

As soon as my anxiety wakes up, my mental processing power vanishes. I have a couple of apps on my phone that are mindless and relaxing games - no ads, and the point of the game is to organize things, which pleases my OCD and helps me calm down. Sometimes, in the time it takes me to pull out my phone and unlock it, I've forgotten why I'm doing so, so I'm just staring at my phone, mind completely blank, feeling frustrated because I wanted to do something but the thought ran away before I could act on it.

One of my biggest problems in this time, as I've vaguely hinted, is sound. I've seen the question asked "If you had to lose one sense but could choose which one, which would you choose?" or some variation of that, like "If you could only keep one sense, which would you choose?". Touch is my favourite, because I'm a klutz and I need to find my way around somehow. Also because I enjoy food mostly based on texture rather than flavour. But a very close second is my sense of sound.

I almost always have music on, unless I'm having trouble focusing. I can navigate to some extent by sound; it's how I'm most aware of my surroundings (my eyes are terribly inobservant). When I was a kid, I could tell what type of vehicle (car, pickup truck, van, etc.) was coming around the street corner by my house based on the sound of the motor.

But I wouldn't mind being slightly less in tune with my sense of sound (pun not intended, but now I'm keeping it!). Sudden loud noises cause me physical pain, from the crown of my head down my spine. Things like: something falling down, my dad sneezing, traffic noises outside. It all depends on how heightened my anxiety is; the higher the anxiety is, the more the sound hurts.

To end on a lighter note, I'll explain why my dad's sneezes are included in this with a fun family anecdote.

If you've heard me sneeze, you know I'm loud. My dad is close to twice as loud. His dad was twice that again.

My grandparents lived in the country, on a stretch of highway. Not a super-busy highway, but it had its share of traffic. My dad was visiting his friends, who lived just down the street, probably ~200m. They were packing up a board game. Grandpa was working in the honey house (behind the house) with machinery going.

Grandpa sneezed.

Dad's friend said "God bless you Mr. [Pendragon]."