Sensory flareups happen when something feels untoward, or something feels wrong. It is making us aware of an issue that can get worse. Sensory issues can be scary, can make you panicked, they can make you feel fearful.

And even if you don't have heightened sensory sensitivities, the pandemic will have left us all in shock, panicked even. It has not been easy for anyone. My senses still continue to flare up.

Through heightened sensory sensitivities, I have found life more challenging. Anyone with heightened sensory sensitivities in the pandemic, may have had to deal with the following:

  • Changing to new circumstances causing them to feel fearful and linked to worry around new sensory experiences;
  • Being 'home' full time causing you to feel panicked and fearful;
  • Feeling fearful where there is no end to a situation;
  • Having to cope with life and death scenarios;
  • In the first few months feeling anxious leaving the house to go for a walk;
  • Meeting up with others and worrying about social distancing;
  • Feeling panicked all the time, not knowing how you will cope or if you will catch the virus.

Anyone dealing with sensory issues, needs advanced warning of change. They may struggle when pushed into making decisions that they need time to process.

Also, anyone who deals with sensory issues needs to have their stress minimised, so they cope better in a sensory situation. For many in the pandemic, that will not have happened.

Ilana Estelle is a mental health and wellbeing advocate who combines educational insight with her personal experience of living with physical, mental, and emotional disabilities. She holds diplomas in Counselling, Diet and Nutrition, Nutritional Therapy, Psychotherapy and Counselling, and Stress Management. Through her writing, Ilana supports others in navigating their emotional, mental, and physical health challenges. In addition to writing for The CP Diary, her work has appeared in healthy lifestyle magazines. Ilana is also the author of three books: Cerebral Palsy: A Story – Finding the Calm After the Storm, Spirituality, Healing and Me, and Survival: The Covid Years – Time for Change.

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2 comments on “Sensory Flareups in the Pandemic”

  1. It's not surprising that you struggle with your senses in the pandemic. A healthy amount of fear is necessary to maintain our safety.

    If our sense of safety is dependent on ever-changing and inconsistent policy decisions, it's not unexpected that we will feel as though we have no control over our own safety.

    The government's track record in the UK of too little too late has only made matters worse and we are now seeing infection rates spiralling out of control again.

    I have no doubt with the right measures in place we would all feel safer and that would help anyone like yourself, dealing with sensory overload in the pandemic.

    1. Thanks. It's hard to imagine and difficult to see or know how or when this will end, I agree.

      Now four-walled because of lifting restrictions, there is a small light in the shape of the UK PM's resignation, but it remains to be seen who will replace him and whether the new incumbent PM does a better job, or it will be a continuation of the same.

      When I was growing up, politicians had integrity and a moral standing. Hard to see any of that and the incompetence continues.

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