I sometimes suffer from sensory overload when I’m anxious or stressed, but since an incident in November, it has really become an issue for Tori.

Loud/sudden noises, busy rooms, sudden anythings, often tip her close to panic attacks, or at the very least trigger her anxiety symptoms.

I have been doing my best to help her find techniques to calm herself, and try to stop her from going into full panic mode, but obviously I can’t be there all the time, and she can’t just avoid ‘loud’. She’s twelve, she goes to school. School is loud, full of sudden movements, and people who think it’s funny when someone freezes up and almost cries if you push a chair over at the back of the class.

I don’t want her to miss out on things because she’s nervous, or afraid to even try ‘just in case’ she freezes up.

But I don’t really know how to help her beyond suggesting things I do or have tried.

Does anybody have any advice/suggestions/techniques that she/we could try in order to make life in general a bit less fraught.

I miss my happy-go-lucky confident girl, and just want to help her find herself again.