Does anyone else hate the term 'meltdown'?

So lets make new word up
dragiment (Dragion I Moment)

I don't like 'meltdown' either both because it sounds like a childish strop and also because it doesn't really describe my personal experience. Overload is good but for me is half the story, overload of stress or fear is usually followed by implosion not explosion in my case. Once that has occurred then I withdraw and depending on the severity I will stay in hermit mode until it passes which can be anything from hours to years. This has been my pattern since I was about 5 years old, it sucks but I guess I just have to live with it.

Can I call it an “aaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrgggggghhhhh!!!!!!!!”

I dislike the term 'meltdown'. Because automatically, you are being looked upon and judged. Personally speaking there is enough stigma and discrimination going on enough as it is. People have fought hard to be treated equally like everybody else but also to be accepted and not discriminated against. The term 'meltdown' itself can appear to been seen as a joke at times. Some people do not realise the complications one has to go through or endure. I hate the term 'normal' with a passion. If anyone uses that word towards me or in a sentence I would happily challenge or if needs be ask them to explain in more detail then I share my opinion.

I like the term "red-lining" too! That's what I'm going to call it when I'm getting close to overload.

You will never explain it to most people. I have a few people who know and understand the signs. I can deal with information pretty well but when I'm getting close to that point I will start saying things like "Hold on I'm trying to concentrate" or "I can't hear X,Y,Z". That would seem pretty inocuous and inane to most people but I'm my worst enemy. I literally mean "Noooooooooooo!". The next thing I know I'm all over the place. 

Drinking actually stops the tendency for me to have an overload but that's my problem. It's too good at doing it!

I'm not against it, its sure easier to say than anxiety attack, and whenever i think anxiety attack I always get a flashback of that time where I called 999 because i thought i was having a heart attack, this was before the nhs 111 service btw which would have spent less resources because in the end it was just dehydration.

I usually have panic attacks and just cry, because I can't cope, like I did at work before a real big crisis, when I have panic attacks or shout and cry, then I know I have reached the limit of what I can tolerate.  I hate them and the last ones were at work before I left, I was drinking sips of water in the careers office, attempting to be professional at work.  Yet my former colleagues have asthma attacks, diabetes, epilepsy, so why not deal with colleagues who have autistic meltdowns or whatever you call it.  I know what to do if my colleague has an epileptic fit, heart attack, asthma attack or goes into a diabetic state.  it should be taught on 'First Aid' training programmes, instead of shock horror.  At work I did First Aid training and know how to deal with most things including cardiac arrest but dealing with someone with autism is not taught on First Aid programmes.  Many of my former colleagues continue working despite their medical conditions like 'Asthma, epilepsy, heart conditions, diabetes but if you have autism no one seems to care or cope with the situation, instead they try to get rid of you, without even adjustments being made.

Yes, I like 'overload'.  Meltdown always has the negative connotation of 'tantrum', because of the way it's applied to kids.  It's very difficult to explain it to an NT.  I had to speak to my manager yesterday about a few things at work that make me angry.  Things came to a head on Friday evening, when I got close to red-lining.  I'd already started raising my voice and swearing, which is the first danger sign.  Fortunately, I left before it got bad - but I still couldn't drive home straight away because I would have been a danger on the road.  It took me a couple of hours to calm down and stop pacing when I got home.  Even then, it lived with me over the weekend, when I drank too much to try to numb the emotional fallout (another 'meltdown'-type term, I suppose!)  I told her I came close to an 'incident' - but even that doesn't do it justice.  She said she would have been angry, too.  I tried to explain that it's more than just anger: it's essentially the head shutting down because it can't cope with the inputs. 

It needs its own language, really.  It's like with epilepsy.  What used to be called 'fits' and are now 'seizures'.  I said to one person I know with epilepsy that I imagine it's like a short-circuit - which didn't go down too well!  In a way, I think of the 'meltdown' as something like a seizure, because it renders me incapable of doing anything for some time.  'Meltdown', I suppose, is a term that most people think they understand.  But it'll always have that negative connotation.

Call them overloads, either caused by emotions, information or senses, or a combination of the three. I don't mind what they are called just as long as I have them as little as possible!

Hope you had a good bank holiday too!

I'm perfectly happy with it. 

It accurately describes my experience, like a nuclear meltdown. Pressure builds up for whatever reason, and then I reach breaking point often with tears and panic. 

I'm wondering if it comes from nuclear meltdowns, which wouldn't be belittling at all but rather the opposite? The chain reaction gone out of control thing would make some sense, in a way. And being described as a "reactor", not in the technical sense but as in reacting to something rather than just being inappropriate in itself seems quite fitting too, now that I think about it... I don't like the term either though, because it is used mostly in the way you describe. I don't really get them anymore but did as a child and the closest I can compare it with now is a panic attack really, only that the "bad" feeling was so intense that I didn't even know what it was while now it is more distinctively fear. Perhaps a term that implies that comparability to a panic attack would be better because if people understood it that way they would perhaps react differently and judge a little less. 

I do not like the term "Meltdown''.

Hi Angel Cake thank you for saying you hope we have a good week, may I say that is a very kind thing to say.

I don’t have such a thing as a meltdown, I get very stuck at times, have a desire to run away,often struggle to keep focus,,the word does sound like an ice cream left out in the sun.or something you do to gold when making an ingot.

I really hope you have a good week also. Take care.

x()x

Yes. I hate it  even though I use it to describe my own 'incidents'. We need an alternative.