Loud Noises

Yes, many of the sounds people have mentioned are awful. I am surprised nobody has mentioned car alarms. I have been driven to such fury over car alarms I have seriously wanted to take a battle axe and smash the car up until it stopped the noise! Reasons I didn't include it being the middle of night and not wanting to be found roaming the streets searching for the culprit half dressed and raging, which would not work out well for me whether or not I actually managed to inflict criminal damage on the car. And that I don't actually like damaging things.

A sound I loathe which is increasingly common in the background music of youtube videos I otherwise enjoy is finger snapping. Ugh. Why?! Not overly keen on percussive sounds anyway. Vastly prefer videos which don't have background music. Very few actually have music I like. I so wish they would make tech which can turn off the background music! Surely we are capable of it? But I guess there is not enough demand.

And recently youtube has started making a horrible loud sound when starting up, but not all the time, slightly less than half i reckon, so I keep thinking they have stopped, and then there it is again! Bad enough if it was consistent, then I could get into the habit of starting it on mute, but I am very bad at remembering that kind of thing, especially if it is not every time.

Leaf blowers. Extra annoying as it is far better for nature to leave the leaves! Why do they have to mow the park behind my house at 6.30 am while I am still asleep? And why are bin collections so early, especially the glass one?

Oh, I've written a longer post than I expected, guess this one triggered me a bit, haha! Looks like the answer to your question is a resounding yes!

Whistling drives me insane too. It's mostly just the shrillness of it, but can often be passive-aggressively weaponised too: someone sharing office space who sees you're having a bad day wants to flag up their contrastively jolly one (real or faked)? Out comes the old cheery whistle. Or that's how it can feel, rightly or wrongly, sometimes. 

Whistling can sometimes ruin a good song or soundtrack too. I remember Murray Gold hired a professional whistler to add bits to the otherwise beautiful soundtrack for one of Doctor Who's best stories, Human Nature/The Family of Blood. Russell T. Davies, who must be a fellow whistling hater, or at least saw the vandalism that would be inadvertently wrought, interceded at the last moment thank goodness, and as broadcast the whistling was gone. Unfortunately it turned up on the soundtrack release after, but I suppose that meant the 'musician' got some recognition. He meant well!

I do find that anger is my default setting for loud noises. People who whistle loudly can make me angry very quickly, if looks could kill, some of these people wouldn’t be around anymore. Reversing bleepers and having a tv and radio on at the same time, drives me insane.

Omg yes been in that situation before! I've had it where the bus stops and does that and I dropped my bag and everything fell out because I never zip them up lol.

One I really hate is hand driers. So, so loud. I don't even like using them myself, but it's twice as annoying when the unpredicatble start and duration of someone else using one kicks off. These last few months, I have a new way of drying my hands over the sink that takes no more time and is blissfully soundless. I just squeeze each hand in turn from the wrist down to my finger-tips, then a shake or two. Done. 

Obvs I use a towel at home, I'm not completely off my rocker. 

Know that felling well. And I had a bus do that to me two months ago - I nearly jumped a foot in the air from the shock, even though I could sense it coming. 

Yes, I get this as well. It's defos worse than it used to be unfortunately.

I find noises like babies crying, phones ringing, anything like that is ear splitting for me - even the buses when they stop and go Sssssss... Ahh horrible!

Sometimes it's like every sound is magnified for me.

Mike,

Yes! I get really angry because our neighbours leave their dog outside to bark.  I feel raging because the poor animal is distressed and it's being ignored! I also feel irritated when my daughter listens to the youtuber "ss sniperwolf", who I call ss shiterwolf.  Her accent is so whiney that it actually causes me to rage internally which's exhausting.  I politely ask my daughter to wear her headphones when watching her phone because otherwise I get very frustrated inside.  I'm lucky in that I can escape to another room to calm down.  I avoid shops at certain times because it can be pretty overwhelming.  I'm lucky that I'm not experiencing panic attacks at the moment but I put this down to my diet, the fact I choose when to get shopping and that I am not working so I can concentrate looking after my Autistic daughter to the best of my ability. 

I shopped today in the afternoon which was reasonably quiet except for some idiot wheeling a loud squeaky trolley around.  My shopping was done pronto!!! 

Yes. "Like nails on a chalboard" was always a literal description imo. I cannot stand clocks that tick, vocal clutter (it's not even white noise because white noise would be somehow okay) of being in a crowded place with lots of people talking, there's so many it would be impossible to list but just to illustrate a point I even hate those "lo-fi for relaxing/studying" vids on youtube.
If there's noise to be relaxing it has to be wall-to-wall and feel safe (it has to be predictable or at least I go into it knowing what I'm going to get, ie a long lull and then suddenly a whale sound is the anti-relax, while the expected roar of the lead singer of a metal band is soothing), and it if it is a single, loud stand-alone noise it has to be dull not sharp. Eg. why my partner has been banned from chopping on the glass cutting board (that one is for slicing) the wood or plastic one is for chopping.

Yes! Ice cream vans are the worst, totally agree. I’d ban them if I could - sorry kids! 

Yes I do and like you it is something that seems to be getting worse as I get older.

I believe it stems initially from an autistic sensory issue. If calm I can usually tolerate noise up to a certain level. However the more I am exposed to the noise the worse my emotional response becomes. It seems to be a mix of the actual sensory distress and the fear of the sensory distress with my emotional reaction. Being stressed or in a state of autistic burnout can also make us more intolerant to certain noises. 

If you haven't heard of Misophonia it's worth looking into, as that is something that many autistic people experience.

It's not all noise and I think that is a common misconception surrounding autistic people. Yes we do like music and even loud music. However I find it difficult to tolerate any background noise when I'm trying to concentrate on doing something. With me the noises that affect me very badly include certain types of dog barking, children screaming, babies crying, certain types of reversing bleepers and the bleeping from tills in some stores.

One of my noise triggers can induce an angry meltdown within seconds. I can go from completely calm to raging, kicking, screaming, sobbing and completely out of control. If I'm in a public place when it happens the amount of effort needed to try and suppress that is immense. Like you I sometimes have to just abandon my shopping and get out of the store, away from the trigger noise.

I wish I knew what the answer was. I've tried all kinds of ear plugs, ear buds, noise cancelling headphones, etc. They do dampen the noise somewhat, but work less well for the kinds of higher pitched noises that seem to bother me more. However the big problem that I have is that once the emotional 'fight or flight' response kicks in, usually instantly on hearing the noise, my heart is pounding so much that all they do is amplify that pounding even further inside my head. That then becomes unbearable further sensory overload for me and I have to take them off.

Babies crying in particular makes me angry. I immediately get the urge to destroy the baby so it can't make that sound any more. Other human noises are also annoying and will make me angry if I can't get away from them. I'm better at filtering out steadier, more low pitched noises like traffic.

I always wondered why I didn't like dogs, as I like most animals. It struck me recently that it is because they make sudden loud noises. 

White LED lights have similar effect for me. Like security lights that pop on. Also when other people's devices buzz. It's like an intrusion. 

Yes, I'm very sensitive from a sensory perspective. Olfactory is my most sensitive, but it's closely followed by aural. Loud and unexpected noises send my adrenaline through the roof, and this in turn makes my skin hurt. Have you tried earplugs? These are particularly good because you can still hear, but it takes the edge off the generally obnoxiously-noisy world:

https://www.loopearplugs.com/