I've always been very sensitive to light in general. I can't go outside hardly without wearing some kind of protection. I like my hat for this, sun glasses are too obstructive and irritating. I love astronomy and stars... but the sun is my worst enemy. Inside lights can also cause me pain and problems. Many of you mentioned fluorescent lighting and I share similar disliking for them, but I still prefer them to the standard incandescent type. If I'm exposed to bright lighting for too long, several things can happen. Usually, the first thing to happen is that my eyes will hurt. I would describe this as a pressure pushing in. Then comes the colored spots that float around and obscure my vision. If it goes on for too long, next steps are blurred vision and disorientation. This has happened to me at night before while driving home from work. I almost ran off the road because a distant train coming round a corner was shining it's light right into my face, while I and another car were passing each other, crossing the tracks. All I could see was a ball of white and I actually remember yelling out cause it hurt so bad to have to force myself to look where I was going. Once I got clear I had to go slow(couldn't really pull over) and get my eyes working again. It really sucked.

I am assaulted by sounds every day. Things bother me that no one else see,s to notice or care about. I don't eat with others because I cannot stand the sounds that people make when they eat. I don't make these sounds and I don't understand why some people have to make such an ordeal out of something as disgusting as feeding themselves. I really consider eating to be a private act because of this and cannot go to restaurants except on rare circumstances. People at work have commented on me eating alone, in the office, but they don't understand what's it's like to be pained by common everyday things. I just need to quiet, to eat, to chat on irc, to just get my brain relaxed so I can go back to work and not freak out. Lunch isn't relaxing for me if I have to go out and eat with a bunch of loud people. But that's not the only sounds that bother me. Pretty much any high pitched or repetitive sound has the potential to make me nuts. I absolutely HATE Shop-vac vacuums because they make this terrible high-pitched whining sound as they operate. This can actually make me cry and get very, very upset if exposed to it for too long. If someone operates one around me, I have to leave. The "twanging" in country music causes me similar pain but it usually just makes me mad. There's more, but you get the idea I think.

Other things are my self awareness: there are door frames and corners in my own house that I run into pretty much every time. I'm also a klutz and drop or knock things over. My distance perception is bad. I often think things are closer or farther away than they really are. You can imagine how nervous this makes me behind the wheel. When I get touched unexpectedly or in an odd place, my first reaction is pain and I may actually say "ow!" when it didn't actually hurt per se... hard to explain and I don't really understand it myself. It's often hard for me to find clothes because I have so many sensitivities to clothing and fabrics as well as sizing.

That's all I have for now. If you read all of that, I applaud you.