26/05/2025
This is an important article.... and yes, while headphones are great, and sometimes necessary, when there are mixed sensory needs within an environment, they do signal that the environment as it stands, is not suitable for someone in it. There needs to be compromise, and understanding, but it shouldn't be that the person with the sensory difference is always the one to do the compromising, e.g. there may be times when that person wears the headphones, and other times when everyone else adjusts their sounds/noise/environmental stimuli to accomodate their needs. I see this often in my own family, I am one who is highly sensitive to chewing sounds, and packages crinkling, and the little 'ching' of cuttlery on plates, or lots of overlapping talking in one place, such as a mealtable or staffroom, so.... I will wear my headphones, at the table, or I will eat somewhere else. Or go to the staffroom, not to eat but to socialise for a time, and then when I have interacted as I have needed to, will move on. At home, at the dining table, if I am sitting, not eating, but someone needs to sit there at eat their crunchy cornflakes, I will get up and walk away, because the purpose of that space if to eat.... so I can accomodate my own needs..... it's a balance, and it's about being considerate of each other. It's just people can't accomodate you if they don't know.... so make room for varied views of how someone experiences environments, and no two neurodivergent folk are the same.... just as no two neurotypical people are the same.... but there are common and frequently occurring patterns in each. So if you can identify that someone may be neurodivergent, you don't need to ask them if they are... but it's a nice human thing to do, to ensure the comfort of others... let's just broaden our scope of what 'checking on someone's comfort' looks like.... not just the nuanced 'hospitality' that is much more neuronormative in nature.
