Alarm Tests and Autistics

~ Clarissa

I don’t know who is the enemy of humanity who decided that alarm tests have to be conducted during normal business hours, but I don’t like that person at all.

I’m on the review committee for one of our university’s departments. This morning our committee was being taken on a tour of the department when the alarm testing began. There were three kinds of alarms that were tested one after another and each lasted for several minutes.

For non-autistics, alarm tests are a simple annoyance. For autistics, though, they are much more than that. Such loud, unexpected and piercing sounds completely disorient me to the point when I have no idea where I am and how I got there. They bring on panic attacks, hyperventilation, and intense anxiety. And I was on a committee, which means that I couldn’t just fall apart and stop participating because of the alarm.

I seriously have no idea why the alarms can’t be tested before or after working hours.

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Published by Clarissa

13 thoughts on “Alarm Tests and Autistics”

  1. Oh I know it! Aspie stubbeones has one weak spot: alarms.
    One can’t make me to do what one wants never ever if I am disagree. But Alarm? With alarm I will break my rules and leave all my ideals:-) I can’t bear alarms, is not a sound from Hell where sinners are tortured by a multiple loudest alarms.

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  2. Ick. The only thing I can say is worse than alarms during the day is an alarm around one o’clock in the morning. In the dorm, at a time when most people are very much asleep.

    I think I only left the building because I wanted to get away from the sound. I didn’t realize what was happening until we went back inside. If there was anything good about that experience, it was that I was too tired to be anxious.

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  3. We have to evacuate the building whenever an alarm goes off. The check to make sure everyone can get out in time if there is a fire is meaningless if it is done in the evening, for example.

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    1. These test alarms are the ones where we are not expected to do anything, just wait for them to stop. I don’t know what the point of them is. maybe just to see if they are loud enough for people to hear.

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      1. There’s always a reason for an alarm – just because you ignored the purpose doesn’t mean it didn’t have one. As a former security officer, I can assure you we don’t do tests simply to annoy.

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  4. I volunteered for ambulance service for many years. About 15 or 20 years ago emergency services were offered “modern up-to-date” stroboscopic emergency light bars. Unfortunately, some of the lights flashed at a frequency that set off seizures for quite a few people. Imagine someone driving down the highway at 60 miles per hour and having a seizure because the police have someone pulled over for a traffic ticket. They were taken off the market and the company changed the frequency of their bars, but it was a major embarrassment for people in the emergency services business.

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  8. When I worked inpatient psychiatry on the 11pm to 7am shift, they tested the alarms every Saturday night, usually around 1 am (I think they also tested them on day and evening shifts as well, but since I didn’t work those shifts I couldn’t say that for certain). If I was working an adolescent unit, they mostly wouldn’t wake up, but the adults often did, which meant the rest of the shift could easily turn into a complete zoo. The under-10s also sometimes woke up, usually in tears, and that would take a while to get them back to sleep.

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