The way my neurologist/psychiatrist/research scientist put it is this.

The concussed or injured brain, once it has reached the critical mass of severity of injury, loses its ability to filter stimulation and the many environmental factors we constantly live with. When this filter (or system that give us the ability to ignore inconsequential issues or issues that we have developed a tolerance for) fails to work, it allows information to make it to cognitive (conscious) and even sub-conscious thought.

The brain has a limited band width for information processing. The injured brain has even less due to inefficiencies of the biochemical and physiological systems.

If the healthy brain were an 8 lane highway, the injured brain is reduced to 4 lanes with occasional reconstruction zones. When the information is flying down the road at 60 mph on 8 lanes, it does fine. When the on-ramp metering lights are on, even rush hour traffic can keep up to an limited extent.

The injured brain is like rush hour but the on-ramp meter lights are not working (filtering) As cars (sensory stimuli) increase and flow onto the highway, traffic starts to get crowded. But, the cars are still trying to go 60 mph. Eventually, the road narrows to 4 lanes and cars (sensory information) start to collide. Now, we have a 150 car fender bender pile-up. Brain overload and crash into a full blown anxiety attack or shut down.

To correct this, the traffic has to be slowed at the on-ramp ( environmental stimuli, sounds and lights etc.) and the pile-up of dented cars need a traffic free environment to get untangled and moving ( refocus in a quiet place) or towed away ( a nap).

My doctor did some diagnostic work with a qEEG. He could observe as my brain's auditory filtering and processing center tried to pass everything I heard to be processed and forwarded to the frontal areas. Unfortunately, that first step of directing the auditory information gets stuck with a single lane where there normally should be 4 lanes. (25% processing power).

As such, it crashes and lets all of the auditory information flow unregulated and unformatted to the frontal area. Now, the frontal area is still working at full power ( mine is processing at up to 10 times normal power by my doctor's observations). Now, my brain is going full speed trying to decipher piles of shredded and cross-cut documents. As the saying goes, Garbage in, garbage out. A likely uncontrolled outburst or a total crash/pile-up.

The only solution for me is to physically limit the amount of sensory information allowed in. I do this by controlling my environment and being ready to exit an environment that gets beyond my ability to moderate.

With 10 years of practice with failures and successes and a prior 30 years of a less intense need to limit stress but still a need to limit stressors, I can lead a decent life. I had to move away from too busy and chaotic California and find a place in suburban and rural Idaho.

My 2 day visit to California last weekend was all I could handle. Same goes for visits to see my grandkids in Seattle.

Hope this helps people understand.

My best to you all and to all a Good Night.