Do you get knots in your stomach when your manager at work says, “Have you got five minutes to come and see me in my office tomorrow?”
That moment.
The message.
The stomach drop.
What are you thinking in this moment? What is your brain doing?
- “Oh no, what have I messed up?”
- “Was it because I got stuck in traffic this morning and missed the start of the meeting?”
- “Am I going to be put on a performance improvement plan (PIP) or even worse, sacked?”
- “Is my career over?”
- “There were rumours about redundancies, is this my time?”
- “How will I pay my mortgage?”
- “What if I end up homeless?”
RSD can be the gateway to catastrophising or snowball thinking.
The Snowball effect
You know when a tiny snowball starts rolling down a hill, picking up more and more snow until it grows into something massive? That’s the perfect image of the “snowball effect.” Small events or emotions can quietly gather momentum, eventually transforming into something overwhelming. It can hit faster than you realise.
That’s exactly how a small trigger can turn into a full-blown avalanche.
A minor worry becomes:
- Anxiety.
- Panic.
- Shame.
- Fear of rejection.
Sometimes, all within seconds.
The physical side of RSD
RSD isn’t just emotional, it’s physical.
In that moment, you might notice:
- A pounding heart.
- Nausea or a knot in your stomach.
- Brain fog.
- Shaking or uncontrollable crying.
- A visceral, clawing sensation in your chest.
- Rapid fire thinking. “Did I upset someone?” “Did I say something wrong?” “Did I miss something?”
- Little or zero sleep, spiralling anxiety, and feeling emotionally wrung out.
What is RSD?
Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria (RSD) describes the intense emotional pain triggered by perceived or actual rejection, criticism, or failure.
It’s not a formal diagnosis, but many professionals recognise it as a pattern often linked with ADHD and sometimes autism.
People experiencing RSD are not “too sensitive” or “dramatic.” It’s a nervous system reaction to a threat.
How RSD shows up at work
The workplace can amplify RSD in ways others don’t see. RSD often makes you feel like your reactions are “too much” or that you’re failing at being a “professional.”
Overthinking emails
Re-reading again and again. Worrying about tone, punctuation, the risk of being misunderstood, or accidentally coming off as rude. Trying really hard to ensure “message sent is message received.”
Stress from ambiguous messages
When a message is unclear, a brain wired for RSD often fills in the blanks with the worst case scenario.
If workplace communication is often vague, someone with RSD may feel constantly on edge.
This creates constant vigilance:
“What did they really mean?”
“Is something wrong?”
“Have I upset them?”
That level of hyper-alertness is exhausting and can lead to burnout.
Power dynamics and office politics
The workplace is not just a place where tasks get done. It’s a landscape of unspoken rules, hierarchy, expectations, and social cues. For someone with RSD, these can feel like invisible tripwires.
Power dynamics and office politics can intensify RSD in ways that are often invisible to others.
Constructive feedback
Even neutral feedback can trigger a full shame spiral:
- Feeling exposed.
- Feeling like a failure.
- Believing your manager dislikes you.
- Avoiding questions for fear of seeming incompetent.
Performance reviews
360 feedback?
Input from managers or supervisors, peers or colleagues, direct reports, clients, or external partners?
For someone with RSD, this can feel like standing in front of a firing squad.
Avoiding communication or going quiet
Silence becomes safer than the risk of being misunderstood or criticised.
People pleasing or overworking
People pleasing becomes a survival strategy to avoid conflict or criticism. Trying to stay liked by everyone to feel secure.
Perfectionism
Perfectionism often develops as a response to RSD. It’s a way to try to prevent criticism, avoid conflict, or be “good enough” to be accepted.
It can show up as working twice as hard just to feel “safe” from criticism.
Perfectionism may temporarily reduce fear of rejection, but it comes at a cost: burnout, never feeling “good enough”, anxiety, and a constant sense of pressure.
Your amygdala: The overactive alarm system
The amygdala is the tiny part of your brain responsible for detecting emotional danger.
In neurodivergent brains, especially those with ADHD, it can fire too quickly and too intensely.
- Neutral comments can feel threatening.
- A raised eyebrow feels like judgment.
- A sentence with a full stop instead of an emoji can feel like rejection.
These reactions are not character flaws.
They’re the result of a nervous system working overtime to protect you.
Your emotional intensity is not weakness, it’s wiring.
How counselling can help?
If you’re experiencing RSD in the workplace, counselling can provide a calm and supportive space to understand what’s happening beneath the emotional intensity. Together, we can work at a pace that feels right for you.
In our sessions, we can:
- Recognise the moments when RSD is influencing your emotional responses.
- Build practical coping tools to help you navigate overwhelm with more ease.
- Develop communication strategies that feel grounded and confident, rather than driven by fear.
- Strengthen boundaries to reduce people-pleasing, perfectionism, and burnout.
- Reframe unhelpful thoughts that contribute to shame, anxiety, and self-doubt.
- Explore past experiences that may be shaping how you show up at work today.
Counselling offers validation, clarity, and a supportive relationship where you don’t have to manage everything on your own.
It can help you approach work not from fear or urgency, but from confidence in who you already are.
You are not overreacting.
You are not broken.
You are not alone.