I think that in relation to infections etc, others probably see it as a overreaction (if they noticed - basically i start to feel sick and stop breathing for a bit... ), but it doesn't last long.
However, a while ago something else happened. I realised that I had started to feel intense anger a lot of the time, and that i was heading towards having rage issues. I then realised that i had been shelving a lot of negative stuff because i hadn't had time to deal properly and it was catching up with me. I realised also that i wasn't even sure what i was feeling immediately, so you are right, it is ironic - I had been spending a lot of time helping dc with emotional intelligence while my own emotional intelligence muscle had basically stopped working.
I considered going to the dr and asking for betablockers just to try to calm down a bit, but in the end i just went back to basics - every time I felt anything uncomfortable I would sit down immediately and write down what had happened, how it made me feel, and then go through the feeling and describing (in writing) the anger, fear, sadness, sorrow in relation to that event, and that would then process, and I would then be fine for a bit and then fairly quickly (like, an hour or so...) get wound up again about something else so i'd do the same thing, over and over. Once i had started doing this, literally after a couple of days i found it was lifting. It felt a bit like magic, lol. I then started doing what i used to do again, acknowledging the feeling in my head and processing straightaway.
Most of my rage was to do with other people's reactions and behaviour during the time when dc had been ill/having emotional problems. I had found it hard to talk about what had happened, people made assumptions that it was autism, adhd, etc, thought i needed to hear it and and said I was in denial, and things like that. It wasn't helpful, but before all this had happened it would have been water off a ducks back and I realised that it was because at that time, before it all happened, I had dealt with my feelings about things quickly and rarely got wound up, whereas while things were difficult I just didn't have the time or the headspace and so i shelved it. It started to come out at a time when things were near normal, after the euphoria of dc being ok, everything back to just sort of normal, so it was the time for the shelved stuff to resurface, maybe.
If that does not make sense, I will not be offended!
Thank you very much for saying that about your friend's son! It gives me hope too! I think you are right, that the skills dc are learning cannot fail to stand them in good stead. And thank god for the internet and forward thinking psychs!