I've found I often have trouble remembering things. It can be as simple as trying to find the word to make my point (or finish a sentence) to when I'm going through my nightly routine and cant remember if I took my prescriptions yet or not. Lately, I've been misplacing my phone just about every hour...sigh...
It's supremely frustrating. Ironically, I was sitting down to write out a list of topic ideas I'd had. There had been three. This was number two. I still don't know what number three had been. Yeah...Before I had finished writing this down, idea #3 had completely vanished. Try as I could, it was gone.
Is there anything we can do? Something to take, along with the handful of other Rx's and supplements that will clear our head and help us remember? Not that I've seen, and not that I'd be willing to add something else to the mix of things. Its just one more pill to remember to take...or did I?...lol...
So what can you do to deal with these little issues? The whole thing, in my experience anyway, is mostly just annoying and kinda inconvenient. I haven't stumbled upon any instance, that I can remember (ha!) that has made this a serious problem. So what do I do to survive the memory lapses? I have two words for you: post its. Yeah, I'm a huge fan. And I have them everywhere. There's a pad in my craft room, in my purse, computer bag, there's stacks of them at work, and I keep them next to the bed. There's nothing more annoying then going to bed thinking: I have to remember to do _____________ tomorrow, and then waking up the next day and having no clue what you'd wanted to MAKE SURE you did that day. So, yes, I keep them by the bed, the little notes I leave myself as I'm drifting off don't always make sense, but hey, at least I tried.
Another idea I've seen many bloggers advocate is the weekly pill reminder box. A few years ago, I could never understand why someone would have to fill one of those things every week to make sure they took their medications daily. I mean, I could see it if they were traveling, it condenses things and you don't need to take everything with you. I remember thinking, really? Is it that hard to remember if you took your pills that night or not?...And now here I am... I now understand, with unfortunate clarity how this can be a problem. It seems absurd and a bit of an exaggeration if you've never experienced it for yourself. Its hard to explain to someone how it can be, and really do you want to try? I mean, I'm 28, I don't want to come off sounding like some 80 year old who can't remember worth beans, but isn't that how we feel a good deal of the time? Not only is the memory an issue, but we're plagued by other health problems that are normally considered by most to be limited to the elderly. When people joke around that something shouldn't be an issue/problem for me, "cause I'm young" I just kinda smile and say "I may be young, but I have the body of an 80 year old". And apparently, occasionally it spreads to my memory as well...
I was told memory loss and problem concentrating goes with the disease. Losing words mid-sentence, not remembering numbers and very basic information. Short term memory is a real issue. I can remember what I did years ago, but not an hour ago. My coping strategy include writing everything down, lots of postits all over the place, record reminders in my own voice and set them as alarms on my cellphone, stop multi-tasking as I was failing badly at it, get other people to remind me, delegate more to those around me, make lots of random notes to self, turn off radio because background noise don't help, listen to music without words to help concentrating, resolve to playing card games to help re-build my memory...... and the list goes on. I'm happy to say I'm getting some measure of success, so don't give in! It is temporary, don't give up!
ReplyDelete