It’s like being stuck behind a glass wall in my own head - watching myself be stuck unable to do what needs to get done
Artist Source: https://schnumn.com/
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My life.
I’m right now stuck in a fucked up spot with this. There’s a funeral tomorrow that I need to go to, for myself, my friends, the person who has passed and her family. The past three weeks since she passed, from sudden unexpected death in epilepsy (SUDEP), has been fucking fucked. I’ve only been able to sleep every two nights, just from exhaustion, but I’ve been fully focused on saving any and all possible energy to get to this funeral. I’m in bed and my downstairs neighbour who moved in a couple of weeks ago has people over and they’re all kinds of fucked up, loud talking, shouting, stumbles, going in and out of the apartment etc. I’ve banged on the walls and the floor but they seem way too gone to even hear it. I should call in a disturbance report but I’m so far from being able to do that, it would fuck my whole night as much as it does just letting them be. I’m so stuck that I’m crying on the inside but unable to do so physically and it’s all just hitting me like a rain of cannonballs. There’s one thing I hope can help, music, but my earpods are in the kitchen and even turning in bed feels too much right now. I don’t know how to het out of this, just stuck.
Just wanted to say I read your post and thanks for sharing. I can’t help directly over the Internet, but I hope that writing it down helped you distance yourself a bit from the frustration.
I get past this by accepting that I’m not going to get everything done, picking the highest priority thing (or whatever I want to do the most if they’re the same) and reframing it as “Everything else can wait, I need to get this done today”. It’s not ideal but it does usually work that least get one thing off the list. Sometimes getting the one thing done will even get the juices flowing to start knocking other things off the list too.
Hah. Imagine being able to tell what is the highest priority or what you want.
Throw a dart at the wall then. The point is to filter as much of the noise as you can and get moving.
I’ve been floundering with this project. They’ve given me some deadlines and as usual my panic centers are lighting up and I’m starting to work on it.
I hate this cycle
Yeah I know that feeling, being the most motivated only by severe pressure of the quickly approaching deadline 😅 How I managed through uni with a good grade is beyond me sometimes lol. Meds helped a bit with that for me though
Why am I not doing them right now?
Because I just remembered you can install Seven Kingdoms II for free on Linux
I still haven’t moved my standing fan from my room back into storage. It’s fall. The heater kicked on a few days ago and I still haven’t moved the fan back…
But the fan can help to distribute the heat better.
Ehhh it makes too much noise and can’t be made to run slower and quieter. I’d rather stash it.
Something something, therapist asking if I’ve dealt with getting a new psych for meds yet… ;-;
we should normalize doing nothing at all. the society’s demand for everyone to be productive at all times is a sickness that must be eradicated.
that’s cool but i still need to do the fucking laundry at some point
Let it become an civilization, and be its god.
No, I want to do stuff. I don’t want people to tell me it’s ok to just lay and rot. Occasional moments of respite are good, but not this.
I completely agree, but I think there is a balance to be struck if you need to be productive to take care of your living area. I love to do nothing and am proud of that, but I also want a clean kitchen and bathroom.
We should not. Make use of your time, and try to be productive as much as possible.
As long as we acknowledge that having downtime, and doing activities for yourself and for your mental health is also productive. Even if that occasionally includes having a day where you’re doing very little and resting.
Burnout and such also reduces your efficiency with other tasks anyways (and can damage mental health). It’s why I disagree with the wording of “people are expected to work like machines” because even machines are given downtime for maintenance. Some people seem to expect other people to work without downtime or self-care in the name of productivity and it’s insane
yeah, better have a self care day than a burnt-out year
Yep exactly! I used to feel guilty when I ever had a day where I did nothing other than eat, shower and game. Now, I look forward to it.
We all need our breaks to recover and recharge for the week ahead and society kinda tries to push us to feel bad about that.
Sometimes I’m working on a project or my job… Sometimes I’m working on/for myself. Still work, just the latter is paid in a different way ✨
Make use of your time to bring joy to yourself and others.
“Productive” is a lie.
What I said is:
Don’t bedrot, be efficient and discover the skill that just clicks with you and keep doing it
I think it was just how you worded it originally that got people mistaken on what you meant haha. I at first assumed you meant the “don’t stop working” kind too… Unfortunately some people do have that way of thinking
But yeah skill development can be fun when we find the right ones for us. I’m an artist and do that in my day-to-day but I’ve always dipped into programming on and off through my life… I wanna soon put some proper effort into learning more than just the basics of a language (and without relying on vibe-coding).
It’s nice to have personal goals
you first. also no.
just another normal day
Yep, some days better or worse than others. I missed my usual dose time for my Elvanse so today is a no-meds day. Maybe a do little and play Stardew day
I was on amphetamines once and it worked so well, but doctors keep putting me on other shit that does nothing despite I always repeating amphetamines worked…
Damn, why? :( Surely it makes sense to just keep you on the thing that’s been found to work the best. I was once on Methylphenidate at the start of my meds titration which was a non-amphetamine that did work but brought along a good few negative side effects due me so it was agreed to try Elvanse.
The highest dose of that has been perfect for me so I’ve been kept on it…
Hope you manage to get back on the right meds for you soon!
Same, adderall works but my heart rate is going up too much and I take it sparingly. Trying to exercise more and quit smoking (I know, awful) but for now I’m just not taking it and doing my best. Which right now consists of working on a bunch of lemmy scripts instead of studying for pre-nursing, although I’d prefer CS but I’m afraid of the industry and I’m old (43). FML
I feel you on this one. I had to stop my amphetamine medication because it was giving my heart an arrhythmia. Nothing works as well, but my heart. I guess I am just going to be a little more dysfunctional.
Adderall not working for me 😭
Well, for me it’s like that everyday right now. I think I’m having a sever depressive phase. This stuff also occurs as a depression symptom. But that also means it’s not always always like that for me.
And 20:30 again. I should really cook something, do workouts and shower before the day is over 😐
Ah yeah I can understand that. Though I’m thankfully not going through it at this moment, I’m well acquainted with those depressive episodes :/ it definitely adds to the issue…
Be easy on yourself though, may the food and shower be pleasant for you ❤️
I’m pretty good at pushing past those points. Just pushing, pushing, pushing until I collapse especially when I have someone else to push for.
The graphical artifacting of mental illness.
People thinks of themselves as machine following a spreadsheet plan. In reality we desperately NEED of times like these to just stop, and do…
…not.
…a.
…fucking.
…thing.
I call them burn days.
I’ve burned weeks.
the problem here is that it’s been a single continous moment for my entire life, and there are in fact things that i want to do but it just doesn’t happen.
I hope you’re not saying that it’s good to play minecraft until my body starts screaming at me loudly enough that i finally get off my ass and refill my water bottle? because it’s really not good
In one way, I agree, but unfortunately with Executive Dysfunction it can also affect your need to eat or look after yourself, as your brain just fails to assign or prioritise tasks. It gets really bad for me if I am or was recently overstimulated, or if I’m having a depressive episode.
I’ve had days where all I needed to do was have a shower, go to the shop, eat food then go play a game since it was the weekend. But the dysfunction hit so hard I couldn’t do any of it so just sat staring at a wall for an hour and doomscrolling for another few hours. I’d have preferred to have just played the game, but since that was one of my planned tasks, I couldn’t bring myself to do it.
Took majority of the day before I could break out of it and get to the shop before they closed. Almost sounds odd when explaining it but the brain is an unusual thing sometimes…
But yeah I do agree that sometimes people work themselves too hard and need to find time to stop and give time to themselves
Right. In some situations, that’s probably the right thing. I’m not sure about OP’s situation, but this comic resonates with me for the following scenarios (among many, many others):
- doing my taxes
- applying for jobs
- making a GP appointment for mental health issues, or literally anything else
- planning my wedding
- doing the laundry
- sending a “happy birthday” text to my brother (literally just “Happy birthday!” and a suitable emoji would do)
In all of these cases, I know what to do, and I want to do it, and I’m able to do it. I just don’t. Somehow, I just don’t. I just can’t get myself to do the thing. If that doesn’t resonate with you, or your immediate reaction is “oh, just do the thing!”, then maybe you’re not the target audience of this comic.
It’s been months. Since perimenopause started it’s been almost impossible to break task paralysis. I went and got diagnosed, got medication, noting is helping. Deal with ADHD before you get old, don’t end up like me.
just out of curiosity have you tried hrt? might be worth considering if you havent.
Not yet, figured I’d try the medication route first since I had a hormone panel done and it was still reasonably ok. I plan to though, if all else fails. I have a long list of endocrine conditions, I wouldn’t be surprised if it helps more than I think it will.
Just throwing it out there, but how’s your sleep?
I have adhd and recently discovered I have sleep apnea as well. I was at wits end before I got my cpap. The combination is a wombo combo for executive disfunction.
Like most neurodivergent people, my sleep is shit and thinly held together with medication and weed. Before my mood stabilizer I really struggled, but it helps me sleep now. Still, I have to sleep much longer than most people and I’m still exhausted all day. Hypervilligance takes it out of my brain.
Damn, have you tried other meds other than the Adderall you mentioned in another comment? If not, it could be the wrong meds for you (Though saying that, I have no clue personally on how much perimenopause adds to the issue, so I’m sorry to hear that 💔)
Hope it gets easier for you though!
I’m giving it another month and then I’ll try something else. It’s my last hope :(
Hope it does improve for you! Did you go through titration (trialing meds at a low dose and slowly increased over the weeks while being monitored) for your meds or did your doctor just give you meds and wave you away? I’ve heard of some people having that happen which sucks…
Like, for me I was on methylphenidate (concerta) at the start of titration and had to report back any side effects (and my blood pressure, weight etc) and each week the dose was increased til the positive effects were the strongest with little/no side effects. I’m pretty sure if I had told them the meds weren’t working at all or not helping much, they’d have taken that as a sign to try a different medication… There’s a lot of different types of ADHD meds and they affect us all differently (or with some, not at all or with negative side effects)
I ended up having some negative effects with methylphenidate, and was switched over to Elvanse and it was a night and day difference with no side effects (for my body - I’m not saying Elvanse will be like that for everyone :p).
Hopefully it’s just the wrong med for you and you find the right one eventually! Good luck :)
I tapered up too, I’m hoping that one will work for me too, I’ve heard several people say it worked for them when others didn’t.
Yeah, it all depends on the person :p it’s been great for me though!
i setup a automation that triggers my hifi to blast music at me to jolt me off the couch. i usually turn it off once im standing up but it allows to create that initial transition im avoiding.
need one of those Wallace & Gromit couches that fling me off it with a massive spring
literally me rn
comp sci project due tomorrow and writing assignment due yesterday but not doing anything bc brain is too drained
That’s rough… Good luck though!
Hopefully you’ll have some possible downtime after the assignments? Even just for a few days or so?
