Confused… Loss of Motivation

[dithl]

@jojosephine: it looks great, congrats!! You even stained it too? So cool to read your before-and-after experiences, it’s easy enough to take diagnosis and meds for granted, nice to remember what a huge diff it can make.

Not a wet blanket, but a word to the wise…medication is awesome (for me anyway), but it also allows you to overwork your body without realizing it – until you crash. 🙂 It’s so hard to stop sometimes….but if I don’t consciously stop to eat/sleep/(I’m still working on exercise) properly, I wind up paying the price later. (As does everyone around me…)

And yes,this is advice @kc5jck-style. I haven’t done the greatest job of stopping these past couple of weeks. Then wonder why I feel like a robot. Capable of doing, sort of, but thinking, not so much. And getting ready in the morning is a b*@#!!

@blackdog: Naps are also awesome. The universal cure. I call it hitting the reset button.

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[blackdog]

@dithl – Naps are awesome. And it did help, except it wasn’t long enough. I really should have just stayed in bed today. Not feeling too well but wanted to get things done. The result is not much done and I’ll probably have to spend tomorrow resting.

I used to forget to eat/sleep, but it I wasn’t on medication when I did it. But now my energy level is really low and I just can’t get much done in a day anymore. So I am hoping if I get on medication it will give me a little more get-up-and-go. Overworking is not healthy, but neither is underworking.

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[jojosephine]

@dithl oh ya I totally get that. It just feels good to have the motivation to get this all done. I have an on going to do list. I am getting pretty good at prioritizing what needs to be done. Like the grimy state of my house can not be taken care of in one day. (like Rome wasn’t built in a day). I have broken it down in smaller tasks and handle one thing a day. Where as before the medication the whole task was so daunting, I just took it and “swept” the whole grungy house “under the rug”.  Now I see each small task as a victory. So it feels so good and now I am starting to see the results. I am also finding myself tidying as I go and cleaning up after myself. Before it would all pile up and that also became to daunting to face.

I do rest. I do eat (just grazing though the day on things like trail mix and staying hydrated). I have a big dinner and a couple hours have a pretty big bedtime snack. I am usually asleep by 9:30 and get up around 6am. Exercise is another story, it is so hard with the kids. The only time I can really do it is cutting into my sleep time. and I can’t sacrifice that. I try to do some active things with the kids, park far, and take the stairs as often as I can. It might be better once the kids are in full time school, but I have a couple more years for that.

There is absolutely no way I could nap during the day, now. I would want to get up and get stuff done. Before medication, I could lay in bed all day. I could watch TV all day. I have zero interest in that now. I don’t even like watching my favorite evening shows anymore. I feel like a functioning, contributing human being now. Anyways…back to my video project.

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[blackdog]

@jojosephine – I imagine taking care of two young children is pretty good exercise. And housework is good exercise too. Just climbing up and down to clean windows and cupboards, vacuuming and scrubbing, can be like a little mini workout.

The more I read your comments, the more I think I really want to try the medication. I know that it doesn’t solve all the problems, and it’s not a cure, but at least it might get me off the couch.

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[ProshopperLinda]

Blackdog…that’s a place I want to live! We’d all get more done and we’d have so much less stress too! If you ever find a place like that let me know and I’ll move in a heartbeat!

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[allan wallace]

Aha!

G’day, it’s been a while since I popped in here! It’s always re-assuring to hear of the familiar challenges….so comforting to know that I’m not the only one that is crippled by procrastination…the boring robots that march around with their clipboards ought to pushed over cliffs and left to rust lol
Hey, what happened to those little facey thingys? I love those things!

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[sdwa]

Yes, I get excited about projects and then lose interest, but my obsessions are drawn out over a year or more. This allows me to get stuff done that later feels like a waste of time. But I was really focused.

😉

Seriously though, sometimes what happens is that I run out of steam because I get stuck. There’s an unanswered question dogging me. I’m missing information I need. Maybe I don’t have the supplies at hand. I get interrupted and lose my train of thought. I start to doubt myself. I question whether what I’m working on is worthwhile. I get hung up on the difference between my value as a person and my ability to produce. It isn’t just a random dead stop. Usually something takes the wind out my sails.

As for being doomed to never be happy…I know the feeling.

I look at it this way. Happiness the Mood is different from Happiness as Overall Life Satisfaction. I have up days and down days. I have clear days and dark days. But in general, life is better than it used to be because I understand what I’m dealing with now, that this is the way I’m wired. I enjoy my abilities more because I stopped expecting myself to do what’s hard for me. I quit attempting the impossible and equating that with virtue. I know I’m good at making art, and I love to write. I don’t take accounting classes.

😉

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[jojosephine]

@blackdog things are so different on medication. I understand it is not a cure and when my daily dose is wearing off at the end of the day I can see some of the symptoms coming back (like some absent minded things like “why did I come upstairs again?”.  I will always have ADD.  I still have to put to work the strategies that have always been there, but before the medication those strategies did not work.  My efforts were futile.  I used to say “today is going to be a different day”- that never turned out to be a different day.  Just another day of broken promises to myself and complete disappointment in myself (and of course the feeling of drowning in…well..my life).  Now I have such a zest for life when I wake up in the morning.  I am excited to get to the tasks I have planned for the day because they are not as daunting and the more I get stuff done, the happier I am because I always wanted to be that person that did all that stuff I am doing now.  Medication really helps me.  I cannot speak for everyone, but I am sure a lot of people feel the same way and I totally understand why so many psychologists mistake ADD in adults for depression (I have been treated for depression multiple times in my life for depression and it never worked) – because that wasn’t the issue. The lack of zest for life, the fog, no motivation, all the results of untreated ADD.

@swda You are right about happiness being defined in 2 different ways. There is a day to day happiness that can be found in your mood. For example, I am not happy when my sons draw on my floor with marker. but my overall life happiness makes it tolerable. Where as before, I did not have that because all I could think of is OMG another daunting chore to add to my unbearable list of things.  My mood definitely can change through the day or from day to day, but I do have an overall happiness for life now because I can take charge of my life.  It’s great.

 

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[blackdog]

@jojosephine – You just hit the nail on the head. I have been thinking exactly that lately, about doctors mistaking ADD for depression. There is no doubt that I also have depression. But I don’t think that is responsible for my lack of motivation and zest. I think the clearest indicator that I also have ADD is that when I am feeling happy and having a good day emotionally I still don’t get anything done. When I wake up in the morning and I feel happy the first thing I think is “oh, I want to play video games!” or “oh, I want to go out and get a latte!’. It’s never “oh, I need to scrub the kitchen floor”.

@sdwa – I always love reading your comments. They are so beautiful and insightful. 🙂

What you describe is exactly why I don’t finish things. I get so frustrated if I don’t have all the pieces. And when there are a lot of supplies and a lot of steps involved in doing something it just seems like too much work. And the doubt. Why am I wasting my time on this? I should be doing something else, something more worthwhile, more productive.

And the way you describe happiness is perfect. I remember one time I was watching George Stroumboulopoulos (try spelling that without looking it up) on his old show, The Hour. He said he doesn’t believe it’s possible to have true happiness but that you can find balance and you can have happy moments. That has always stuck in my mind because I realized when I heard it that one of my problems is that I expect to be happy all the time. I want life to be like a movie where everything just automatically works out and everyone lives happily ever after. But life ain’t like that.

Oh, and jojosephine, when the kids draw on the floor with markers, they are making more work for themselves, not you. Make them clean it up. They’ll be less likely to do it again. 😉

 

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[dithl]

@jojosephine: It is so cool to read your posts. I can almost feel the relief, like you’re emerging out from under years of unfinished “stuff”.

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