This morning I’m mostly grumpy about my ADHD.
Firstly, I didn’t get around to taking my pill until an hour after I got up, because I straight up forgot, despite remembering as I was pouring my coffee.
Then I just realised that I missed a Dr appointment yesterday, because it was made two fucking weeks ago, and despite being in the fucking calendar I can’t be trusted to fucking remember anything.
I’m particularly angry about that, because it was to review (and hopefully increase) my meds…
I’m angry about that because it could have been a sodding phone appointment, but every drs surgery is run by old guys who are massively averse to anything beyond sitting in front of their patients so they can chastise them for being fat.
And I really want to practice the mindfulness I’ve been taught, to consider that this is a spiral, and that ultimately no harm has been done, I’ll just be increasing (hopefully) my dosage a couple of weeks later.
But I’m frustrated that there’s so much stuff I have to remember that I just can’t. Other people manage to juggle all the needs on them, but I feel like I always fail, or at the very least that I can’t be trusted to be consistent.
I was diagnosed in 2019, at the age of 39. So I have a lot of work to do to unravel all the ‘coping’ mechanisms I’ve taught myself over the years. But what’s been most eye-opening is my shift in perception of what ADHD is from something that naughty boys at school are told they have, to this thing that afflicts my brain which causes me to forget everything all the damn time.
And the best part is when I complain about this, and some well-meaning person will say “Have you tried using X.app?” and I’ll go to download X.app ONLY TO FIND I ALREADY FUCKING HAVE IT, THAT I USED IT THREE TIMES THEN FORGOT IT EXISTED.
And it’s all just so fucking exhausting.
Yeah, diagnosed at 31 here. So many coping mechanisms that do or don’t work.
Unfortunately during the summer I have to choose. My meds or decongestants to at least reduce the misery from bad seasonal allergies.
Can’t make doctor appointments, can’t remember to call a contractor to fix the porch, forget to call people on their birthdays, forget to cancel subscriptions, can’t remember to do simple task, or return things under warranty…etc I always remember things in the middle of the night, when you can’t call any of the businesses or people you need to call, or drop anything off.
Work is my hyperfocus time, so all the other tasks and todos I have vanish from my brain till after, even with meds.
It’s frustrating man, I feel ya, shit sucks.
I always remember things in the middle of the night, when you can’t call any of the businesses or people you need to call, or drop anything off.
At the risk of being the “But have you tried this app” Guy, for the problem you’ve outlined here, I use Brain Toss. Literally all it does is email your own ramblings back at you, so if you remember something in the night, tap out a message on Brain Toss, then when you check your emails the next day there will be a reminder.
When I remember I have it, it’s a brilliant little app.
I have Projects, To Do List, and a wiki I’m building using Notion. I highly recommend it. Biggest one stop shop and most customizable.
I’m even working on a workout tracker and meal planner with grocery databases and stuff. It’s really comprehensive and I’m just modifying templates others have established.
I spent weeks building a calorie tracker in Numbers to help me lose weight, which worked amazingly well. For a month.
Then I forgot to put a few meals in, got annoyed with myself, got the self loathing, decided that the tracker was now damning evidence of how flaky I am, and abandoned it.
I’ll look into Notion though.
I absolutely get that sentiment. That’s what killed it for me the first time even though I was doing so well. Around thanksgiving a couple years ago, I decided to top tracking because “oh it’s the holiday, I might as well enjoy it”, and then Covid hit and I really said fuck it.
I got back into it last year after I finally decided to get myself medicated. It started off rough, and I definitely missed some days, or skipped some days because “why would I count, I know I’m going to go over anyways?”, but eventually the habit stuck and it’s been almost a year since I’ve started tracking. It’s still tedious at times, but it’s become second nature to log my foods when I’m making a meal. It may be slow going at first, and it may take a few tries for it to stick, but eventually it will
I would HIGHLY recommend obsidian over Notion for knowledge management.
Mainly from a portability and data-ownership perspective.
However, I’m a dev, so I may be biased towards solutions that give me lots of freedom to utilize different technologies to get exactly what I want.
Is there a significant difference between something like Obsidian and OneNote?
Yes, QUITE a bit.
Obsidian has a significant community plugin ecosystem to start. It also uses markdown which you have control over, simple files, so it’s entirely portable and not tied to obsidian. It has a lot of features geared towards personal knowledge management and linking knowledge together.
Two different use cases IMHO. I don’t use Obsidian for scratch notes, I use if as a 2nd brain (https://www.buildingasecondbrain.com/).
So, the second brain thing just sounds like a journal or diary but with good indexing and searchability. Is that correct? I guess I’m not understanding why it’s unique or how it’d be useful…but I suck ass at knowing what to write in journals or diaries, so this is likely at least partially just a ‘me’ thing.
I’m just not sure what I’d write into one of these things. Do you mind if I ask what types of things you out in yours?
I signed up for their emails, so maybe that’ll help me. I wish I could just snap my fingers and already have it all done, lol! It sounds so daunting and I don’t know where I’d start or what I’d put in it.
