Effect on the memory | ADHD Information
Memory is a problem, at work I am the only person with 2 phone lines, and sometimes the calls just come in so fast that I try to scribble everything down.
But I failed to complete my notes and just look at them blankly trying for the life of me to remember what was so important that I was suppose to do.
I have so many tasks that somedays I take a pure dis-liking to and will be half way through it and the next day come in and try again but start over from the start.
I have caught myself forgetting things just within a few seconds of having heard it, or thought about what I was going to be doing. I talk to myself alot trying to work backwards to remember what I am missing.
It is very flustrating, sometimes I just have to let it go, then later I get in trouble once I do get reminded that a deadline was attached to the thing I had forgotten.
our memory problems remind me of the movie 'momento' with guy pearce..he wakes up every day without his memory..
there was a sci fi story i read when i was a kid. short story about a man who had lost his memory. he would wake every day and his fiance would try to bring him up to speed..his last memory ended up being before the world had changed entirely b/c it was invaded by an alien master race..so he was one of the few that had the memory of earths past...since everyone else was wiped..
LOL
anyway those kind of stories always intrigue me..
i just feel senile sometimes.where is my bankcard?back pocket? front pocket? in my purse? which part of my purse? jeans at home? in my drivers' seat in my car? maybe it slid btwn my seat and the console? geez.
i hate that! i look for stuff frantically every day like i'm trying to win a million dollars if i do it fast enough!
find the wallet! find the keys! find your pda! get your phone charger.geez louise...
sumi
I may have a solution for you (about loosing the cell phone) depending on your phone type.
Mine let's me program different rings for different people. I have it set to default to vibrate (my phone shouldn't ring loudly in some of the places I work) but I set our home phone to make it ring. My wife RARELY calls me at work from our home phone, so the only time it rings is... you guessed it... when the Darn things lost and I'm looking for it!!!! 
While I'm posting... does anyone else find it impossible to follow the really long, really small posts??
Oh man I need help in that department - looking for shoes, keys and worse of all my cell phone. Half the time I turn the ringer off because I can't take a call - well then I misplace it and try to use dear husbands phone to call mine just to locate it, but that is hard to do when it is stuck in vibrate mode!
Me! my attention span is supper short and my retention rate is equal so i cannot keep it together for more then a paragraph or there abouts. It is like my interest in novels, i have upstair book, couch book, all at once so i dip in a bit everyday. I take forever to finish but damn it's fun, for me at least. Others, well, it is probably weird.
DADwithADD
I am going to have to try that - maybe set to a lower tone, since DH does call me from time to time at work (usually not if I tell him I will be busy that day).
I use to love reading books - fantasy novels, and I can't have no 100 / 200 page book no that is not good enough - has to be 600 / 800 page books. Problem is I get so focused that I can put 3 days straight into reading just to hurry up and get to the end as fast as possible.
Now I have trouble with staying awake, more often reading puts me to sleep. My eyes just bother me, I have not read a book in months.
Is this the Pricess Cruise line here? It must be, because we all seem to be on the same boat.
Drained. I can relate. I'm (or used to be) the worst conversationalist. Not only do I have a habit of not listening and interupting, I often times make others uncomfortable when on the phone. Especially when talking with strangers. I always have a hard time ending telephone conversations. So there's that uncomfortable silence. Then before you know it, I suddenly try to end the call abruptly. It's inevitable that my timing is off. Whenever I try to end the conversation, it's always when the other person was about to say something else. So, we end up speaking over each other. Then when they realize that I was ending the conversation, they stop suddenly hurry to rush in their "Good-bye's" as to fear they are going to get hung up on! I must come across as rude. I hate it when I do that.
Does that make any sense at all? Anyway, I don't know why I do that. I try really hard to slow down when on the phone and that seems to help.
Other than that, my medication is helping a lot. I'm getting a lot of help from Wellbutrin (depression and some ADD symptons like "scatter brain"), Paxil CR (anxiety and "what if" thinking) and most recently, Adderall XR. I beleive I am now seeing the benefits of Adderall. I'm much more mellow. The Wellbutrin has helped me greatly with conversations. I'm a much happier person.
i have a problem with memory too. it plays really not funny tricks on me. this is obviously one of our primary symptoms. when i was tested for my iq that was my lowest score...( i still managed to get a good score. yes i am a grade hog)
i have great memory when it comes to stuff that really interests me like science and general knowledge, random facts verbatim conversation memory, and i can remember stuff i've read almost verbatim. however today i forgot that my debit card was in my jeans pocket from yesterday. i forgot on that i had barely a drop of gas in my car ( i have an hour and half commute) and i was pulling a seinfeldian kramer move and eyeing the needle on 'e' the whole time hoping i wouldn't just run out til i got to a gas station on the other side of town. so then i had to purchase gas with my credit card which i hate b/c that means i have to pay interest on freaking gas. as soon as i filled up and i went to work i then freaked out b/c i didn't know where my credit card was. searched my entire car and it was in my purse. this happens to me every day. i feel i spend inordinate amounts of my time getting to near tears out of the sheer frustration digging around my purse my car my laundry my house my closets looking for things.
as a matter of fact i you could imagine a personal hell for me.>> it would be an existence where i would forever be looking for something i just had or just used or i need so much right now but i can never find it until two weeks later or until i'm an hour late..oh wait..i already live like that! LOL
so when it first dawned on me that i was severely adhd. mostly everyone around me thought i was just whining and totally a hypochondriac. i have to give myself credit, or not b/c i have unconciously worked around my issues as we all have. i space out in the middle of convos and i just guess what the context is. usually this is fine i'm good at judging what ppl are saying and most of it is just filler anyway. unfortunately i have been unfair to some ppl like my dear husband. he is calm and for me SLOW when he talks and explains things. and i want stuff concise and fast. meanwhile i've just learned realized , that i when i'm conversing sometimes i'm totally to the point and close to being perfuntory or curt..its not on purpose just utilitarian b/c i have no patience with anything else.
but sometimes i meander and i digress like crazy. yikes!
i annoy myself.
sumi
Drained, You do sound just like me too. Especially that part about interupting people during conversations. I just can't control/contain myself when I have something to say. I do realize I have been rude after the fact but it doesn't seem to make a difference in helping me control this behavior. I am hoping when I do get some medication that is one of the ADHD symptoms it will help.
Gettinagrip,
Like you if something peaks my interest, thats it, in feet first. Hey Drained!
Welcome.As the saying goes, Keep sharing and chatting.
Hi Barb, !
Chazinmo, Finding a good ADHD aware doc has been my battle.In the meantime this little corner has been a real teacher and broke the isolation, aloneness barrier for me.
Sounds like ADD...I do most of the same things you do...Try to find a MD who specializes in ADD and see what they say. I went from depression to anxity (sp)then to finally finding out I am ADD at the age of 29.
Good luck! And by the way, I am so glad to find a site that relates to what I am going through!
When I am reading anything I need to look for all the abbrevations definitions again and again. It feels like I cannot keep it in my memory at all, the same abbrevation I looked for the day before a zillion times, I need to look for the definition again. Can ADHD be causing this, or depression? Will it get any better? Can it get any better?
After realizing I do have ADHD a lot of old memories starting to make sense, why I was getting extremely angry to people when they break my concentration even just to make a joke. Why I starting to the same project the next day from scratch again since I lost where I was. All my excitements are very short term, and inside of me I know they would not last long and I hurry up upon them. Why I never liked history lessons, since I couldn't remember them.
I knew all the technical specs of any car when I was younger though, even know I can remember them, not sure why I cannot keep the same will on anything else.
Sometimes I think am I just lazy and want to run away/ quit / give up and that's why I am making this up or not. I don't know if this is realy or not. Sometimes I really believe I have an answer on somethings in my mind but a short while ago I totally forget about it and get down and get confused again.
When I need to tell somebody something during a conversation I feel like I have to say it right away otherwise I won't remember, I cut somebodies conversations since I think I'll be forgetting what I am going to say, don't even notice I am acting rude.
Drained,
Did I write that or did you? There is nothing wrong with you. You have ADD. Welcome home. We are all like you here, you fit in so well. I know the feeling of not being able to remember anything for 2 seconds. Someone told me just today "you really do have a bad memory don't you"! I said yep!
Its late and I'm tired so I will probably come back when I can make sense. I just hate to leave a post unanswered! 
Barb
Hey buddy,
Sounds just like me (and as it seems a whole lot of other good folks on this message board). According to the books I have been reading, these sound like classic ADD symptoms.
I am no doctor, but according to what I have read there are other possible causes for these types of symptoms also, although it sure sounds like ADD. But no matter what causes it, there is someTHING causing it. It is not a moral issue and you do not need to feel blame, shame, nor beat yourself up over it.
#1 - Try to find a doctor or counseler familiar with ADD. It is like a guy with a car and the lifters start clicking. So he pours STP into the tank. The clicking keeps getting louder and he just keeps putting different additives into the gas tank. Well, if the oil pump is leaking, that STP ain't gonna do a thing to fix the problem! So don't wait until all the oil is gone and the engine gets so hot it siezes and you throw a rod! Sometimes you need a mechanic for your car, and sometimes you need a doc for yourself! If you don't have insurance for a doc, the internet and the library have a lot of helpful information (like a Chilton's repair guide ).
#2 - Read and share with the great people on this message board. It has been a great help to me in the short time I have been coming here.
#3 - Don't ever give up (although I know the feeling well). If things are not working, try new things. Seeing a professional who understands ADD will help. So will a trip to the local library to find books on adult ADD.
#4 - You are not alone!
Hang in there!
IMO many of the behaviors (frantic, urgent, panic, confused, irritated) described in prior posts are not caused by ADD/ADHD. As described they resemble anxiety disorders (ocd, panic, social anxiety). Certainly the frequency and intensity of such anxiety events could be worsened by ADD-related forgetfulness or uncertainty. But the cause of the stress behavior is anxiety, not ADD. A direct approach to dealing with such stress events would be to better understand them and to learn simple ways to identify and respond to anxiety stimuli.
I recommend Lucinda Bassett's Attacking Anxiety program (www.stresscenter.com). It is expensive, but worth it. You can find it for around half price on eBay. You can also resell it after a few months ... but you may want to keep it for future selective 'refresher' listening and motivation. If you are lucky, your public library may have it. She also has several well-rated books that you can find on Amazon for a few bucks (in the Amazon Marketplace, i.e. used & new). Bassett is down-to-earth, easy to listen to, has a pleasant personality and offers countless observations of such behaviors and effective ways to deal with them.
I also like the classic "Stop Worrying, Start Living" by the eminent Dale Carnegie. There is a fine audio book (CD) version for on Amazon, exceptionally well narrated by Andrew McMillan. It is 10.5 hours and a pleasure to listen to: interesting, inspiring, motivating, loaded with useful knowledge. McMillan is as outstanding as the content is worthwhile. (It is never a big deal to buy something at a good price on Amazon, because if you finish with it you can very easily relist it for sale "Used & New" in the Amazon Marketplace and recover ~75%+ of what you paid.)
[Added: "Stop Worrying, Start Living" by Dale Carnegie has an average rating of 5/5 stars with 76 customer reviews on Amazon. I'd say that is a good indication of widespread high regard for this excellent work.]
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It’s how high you bounce that counts.