Worrying cognitive decline / impairment drug induced reversible?

[YippeeKi YOW !!]

@

I threw the benzos out of my house fearing them to worsen the decline aslo, i only take the betmiga now for the blatter problems but the cognitive impairment did not stop and it didn't get better.
What should I do?

I have no clue as to what kind of benzos you were taking, or how long, or when you stopped them. What I can share is that benzos will screw with your brain in absolutely Olympic quality ways, and it takes a loooong time to bounce, or even slowly slog, back.

Can someone help me please or has any ideas how to make this improve again?

Time is the only real cure. Your GABAa receptors have been downregulated by the benzos, and the acetylcholinesterase (AChE) stuff doent help, either. Both require time for the brain reboot, repair, and recover.

I would do anything to get my brains back ...

This can be dangerous. There are a lot of things that might work for other people, or that have a huge following of true believers, or that look good on paper, but they could be exactly the wrong thing for you, and there's no telling what those might be.

I'd steer clear of nootropics in an form right now. For the most part, they're untested and only lightly controlled and reviewed by the FDA or anyone else They sell largely by word of mouth and wildly enthusiastic reviews. Most of the have serious rebound effects, something you dont need right now. or really, ever.

it feels like all the knowledge I built up during my studies and afterwards are inaccessible for me and I live in like a bubble, very far from this.

Believe me, it's all there waiting for you, and it will come back. Your brain has been hammered by a battery of drugs, and that's not even counting the interactive effects that boost and increase side effects.

So okay to be clear my doctor never ever told me, not even gave a hint or suggested, that these problems were to be expected.

I agree with @Wishful ..... Drs prescribe potentially incredibly damaging drugs like they're baby aspirin, and always pretend wild surprize when patients report bad side effects, usually responding with things like: "That's really interesting ..." or "I've never heard that before, no one else has reprted those problems ...." or "This drug couldnt possibly be causing any of that, it's all in your little head ...".

It's not. While I'd probably be inclined to stick with the drug intended to reduce your nocturia (excessive night time peeing), which is hell on sleep (something you really need right now), I'd dump everything else. But that's just me, and has nothing to do with what you might want or be comfortable with.

Also the benzodiazepine use may have decreased everything even more?

Bingo!!!

it seems benzodiazepines were not harming my brain that much *?* and they are much wider used!!

They are more widely used because they're easy to prescribe, and it's easy to defend prescribing them. And because so many Drs are lazy and ill-informed. They're devastatingly damaging to your brain and CNS, among other things, and in some cases, they're literally deadly.

If you're still taking any form of benzo (and they come under many, many names) I'd consier tapering off them. Do not stop them all at oce, or you'll be in real hell and for a very long time. If you've been taking any form of benzo, you're probably already in tolerance withdrawal, which occurs when your body and brain have adjusted to the prescribed dose and now need more for the same effect, after which they'll need still more, and more, and more, ad infinitum.

I'll be happy to supply it, if you need more info. Am a little tired and unfocused right now, so this is a sort of thumbnail sketch, and it's based on very little information, sooooooo ......

 

[Rufous McKinney]

It is scary, worisome and shocking. I hope I will improve.

All that you said is very similar to what I am dealing with as well. I've lost so much cognitive capacity that I "almost" can't freak out about it or that WOULD BE IT.

I was: famously capable.

I am now: secretly and publically incapable.

But lots of my brain is still in there, I see glimpses. The energy to retrieve the thought, and string several together...seems missing.

And if I rest, I can get a bit of improvement which I appreciate.

I've given myself permission...to just BE and EXPERIENCE this mess.... but try real hard NOT TO analyze it too much, dissect it too much.

I'll worry about how to pass that Driver's license test...in a few weeks. If I can't pass: well then. Oh well then.

(aside- I've had to be on the computer for the last week, 4-5hours a day, I am "having" to do some work involving alot of computer cognitive activity. I'm not doing physical. Well, I have really deteriorated over the last week from doing this work..the kind of work I did for DECADES without blinking.). Its scary, worrisome and shocking.

 

[YippeeKi YOW !!]

@Rufous McKinney , @Belgiangirl

I've given myself permission...to just BE and EXPERIENCE this mess.... but try real hard NOT TO analyze it too much, dissect it too much.

That's the only way to survive this and even to probably come out the other side.

Well, I have really deteriorated over the last week from doing this work..the kind of work I did for DECADES without blinking.). Its scary, worrisome and shocking.

I find that mental exertion requires even more rigorous pacing than the physical type does. Five hours a day is a long stretch for a stressed mind/brain. Dont be scared. Rest, take breaks, do lie downs, clock out when you need to. Give yourself time to recover from this. It'll all come back, slowly but steadily.

 

[Rufous McKinney]

I find that mental exertion requires even more rigorous pacing than the physical type does. Five hours a day is a long stretch for a stressed mind/brain. Dont be scared. Rest, take breaks, do lie downs, clock out when you need to. Give yourself time to recover from this. It'll all come back, slowly but steadily.

Have a deadline. So the deed has to be done. Or: forgone. But its mostly done. Or as done as its gonna get.

The super irritating part is: I had largely gotten my brain to quiet......and now its all AGITATED.

 

[gbells]

I recognise a lot in your story. It seemed that my intelligence was weakening by the minute, but because my interests seems to change: baking, gardening, cleaning the house and stuff (of course not that we have the energy to make all our plans reality) I didn't notice the decline was so extreme.


Though I did notice especially during conversations and writing - something I did fluently and got paid for as someone else here since my verbal skills were impressive - that I couldn't find the words anymore or had difficulty construing a sentence. Normally my brain is always thinking, my fingers have difficulty following to type it - making me also type extremely fast, always without any mistake in spelling or grammar, but now: nothing happened anymore... Now even writing this post I am re-writing and editing it all the time, because I make mistake or don't even how to spell out the most easy words...

As mentioned before I told this to my GP many times, though they would ignore it and blame or my sleeping troubles or my fatigue...

I stopped all benzo use, all acetylcholines, and started taking ginseng thanks to that same GPs. I noticed some clear improvements, but of course the gap from were I have been was still huge. So I ordered huperzine A and phospatidylserine - which I had a very harsh time learning this words by heart and I don't even succeed in it today... - I took huperzine A in the morning and noticed a small headache. In the evening I took phosphatidylserine. I had a HUGE headache in the evening and night beyond belief...

Didn't go to the ER or sth bcs I went there in the same period to much bcs of lung problems (still having no clue what is their etiology right now) and what could I tell them?
Afterwards I noticed an extrééme decline .... don't dare to take the pills again without medical advice... only question is who to go to?


still having amazingly difficulties finding words, I feel it is almost as worse as on the most extreme moments.... it is very depressing. I can't remember "new" words (which I have known once), I can't retrieve them, I try to think but nothing is happening in my brain, why I always was philosophing, thinking about society problems, how to solve them, politics, economics, sociology, psychology, ... now I am like numb... not even aware of anything and not even following the news anymore - because I know i can't place it, nor process it anymore, and will forget it. So it feels like even when I look for verbal input (bcs I have lived with my mother for some time who is verbally very weak and probably is IQ-wise suffering from retardation - probably has always done so ) so I have to avoid using difficult, let alone academic, words.

But all the words I was juggling with, I was playing with numbers using statistics, I was looking up information and processed it immediately in a text, in 2 weeks I could write an academic dissertation for master students which they would get 16/20 for at least for almost any subject. Now I can't even use google appropriately anymore, I just can't find the words...

It is scary, worisome and shocking. I hope I will improve.


I am confirmed ANA positive, because all symptoms most probable candidate is lupus and on plaquenil now and montelukast for the lung problems, the thing is I am afraid... because even if I will find a doctor who wants to work out things, test my cognitive function and help me to find solutions, it is very probably that I will be sitting there, nothing wil happen in my head, and I will just ben completely numbed out and don't say anything useful, making it impossible to help me ... (or think I can't be helped anymore).

Belgian, here is what some others have done:

They got their nagalase tested due to their history of viral infections. Some doctors have found that if it's high they could rule out cancer then start treating with sublingual GcMAF and vitamin D3 for four months.
Some have found that Nagalase will likely need re-testing at two and four months to see if it has dropped. Also, some have found that Antibody tests may be helpful for viruses and bacterial infections that match your syptoms (bartonella, lyme, rickettsia) and common CFS viral infections (EBV, HHV6, cytomegalovirus, toxoplasmosis). GcMAF should give you a window to test.
Rocky Mountain Spotted fever could be checked for if any symptoms match (headache). Nonspecific positive for it may indicate treatment with doxycycline to see if some symptoms clear. This idea is that high nagalase will give false negatives for antibody tests.

Some people have found that Curcumin and earthing before sleep can control inflammation.

That may help.

 

[Belgiangirl]

Belgian, I'd recommend this strategy.

1. Since you had past viral infection get a nagalase test done. If high have your doc rule out cancer then start treating with sublingual GcMAF and vitamin D3 for four months. Retest nagalase at two and four months to see if it has dropped. Then have antibody tests for viruses and bacterial infections that match your syptoms (bartonella, lyme, rickettsia) and common CFS viral infections (EBV, HHV6, cytomegalovirus). GcMAF should give you a window to test. Also check for Rocky Mountain Spotted fever if you have any symptoms that match (headache). If you come up nonspecific positive for it then have your doc treat you with doxycycline and see if some of your symptoms clear. This idea is that high nagalase will give false negatives for antibody tests.

2. Use curcumin and earthing when you sleep to control your inflammation.

That may help.

Wow, are you an MD?

That is a very high level of knowledge you are displaying here - i dream to have it too.

Very interesting, never heart of nagalase, it is really the first time I hear it.
I also do realise if my current GP is going to stay my GP I should be more demanding, insisting, more sec and
more stress out how debilitating certain symptoms are for me.
Now I am here for almost 2 months with lung burning pain making me sometimes even wishing not to be alive... still he thinks it is just something which isn't there... (happily I do get medication for it) and well the pulmonologist is also guilty, but getting tests or referrals to other doctors is very very difficult especially when you ask for them...

But really thank you very much for the help. Today I took the phone and also called to make an appointment with a nefrologist (kidney cyst is sitting there forever and I don't know what it is, everyone says doesn't mean anything but at least I guess the thing has a a name?) and a neurologist at the same time, i am going to try to get a lumbal punction... don't think I will be successfull but I can't blame myself if I try... (Rocky mountain spotted fever isn't something in Europe I guess? I am in belgium where we have public healthcare and everything you ask for the thing they just think about is saving).

I hope to find a doctor who is willing to help me with this.

 

[gbells]

I'm a chiropactor who contracted SEIDs 11 years ago from EBV + HHV6 and an unknown bacteria. I also have an undergraduate degree in Biology and Sociology. I've also worked in clinical research and have training in clinical data management and running research studies.

I do a lot of research on pubmed to identify possible treatments in a quest to cure the disease. So far I've tested many different theories on myself but haven't set up any studies on others.

Please note, I just added toxoplasmosis to the list of organisms to test for. Having it suggests a poor prognosis due to resistance to apoptosis.

 

[Belgiangirl]

@

I have no clue as to what kind of benzos you were taking, or how long, or when you stopped them. What I can share is that benzos will screw with your brain in absolutely Olympic quality ways, and it takes a loooong time to bounce, or even slowly slog, back.

Time is the only real cure. Your GABAa receptors have been downregulated by the benzos, and the acetylcholinesterase (AChE) stuff doent help, either. Both require time for the brain reboot, repair, and recover.

This can be dangerous. There are a lot of things that might work for other people, or that have a huge following of true believers, or that look good on paper, but they could be exactly the wrong thing for you, and there's no telling what those might be.

I'd steer clear of nootropics in an form right now. For the most part, they're untested and only lightly controlled and reviewed by the FDA or anyone else They sell largely by word of mouth and wildly enthusiastic reviews. Most of the have serious rebound effects, something you dont need right now. or really, ever.

Believe me, it's all there waiting for you, and it will come back. Your brain has been hammered by a battery of drugs, and that's not even counting the interactive effects that boost and increase side effects.

I agree with @Wishful ..... Drs prescribe potentially incredibly damaging drugs like they're baby aspirin, and always pretend wild surprize when patients report bad side effects, usually responding with things like: "That's really interesting ..." or "I've never heard that before, no one else has reprted those problems ...." or "This drug couldnt possibly be causing any of that, it's all in your little head ...".

It's not. While I'd probably be inclined to stick with the drug intended to reduce your nocturia (excessive night time peeing), which is hell on sleep (something you really need right now), I'd dump everything else. But that's just me, and has nothing to do with what you might want or be comfortable with.

Bingo!!!

They are more widely used because they're easy to prescribe, and it's easy to defend prescribing them. And because so many Drs are lazy and ill-informed. They're devastatingly damaging to your brain and CNS, among other things, and in some cases, they're literally deadly.

If you're still taking any form of benzo (and they come under many, many names) I'd consier tapering off them. Do not stop them all at oce, or you'll be in real hell and for a very long time. If you've been taking any form of benzo, you're probably already in tolerance withdrawal, which occurs when your body and brain have adjusted to the prescribed dose and now need more for the same effect, after which they'll need still more, and more, and more, ad infinitum.

I'll be happy to supply it, if you need more info. Am a little tired and unfocused right now, so this is a sort of thumbnail sketch, and it's based on very little information, sooooooo ......

Thank you very very much for your reply, all the replies and supporting words are highly appreciated.

Well at least some good news:
- i still keep training my brain (by challenging myself to find certain words - maybe also in other languages: I used to speak 4 and was learning the 5th one)
- i take the ginseng daily

Indeed benzo's I've stopped cold turkey with. Never ever ever again ...
Can you imagine actually my main reason for taking them was ... heart arythmia's!!! My heart was palpitating and getting arhytmia's so bad that I felt like my body was wanting to stress while my mind wanted to sleep so ...
I don't know if these are all so unguilty or if everyone will recover since what I read those anticholinergic drugs (which I was clearly being overdosed on!! Something the GP or the pharmacist should have been catching but it is possible I didn't even pay for the drugs since my GP - because they feel for me and now i am on sickness benefits - gives them in my hands. That is very nice and saves energy and especially money, but it is possible that drug interactions of accumulation of certain very similar stuff has been missed.
On the other hand I also told the pharmacist about my problem and it is not like they are going to say mea culpa even if they should have known or all these pills were in my pharmaceutical file.) are linked with dementia ... something I have in my family at both side. Of course as a 20-30 year old nothing you tell your GP about...
Actually they should tell you this upon prescribing them also it seems highly irrelevant for your age and probably they don't want to give you another reason to stress or to worry (i guess the first time i took them was because of extreme problems in my private life - something with unjustice and governmental issue of which a lawsuit is still going on ... ).


After the push back since the headache effect (I read about it briefly (the fact that I do research and am able to focus for seconds to read something, to save it and remember it and retrieve it on the right moment while writing down about it here is already a miracle by itself!!!!) now and all I can understand this far is that Huperzine A as well as phospathidylserine (aaaaaaarrrr I had to look this up for the 1000th time while normally I can remember words straight esp since I've written it down almost 10 times and looked it up to order...) contain high doses of acetylcholine... while 500 microgram for the phospatidylserine already is an extremely high dose supplement. Combine this with the fact that I am underweight...
Probably that was not thought true very well... this probably explains the headache.
I also do take lecithin (and magnesium among many other stuff).

Maybe this combination of drugs may help others too?
Patience and sleep are import too! I fail myself on the latter one I must say (since I have been very busy) but I do try to make time to read and my brain is very happy to be fed with verbal input again, I hope I can be this verbally good again to write again myself in a 'upperclass' (see, don't find the word...) way...

 

[Belgiangirl]

I'm a chiropactor who contracted SEIDs 11 years ago from EBV + HHV6 and an unknown bacteria. I also have an undergraduate degree in Biology and Sociology. I've also worked in clinical research and have training in clinical data management and running research studies.

I do a lot of research on pubmed to identify possible treatments in a quest to cure the disease. So far I've tested many different theories on myself but haven't set up any studies on others.

Please note, I just added toxoplasmosis to the list of organisms to test for. Having it suggests a poor prognosis due to resistance to apoptosis.

Wow thank you very much!!

I'll write this down: nagalase & toxoplasmosis.

Actually I am shocked reading it:

Poor coordination, eye problems (!!!!) something I do deeply recognise.
To make me even more look like a fool: it is very probably a cat kept me company during a lot of time (sleep with my windows open, earplugs in,d on't wake up: all the sudden there was one acting like it has known me for ages...).

I don't know if you read about it but because of extreme lung problems of almost all kinds (just this evening my lungs burnt so bad "on the bottom" that I went to the pharmacy and begged for cortisone... - i did recieve a prescription but decided not to use it until after the CT was made - i am still waiting for the results but i do feel prognosis is poor knowing what I experience during day and night ...)
So my story is: "CFS" for +15 years and even "fibromyalgia" while for sure muscle or bone pain is very rare in me, maybe some 'sharp knife' attacks at night at best, more symptoms suggesting lupus over time: xerostomie, sicca, always slightly feverish, kidney and lung infections and throat infections all of the time, deep endometriosis, and most prominently devastating fatigue.
Then starting on (an overdose of) plaquenil:: fatigue and even mind fog almost disappear ... I can feel I can finally start my life and I am very happy (and also shocked since I always asked my doctors: the fact that I feel this, this and this - and on scans you can see this and this and this, does it mean my body is actually being harmed?... Of course the answer was negative and i was a hypochondric / psychiatric / somatisoformic / anorexia / ... you name it and we've got it patient.
only weeks after plaquenil I started to experience extreme lung problems disabling me and the eye problems...

The cognitive problems I see as "another line of the story".

The pills against nocturia I have also stopped with, as well as with the anti-stomach acid pills (protonpumpinhibitor). The lung time is for sure not a stomach problem tough (tested it many many times but unfortunately I also know how stomach problems fel and how lung problems feel).

I went to the ER 2 times, have been thrown out because CRP was too low and I myself too pink to be taken seriously tough pulse oxygen was 94 which seems low to me in a "healthy adult" who already took salbutamol... Now I am reading all over the place that in auto-immunity a low CRP is typical ??
So it seems that there are a lot of factors "hiding" other factors ...


Thank you very much for the information and to shine your light on this complex situation!

 

[Belgiangirl]

All that you said is very similar to what I am dealing with as well. I've lost so much cognitive capacity that I "almost" can't freak out about it or that WOULD BE IT.

I was: famously capable.

I am now: secretly and publically incapable.

But lots of my brain is still in there, I see glimpses. The energy to retrieve the thought, and string several together...seems missing.

And if I rest, I can get a bit of improvement which I appreciate.

I've given myself permission...to just BE and EXPERIENCE this mess.... but try real hard NOT TO analyze it too much, dissect it too much.

I'll worry about how to pass that Driver's license test...in a few weeks. If I can't pass: well then. Oh well then.

(aside- I've had to be on the computer for the last week, 4-5hours a day, I am "having" to do some work involving alot of computer cognitive activity. I'm not doing physical. Well, I have really deteriorated over the last week from doing this work..the kind of work I did for DECADES without blinking.). Its scary, worrisome and shocking.

Again it is very similar to my story:

I do recognise things... also it is much more easily for me to retrieve things from "before" than things I did recently learn (which is quiet scary since that is similar to dementia - not that I want to shock you with this because it is highly improbable unless you have been like me genetically predisposed and taking benzos for 10 years and on top of that anticholinerga like sweets because no one told you it would have consequences (of course this like sweets doesn't go for the benzo's and of course i didn't take them continously, think i wouldn't even be able to type here than...).

As you say: it is still there... somewhere ... you can sometimes see glimpses of it, which has been ...
Have you also encountered shockingly on one day that while your thoughts were always racing and spinning about new ideas, analysing stories and everything, which led to great satisfaction and made my life interesting enough for me even when laying in bed all day (kid u not :-/ ) esp since you could write your ideas and vision on paper etc (hoping to ever have energy to work it all out in real live...) that there was just nothing happening in your brain?...
A friend always laughed at me when complaning about this, untill I said this to him: "my brain has gone silent".
He said for him it iwas very shocking to hear...
But indeed it is true ... I feel like while i used to be like someone of the upper range of intelligence in society, and now I am at the bottom and even not thinking things trough or from all sites/angles/perspectives, missing a lot - often acting like i do understand things
It is like i used to be steering a bus during conversations and activelly participating and leading, giving new insights and ideas, now it is more i am like a decoration - in the best case scenario people don't notice I don't have a clue what they're talking about, worst case they think "she's probably to tired to have even 10 brain cells working?? It is harsh...

But still I do feel last days that I could regain some power again. The thing is that i need to exercise and should not avoid the confrontation with you know even newspapers but also books and everything that needs to be read more thorough (you drop from reading +200 pages books, from reading online articles, science, news from different countries and newspapers, possibly in different languages, to reading only headlines, reading twitter and then only reading whatsapp or emails, or maybe a recipe :-/. But now we should slowly step up our game again and hope our brain will regain its properties to process the information?

For me it's also especially the retrieving that is hard, even more strange is that I obviously need time to retrieve, as in now I realise that instead of panicking and looking for what I've lost on the internet or wanting to cry, I should keep searching for it in my brain (most of the times even that searching in my brain is difficult to get started ...), when I do search indeed what I was lost my pop up but it takes several minutes ...
I must say a lot of people who I know who have my age do have this for ages (that they have to look for words) - it is something I did never experience and indeed maybe i was too gifted and it was a luxory - but still for me now this is very shocking

Also very disturbing for me is losing the line in a conversation ...
But happily as for the looking for words, as for the looking to follow the line in the conversation ... I notice that these things start to come back but you have to give yourself (and you conversation partner has to give them) a minute or even a day. That is easing because I just hope so much and do believe, that the more we retrieve ourselves however the hell long it may take or what we have to do to counter the thought or thing again, I hope or brain is going to retrieve more automatically since it finds the "path to retrieve easily again'.
The use it or lose it hypothesis.

So don't google, don't rely on other people to help you get the words or conversation line, but force your brain to do so itself.

 

[gbells]

I'm glad I was able to help. Regarding the benzodiazepines a good alternative is organic essential lavender oil. Put 1-2 drops in 6 oz of water and stir then sip. Excellent, safe, nonaddicting, low cost anxiety treatment.

 

[gbells]

Toxo infection is even higher outside the USA. 23% in Europe.
30%-50% worldwide.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3963851/

 

[Rufous McKinney]

which is quiet scary since that is similar to dementia - not that I want to shock you with this because it is highly improbable unless you have been like me genetically predisposed and taking benzos for 10 years and on top of that anticholinerga like sweets because no one told you it would have consequences

sorry this is serious but made me laugh. Like I have so many options (sob, instead). So they wrote demented on both my parents death certificates, not that I believe them...frankly). (they werent', they were just OLD and ready to leave).

And I've been taking Benzos but not like candy. But maybe in my brain it has contributed to what I call Teflon Brain (that just slid right outta there, didn't it?). I take them at nite so I don't wake up at 4 am sick to my stomach. For some reason, they really helped THAT. I recently cut my dose in half and am OK. I"d like to get to zero. But I hate 4 am.

But yet I still pull the name or answer out of the hat when my husband, eight years older, is forgetting names quite badly..but NOR is he demented. All that just gets harder.

 

[Rufous McKinney]

also it is much more easily for me to retrieve things from "before" than things I did recently learn

Yes, this is really concerning. So I decided to watch Season 1 and 2 of a Netflix thing that I"d already watched twice and I read the books even. Then Season 3 happened, I watched that. 2 years later, I decide to rewatch them again. The first two seasons, I follow the plot, lots of it is familiar, but I am still enjoying it (its about Vikings, OK?)....so when I watch Season 3 it was like I HAD NEVER SEEN IT BEFORE AT ALL. One single scene I remembered..kept wondering when is that gonna happen. So that was a real confront of how my short term memory has suffered and declined here.

But I will not panic. Repeat.

 

[gbells]

Yes, this is really concerning. So I decided to watch Season 1 and 2 of a Netflix thing that I"d already watched twice and I read the books even. Then Season 3 happened, I watched that. 2 years later, I decide to rewatch them again. The first two seasons, I follow the plot, lots of it is familiar, but I am still enjoying it (its about Vikings, OK?)....so when I watch Season 3 it was like I HAD NEVER SEEN IT BEFORE AT ALL. One single scene I remembered..kept wondering when is that gonna happen. So that was a real confront of how my short term memory has suffered and declined here.

But I will not panic. Repeat.

I failed the psychology test where they say name as many animals as you can beginnng with the letter...My brain froze.

 

[Rufous McKinney]

esp since you could write your ideas and vision on paper etc

Umpteen people told me I should blog. Umpteen people told me to write those memoirs.

Most of those umpteen people now no longer know that I just...can't it seems. I re-read something I wrote here in the last two years during which this decline has gotten so severe, and I might as well toss that in a fire pit.

Dang.

 

[Rufous McKinney]

My brain froze.

Really?

I could not find the letter "R" on my phone while trying to check into an airline, exhausted in my hotel room at 9 pm. I can't find "R". Its not there. I know it exists.

 

[Rufous McKinney]

Also very disturbing for me is losing the line in a conversation

I simply look out my weak eyeballs and watch some TV interview where people can speak, have opinions and exchange ideas and its like maybe This is a Foreign Language. How do people do that? How do they stay on topic and maintain a train of thought?

I was staying with a friend last summer..and she talks alot. She is telling me some long saga. Maybe I could have followed the saga, if she didn't include the side Resume of Every Player in the Story (" so and so is so fabulous, they live in this gorgeous house and they are this and that...meanwhile WHAT were you saying?).

Since faking it doesn't work for me any longer, I asked her a question. So she literally screams at me that I am some stupid idiot.

Wow.

It was really a hurtful moment. Oh, then there was the time literally I just felt so horrible with THIS that I started to cry and she more or less indicates: illness is an invention of the mind. I've not seen her in over a year. Sad.

 

[Rufous McKinney]

So don't google, don't rely on other people to help you get the words or conversation line, but force your brain to do so itself.

I do agree- work with the brain and encourage its continued operation. However, I do NOT agree about forcing it. Thats when we may be causing damage. So there is an effort, and then there is a- give it a break, rest and let that come to you gracefully..or some version of that.

 

[Belgiangirl]

Umpteen people told me I should blog. Umpteen people told me to write those memoirs.

Most of those umpteen people now no longer know that I just...can't it seems. I re-read something I wrote here in the last two years during which this decline has gotten so severe, and I might as well toss that in a fire pit.

Dang.

Tell me about it ...

Even on facebook I used to write posts which I would be congratulated for from opponents and eh the other site :-/ and not the least people by far in my region so ... i was admired because of these skills. I would like to retrieve all those texts - hoping that they will make me get my skills back but facebook isn't that straightforward (you can only look up by date).
I also was paid to write - if I read this back I am like: jeeeeeeeeees, did I ????? write this myself??????

Unfortunately I did, and you know what? It didn't even took me any effort, neither time! Words just kept rolling out of my fingers tapping the keys almost as quick as I thought and it just came up from scratch... i used to write daily articles for a business magazine, imagine...