Mood introspection
Dec. 10th, 2017 06:39 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jackIt's not escaped me that my previous post sounds a bit like "coming out of depression". For a long time I've wondered if I have a... specific brain Thing. But I've been really shy about thinking about it openly, partly because of being scared to realise it if I do, partly because I know many friends who experience severe problems[1], and I don't want to trivialise them by speculating that I might have a mild form of... something when the evidence is pretty ambivalent.
Ironically, feeling better has made writing that post trivial instead of a giant chore I didn't think I could ever force myself to do :)
I know brain Things often come in groups, so it wouldn't be surprising if there were several related things. Conversely, some things are very binary, you do or you don't, but other things are "everyone does this, but if you do it so much it's a problem for your life, then that's probably A Thing that needs to be fixed".
What could there be? Ill-informed speculation follows.
Depression? I definitely have some signs. Difficulty forcing myself to do things. General feelings of worthlessness, and lack of being excited about things.
ADHD? I drink... lots of caffeine, and it seems to help me sleep more than keep me awake. Until recently, successful projects were always ones I threw myself at 200%, any other time, if I was doing anything worthwhile, I'd usually switch to browsing the internet really quickly.
But OTOH didn't feel like I was *distracted* by the internet, more that, forcing myself to do anything which was achieving something, as soon as I started, I felt a massive pressure away from doing it. Even with things that were important to do, that was one simple step, I felt a massive pressure to... not do them.
My clearest description is something like "uber procrastination". Doing *anything*, even things I actively want to do, has usually involved finding it really hard to get started. Even every day things -- if I had all weekend to do something, it would TAKE all weekend to get started. Even if it was something I wanted to do. But some important things took for years, because I'd shy away, or start shaking, when I forced myself.
Like, it feels ridiculous to describe procrastination as a life problem. But it clearly WAS. It did any number of harms.
I eventually improved that a LOT, partly through breaking through some of the biggest barriers through trial and error and forcing myself to do those things (much much thanks to the people close to me who helped a lot and were patient when I couldn't understand or explain why things were difficult). And partly through slowly cultivating an awareness that if something seemed intimidating, if I roughed out how well I could probably do it, even if that wasn't really good enough, doing that was a reasonable win, and that made starting big tasks a lot easier.
But I still felt a lot of small scale procrastination, of "don't want to stand up and go to work", "don't want to do the thing today", mostly procrastination for its own sake, not because the task would be unpleasant.
My working theory is something like, bad habits were screwed up in my brain for various reasons, probably due to some unfortunate tendency in my brain that became self-reinforcing, and got so big there were a giant problem, and caused symptoms that happened to be similar to Official Brain Things for related reasons.
What are the reasons to think that I don't have a specific Underlying Brain Thing? Well, I'm really not sure. But for depression, it always sounds like, things can make you happy, but usually can't make you not depressed unless they specifically treat it. But if I manage to get, like, a week of surmountable problems, a bit of social company, some relaxation time, then my brain seems to start working ok. It's just that I've built up the problems so much I almost never did experience that.
For ADHD, it doesn't seem like I can't concentrate -- I seem to have a normal ability to remember things, to keep concentrating across distractions, to work on something boring but worthwhile for long periods of time. It's just anything with a deadline that I can't concentrate on.
I'm sorry for this massive introspection dump. Especially, I hope it isn't bad for anyone who does have Actual Brain Things. But I'm also interested, if my description makes more sense to anyone else than it does to me.
ETA: Oh, right. Anxiety. Or anxiety?
Ironically, feeling better has made writing that post trivial instead of a giant chore I didn't think I could ever force myself to do :)
I know brain Things often come in groups, so it wouldn't be surprising if there were several related things. Conversely, some things are very binary, you do or you don't, but other things are "everyone does this, but if you do it so much it's a problem for your life, then that's probably A Thing that needs to be fixed".
What could there be? Ill-informed speculation follows.
Depression? I definitely have some signs. Difficulty forcing myself to do things. General feelings of worthlessness, and lack of being excited about things.
ADHD? I drink... lots of caffeine, and it seems to help me sleep more than keep me awake. Until recently, successful projects were always ones I threw myself at 200%, any other time, if I was doing anything worthwhile, I'd usually switch to browsing the internet really quickly.
But OTOH didn't feel like I was *distracted* by the internet, more that, forcing myself to do anything which was achieving something, as soon as I started, I felt a massive pressure away from doing it. Even with things that were important to do, that was one simple step, I felt a massive pressure to... not do them.
My clearest description is something like "uber procrastination". Doing *anything*, even things I actively want to do, has usually involved finding it really hard to get started. Even every day things -- if I had all weekend to do something, it would TAKE all weekend to get started. Even if it was something I wanted to do. But some important things took for years, because I'd shy away, or start shaking, when I forced myself.
Like, it feels ridiculous to describe procrastination as a life problem. But it clearly WAS. It did any number of harms.
I eventually improved that a LOT, partly through breaking through some of the biggest barriers through trial and error and forcing myself to do those things (much much thanks to the people close to me who helped a lot and were patient when I couldn't understand or explain why things were difficult). And partly through slowly cultivating an awareness that if something seemed intimidating, if I roughed out how well I could probably do it, even if that wasn't really good enough, doing that was a reasonable win, and that made starting big tasks a lot easier.
But I still felt a lot of small scale procrastination, of "don't want to stand up and go to work", "don't want to do the thing today", mostly procrastination for its own sake, not because the task would be unpleasant.
My working theory is something like, bad habits were screwed up in my brain for various reasons, probably due to some unfortunate tendency in my brain that became self-reinforcing, and got so big there were a giant problem, and caused symptoms that happened to be similar to Official Brain Things for related reasons.
What are the reasons to think that I don't have a specific Underlying Brain Thing? Well, I'm really not sure. But for depression, it always sounds like, things can make you happy, but usually can't make you not depressed unless they specifically treat it. But if I manage to get, like, a week of surmountable problems, a bit of social company, some relaxation time, then my brain seems to start working ok. It's just that I've built up the problems so much I almost never did experience that.
For ADHD, it doesn't seem like I can't concentrate -- I seem to have a normal ability to remember things, to keep concentrating across distractions, to work on something boring but worthwhile for long periods of time. It's just anything with a deadline that I can't concentrate on.
I'm sorry for this massive introspection dump. Especially, I hope it isn't bad for anyone who does have Actual Brain Things. But I'm also interested, if my description makes more sense to anyone else than it does to me.
ETA: Oh, right. Anxiety. Or anxiety?
no subject
Date: 2017-12-10 07:21 pm (UTC)Just be aware that they're not perfect and take it as a start rather than a definitive answer?
no subject
Date: 2017-12-11 11:09 am (UTC)Yeah, really good Q. I have once or twice, but I don't remember what it came out with; it would be a good thing to try again at this point.
Are there specifically disambiguation ones? I've found the problem to be, I don't have a "normal me" baseline to compare to, and questions like "do you have difficulty doing X" leave me really unsure, well, *some*, is that much more than everyone else, or much less, I'm not sure.
no subject
Date: 2017-12-11 12:17 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2017-12-11 12:20 pm (UTC)Thank you for support, don't feel like you should do more, this is all stuff I should look at, but none of it is stuff I need to do right now.
no subject
Date: 2017-12-10 09:30 pm (UTC)Something that helps me sometimes is to interrogate my reasons for procrastinating. If I don't want to do a thing I'm usually afraid of something, but it might be something I don't find it easy to admit that I'm afraid of. So something you might try when you have bouts of procrastination is asking yourself why you don't want to do the thing. It's important for me, when I do this, not to then get judgemental and tell myself that my reasons are silly or whatever; instead I might ask myself why avoiding the thing I am afraid of is important to me.
I think it's fairly normal to have good weeks and bad weeks, periods of time where it feels like nothing works and periods of time where things come together somehow. For me it's as if beyond a certain amount of Hard Stuff I go into some kind of spiral where everything is harder and harder. It helps if I recognise it when it happens, rest a lot, and know that it will pass. Conversely, once the acute Hard Things have passed, I might feel pretty rough for a while, but gradually add in some good things and again there seems to be a sort of tipping point where things get easier again. (Some of the more reliable will-make-me-feel-better things are exercise, making perceptible progress toward goals, and eating and sleeping enough; but it can take a while before things get easy enough that doing those things isn't a major chore. When I'm depressed to the point that I consider medical assistance, I can't do any of those things regularly enough that their good effects "stick".)
I have a diagnosis of ADD (I was never hyperactive) and it doesn't always mean that I'm easily distracted; ability to hyperfocus is one of the associated traits for many people. Sometimes I am way too attentive to my surroundings and everything is distracting. Other times I am not attentive enough to my surroundings and get lost in what I'm doing. It's more like not being able to calibrate my attention dial than not being able to pay attention to things at all. Deadlines often make it worse, but so do other stressors, like not enough sleep, or very noisy environments, or physical illness.
The thing that most helps me with deadlines, and certain other types of thing that are hard for me, is company from someone sympathetic while I work on the thing.
no subject
Date: 2017-12-11 10:37 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2017-12-11 07:35 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2017-12-12 02:23 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2017-12-11 08:51 pm (UTC)PHQ-9 for depression: https://patient.info/doctor/patient-health-questionnaire-phq-9
GAD-7 for anxiety: https://patient.info/doctor/generalised-anxiety-disorder-assessment-gad-7
no subject
Date: 2017-12-12 08:56 pm (UTC)How many nights per week are you busy? How much time do you get doing purely passive things (reading a book, watching TV, playing computer games, etc.)?
no subject
Date: 2017-12-13 10:29 am (UTC)But I think that's the cause of any of my motivation problems, as I think they were much the same at school, at university, and when I first working, when I didn't have so many things.
no subject
Date: 2017-12-13 08:11 pm (UTC)I started therapy a few months ago for the first time and it has made significant changes to how I interpret myself and what the mental think loops are. Turns out I habitually do stupid things to myself in my head without realising - and amazingly there is a whole profession of psychologists who spend their day jobs in helping debug this! Noticing and debugging own bad habits is hard because I can't see myself in context of the 100 other similar people who were previously studied to make the psychological theory established.
Don't mean to pressure you in any way but it is totally awesome for me and I wanted to share. In many parts of the US therapy seems to be a normal part of human medical care with no need to be "sick" in any way before beginning
no subject
Date: 2017-12-13 08:14 pm (UTC)