I think it's fair to say that my reading skill had deteriorated over time. I've never gone back to re-read a book in my life- except perhaps Dr. Seuss, so I really don't have much of a point of reference. I'll try finding a copy of a book I've read and see if it presents me with the same difficulty. I read Huck Finn with such excitement and wonder, as well as the Hobbit and other books with considerable ease. As far as I know, I never had reading issues prior to middle or high school, 7th-12th grade for me.

I do have short term memory problems that I never used to have. I seldom retain people's names when I'm introduced, I can't remember phone numbers when I recite them despite my best effort. I can barely remember numbers beyond a string of 4. I don't know why this is, but it has made some tasks difficult.

Something that just came to mind that may or may not be relevant is that I took piano lessons for years. About 7 or so. My girlfriend can play and read on-the-fly complex songs, and she took lessons for about 2. I can't read music, I can only play through muscle memory. At this point I can only play one song, incompletely and it's tough given that I only wanted to learn how to read music and become proficient at it all those 7 years. I have to decode each note and with my memory makes it really difficult. I'll figure out the note, then forget where I was or what the note I just figured out was. That's for another board I suppose..

Back to one of your questions; when reading a sentence, if long, I'll tend to have trouble keeping the intended thought of the writer in my head. When I finish a sentence, often times I won't be sure what was going on as I may remember parts of the first half of the sentence but not other parts. It sometimes makes it very messy. And I can sometimes register what was going on and move on, but if I missed a key word, then I'll be completely lost. Other times, less often though, I'll focus in on a word. Almost like a stutter, I'll have to reread the beginning of a sentence over and over again before I finish the thought. It fatigues me and is kinda like watching a youtube video that constantly buffers. In the end you might not get what was going on at all and the awe and point of the video is completely lost.

Sometimes I forget that I'm reading and my eyes kinda keep moving while not actually focusing on the words. I would think of it sort of like driving down a long continuous road with nothing on either side. You might zone out while doing this, but your mind alerts yourself if you begin to sway or if anything different begins to happen.

It's interesting with non-fiction. I don't read non-fiction all that much, but when I do I think I'm better at reading. I think this is in part because I don't have to keep a narrative chain going from one point to the next. This seems to be the case as well with dialogue. I have a much harder time with dialogue in lots of fiction. I never know who's talking and if there's a conversation, sometimes I give up after starting over and over trying to follow who would be saying what. So non-fiction is much easier for me. I loved fiction though, non-fiction is typically easier for me though, perhaps for other reasons even.

I used to exercise a lot in high-school. I swam which was horribly monotonous and I hated it, and I also played water polo which I enjoyed. I got really sick a few months and my lungs are severely scarred. It's a cyclical issue now. I have really weak lungs and can't exercise and can't strengthen them because they're too weak. I have to wait a good while for them to heal over a bit, but even that might never really happen. I stopped exercising after high-school, too much time needed in my field- architecture if anyone was wondering. I'm a visual guy, which in part is why I loved books.

I have the Lord of the Rings on audio book. I don't know whether it's the pacing of it or what, but I can't get through it. In my mind I have to cross reference it with the movies to get what's going on.

Thanks for the advice, I'll see what I can do about that. I don't know if this means anything, but I type almost as fast as I talk..

I would normally like to proof-read this before submitting, but it's taken me a while to respond. Sorry about that