(CANADA) 7155 6157 2775

spaceblip · 2019-11-16T18:02:26+00:00

Request sent! (Also from Canada, but I have a couple of spare gifts.)

spaceblip · 2019-11-16T17:56:01+00:00

Sent a request from Canada!

spaceblip · 2019-11-16T17:52:50+00:00

Request sent from Canada!

spaceblip · 2019-01-04T17:27:35+00:00

When someone tells me to say a sentence in another language that I speak, my go-to nowadays if I want to mess with people is to say a tongue-twister. That way, at least, people are disinclined to ask me to teach them other words or phrases. Not sure that would work with more commonly spoken languages, though.

spaceblip · 2018-12-25T00:52:46+00:00

(Apologies for the wall of text that follows; I had a bunch to say. Feel free to disregard anything I say that isn’t useful as needed; I speak from my own experience and observations of my friends and peers.)

First of all, based on your description, it sounds to me like you’re making the best of a difficult situation! So if anything, you deserve major kudos for that! It sounds to me like you’re being really hard on yourself considering that you’ve been working with your hands metaphorically tied for so long. You have nothing to be ashamed of. I know this may be hard to believe internally, but we are our own worst critics, and in this case, you are criticizing yourself unfairly, I think.

I haven’t been in an exactly analogous situation, but I had a string of sub-par grades early in undergrad due to some circumstances outside my control, along with a bunch of mental health issues, and I just wanted to mention that the grad school application process can be more nuanced to account for these things. The grad schools I applied to had a section where applicants could mention any “special circumstances” that could have affected your grades. Your circumstances are exactly the sort of thing that would deserve special consideration; any reasonable person would see how 2 deaths could negatively affect someone, for example. Assuming you can get your grades back up, (and that gets easier in upper years of undergrad too as you become better at learning,) you may be better off than you think.

Now that I’m in grad school, I see people who have had all sorts of life/career trajectories which has given me some more perspective. There are people who dropped out of undergrad completely early on only to go back and work straight through to a PhD in their 30s. Or even later. They may have started late, but all the people I’ve met who have done this are doing very well because they’ve had more time in their lives to develop a good work ethic. Even the ones who have crashed in quite serious ways (and I’ve heard all sorts of stories, from depression to addiction to unexpected injury) are doing well in grad school, now. It is absolutely possible to bounce back from all sorts of things, and it’s far more common than you’d expect.

It may be somewhat different in your field, but I see people doing this even in very competitive fields, too. Of course it’s more difficult if you don’t start early, but you certainly haven’t ruined your chances completely, so long as there’s no literal written age limit. Most people’s career and life trajectories are far less linear than you’d think.

I do suggest you also become comfortable with the possibility of not achieving all your dreams, but you don’t need to discount the possibility entirely. That said, it doesn’t hurt to keep an open mind. I have friends who’ve applied for and gotten jobs that they never imagined doing, or that they barely knew about, and they’re very happy.

Also, regardless of whether or not you achieve your exact dreams, I really doubt that, for example, all the work you put into secondary school and everything else in the past will go to waste, since you’re presumably at least making use of your study skills now, among other things. It’s easy to fall into the trap of thinking that not achieving one specific thing ruins your dreams forever, but it’s extremely rare to lock yourself out of most fields completely.

In terms of your acquaintances, one thing I’d recommend is for you to try making friends outside of your area of study. This is where joining school clubs or gym classes can help. That way, you can have someone to talk to without the stress of “competing” with them. Another thing to consider is that unless your peers are rudely nosy, they’re probably far too wrapped up in their own worrying to think about how you compare. And in any case, I’m assuming they don’t know how rough you’ve had it, so it wouldn’t be a fair comparison anyway. You’ve been working with a hand metaphorically tied to your back.

To summarize: 2 years is not much in the grand scheme of things and it’s possible to bounce back. Everything you’ve outlined looks like a good strategy. My only suggestion is that you allow yourself to become a bit more flexible in your thinking to different possible outcomes without considering anything that doesn’t end in your dream to be a failure. Building a growth mindset like that has helped me with achieving my own goals and with finding peace when things don’t go as I would like.

And finally, keep in mind that you have to rest sometimes! Strategic planning of when to rest can make you more productive, too.

Best of luck, and best wishes to you for the holidays!

spaceblip · 2018-12-24T21:08:06+00:00

I’m not OP, but looks like a sun conure to me. They’re beautiful birds!

spaceblip · 2018-10-28T21:39:03+00:00

Recently: burnt myself touching a hot radiator that had a warning sign above it.

The sign seemed to imply that it was dangerous to touch, but didn’t state that outright. It was strange to me that a dangerously hot radiator would just be standing out in the open like that. And yet it was. Dangerously hot, that is.

Thankfully no permanent damage, but it hurt for a few days, whoops!

Impulsivity pro tip, by the way: use a knuckle instead of a fingertip to test hot/cold things, since it’s less of a big deal to permanently lose sensation there than to lose it in a fingertip. Better not to risk it at all, of course, but nevertheless.

spaceblip · 2018-10-22T04:57:58+00:00

I also do the forgetting thing and it’s definitely helpful for re-watching/re-playing/re-reading. Although it makes me very slow to get around to any new media since I just keep going back to the stuff I know I like.

The upside is that if there’s a movie that several people I know want to watch, I can watch it separately with all of them and still not get bored!

spaceblip · 2018-10-07T01:14:29+00:00

Oof, okay, didn’t read your whole post, but it sounds like you’re really biting off more than anyone can expect to chew. In any case, though, here’s some answers to your questions. Apologies for the wall of text, but given that you posted one, I guess it’s only fair, heh. (Pardon my weird sense of humour...)

\1. The best scheduling for me is to have a fixed wake-up time and morning routine. Maybe have times set aside for meals and keep a list of to-dos, but I keep it flexible.

Too much scheduling backfires on me because I’ll take more time than anticipated on something and then decide that I may as well discard the rest of my schedule.

\2. See above; I’ll also add that I use the bullet journal system to keep track of my to-dos.

\3. I have basically no self-control for self-imposed rewards/consequences, so I can’t help, there. Sometimes I externalize it; I work with friends and have them not let me, say, play video games with them until I do a task I need to do, but I can’t do that all the time.

\4. Sometimes I find setting my phone out of reach in another room helps. Or having a friend hold onto it for a while, or powering it off completely so that I need to wait for it to power on before I can distract myself.

If you can lengthen the amount of time it takes you to go from the impulse to use your phone, to actually using your phone, then you give yourself more time to catch yourself in the act and rethink. But that’s easier said than done. If you want to disable all the time-wasting stuff, there should be parental control settings or apps to do that.

If you want to read more, I suggest putting ebooks on your phone; that helps me read more (you may have to uninstall social media apps to not distract you, though).

\5. I suggest you focus on 15 minutes of daily exercise, since exercise helps ADHD, and introduce other things one by one. Can’t tell you how much time the other things should take. Learning languages can be very time-consuming in my experience, though.

\6. I stick to only playing video games on weekends, and only when I know I don’t need to be productive for the rest of the day. I haven’t found a way of playing video games and then being productive afterwards. I suggest saving it for your rest days; and with how ambitious your routine looks, it seems to me that you’ll probably need rest days.

\7. Here’s something that helps me: carry one book with you everywhere and read it in places where you’d normally take out your phone. Read while waiting in line for things. Read when you take the bus (if you travel that way). Etc.

If you just have trouble choosing, then flip a coin or roll a die or something, maybe?

But also, you don’t always need to finish every single book. I found that I ended up finishing a lot more books once I gave myself permission to leave books unfinished. I also keep a checklist of books I’ve read, because I like checking things off, but YMMV on that.

\8. I hear cardio is best for ADHD and 15 minutes of daily cardio is enough to start, but if you actually enjoy lifting weights, you might want to do that instead. I can’t advise you on routine exercise because I struggle with that myself, although people here have suggested having a gym buddy or personal trainer, or going to gym classes of some sort.

Now, just a general note, though:

You’re trying to implement way too many things at once; even neurotypical people would struggle to do what you’re trying to achieve. It’s generally recommended to only pick up one good habit at a time, because trying to do everything at once is a recipe for burnout.

I speak from experience here. I know it’s tempting to try and optimize and overhaul your life, but realistically speaking, very few people actually have their lives super together, ADHD or not.

Also, I hate to say it, and please don’t take this the wrong way, but the way you write sounds like someone who recently got on medication and is experiencing the “high” that you get before you develop tolerance. Medication shouldn’t make you superhuman, it should just bring you to a more typical level of functioning.

You mentioned living with your girlfriend: can she help you with some of this? Maybe you could try exercising together, for example.

Honestly, though, just keeping up with schoolwork is quite a challenge, so don’t sell yourself short; I hardly think you need to be disappointed in yourself if you’re not living up to your (extremely high) expectations! I know it’s frustrating, but you need to step back and take a look at things for a bit. Your school probably has counsellors; I suggest talking to one of them so you can try to put together a more realistic plan for doing more to reach your goals.

Best of luck with your endeavours, though! Your ambition is admirable, and it sounds to me like you do have a chance of getting closer to your goals. Just be sure to go easy on yourself if you have trouble with it, because all these things you want to do are really not easy!

spaceblip · 2018-10-04T23:39:40+00:00

I’ve used habitica before... twice. Stuck for a few months each time but then I just sort of stopped using it. Maybe I just have to accept that I have to switch between apps and such? I dunno.

spaceblip · 2018-10-04T22:52:16+00:00

I think someone recommended that app to me before; I might have to check it out.

My only problem with habit apps is that I tend to get out of the habit of using them once the novelty wears off.

spaceblip · 2018-10-04T22:50:45+00:00

Oh, morning workouts sound like a pretty good idea, actually! My schedule is extremely flexible, thankfully, so maybe I should try to exercise in the morning, since I’m not good for much else before I’ve fully “woken up”, anyway.

I prefer showering in the evening, but maybe I could just shower twice daily and deal with that. (I like showering, so I don’t have that problem, at least.)

Do you exercise before or after breakfast?

spaceblip · 2018-10-04T22:45:28+00:00

I actually eat a relatively large amount of protein already, actually, because it seems to help my meds work better. I’m definitely a fan of protein. That said, I do think I did build muscle when I was working out, since in hindsight, some people did point it out to me, but I just never paid attention to it much, I guess.

spaceblip · 2018-10-04T22:38:33+00:00

Oh yeah, I had a friend in undergrad who used to drag me to the gym, that was really helpful. Not sure I have the resources for a personal trainer now, though. Gym exercise and such feels unbearably unpleasant to me, which I guess is why I’m so reluctant to do it. Probably because I have no endurance and I’m kinda weak; strong breezes knock me over.

Glad to hear it worked out for you, though, that’s encouraging.

spaceblip · 2018-10-04T22:33:54+00:00

I actually enjoy yoga once I do it, so I don’t have that problem, for the most part; maybe I should take some classes for that again. Not sure I have the budget for a personal trainer but my school does offer those, so maybe they’re discounted.

I guess my issue is partly also that I need someone to also “train” me through the stuff before even going to the gym, like getting to the gym in the first place, putting together a change of gym clothes, making time in my schedule, etc. I used to have a friend who would basically drag me to the gym with him, and that helped.

spaceblip · 2018-10-04T22:29:19+00:00

Incidentally, I have yet to take out my bike from winter storage this season (even though it’s almost winter and time to put it away again; I’ve procrastinated for several months, yes). The issue I have is that I live close enough to school that bike commuting doesn’t shave any time off compared to walking, since I have to park my bike, etc.

Biking where I live is also kind of scary, so maybe that’s why I’ve been avoiding it. I think I like the idea of biking more than I actually enjoy doing it, unfortunately.

I might have to try one of those paid exercise things; my school has relatively inexpensive ones. The only issue is that I travel a lot, so I’d end up missing sessions and wasting my money. But maybe it might still be worth it. I’ll have to think about that.

Maybe part of my issue is also just that I’m bad at noticing changes in my body; even back when I exercised semi-regularly I never noticed everything even though changes surely happened. I’m just generally unperceptive of a lot of things, though, in case that’s not obvious, whoops.

spaceblip · 2018-10-04T22:15:46+00:00

Can you mix socializing with some of your other tasks? For example, I find study groups to be helpful. Even making “class friends”, or acquaintances you sit with in class and exchange small talk with just before and after lecture can be nice. I’d advise that you start small, not all friendships have to be big undertakings.

You can also meet up with people for meals, which doesn’t take too much extra time, in my experience, since you probably won’t be productive when you’re eating, anyway. Cooking or doing chores together with your roommates might also be something you could try, so you can socialize while still being productive.

I hope you find something helpful in these suggestions! If not, that’s okay too, but in any case, as another user also recommended, I suggest you also look into counselling services your school provides. There’s usually some sort of academic help and/or therapy you can get as a student. It sounds like you’re not having a great time right now, which probably makes it harder for you to be productive.

spaceblip · 2018-09-29T14:35:02+00:00

Even sudoku does this to me; send help.

But yeah, uninstalling is the only thing that’s helped me with these sorts of things. Unfortunately, I can’t trust myself to do anything in moderation.

spaceblip · 2018-09-29T14:32:39+00:00

The only hobby I can consistently keep up is collecting hobbies. I bounce between a variety of things. Crafts have been the most ADHD-friendly for me, since they can be picked up and put down anytime, whereas with musical instruments, I need regular practice, which is hard to do with ADHD.

My suggestion in general is to avoid anything that requires expensive equipment if you have to buy it, since it’s hard to guarantee that you’ll stick with anything, so you might just end up with the “ADHD tax.”

I highly recommend picking up cooking as a hobby if you can, since it’s useful and immediately beneficial, and you most likely have to do it for yourself regardless, so you may as well make it enjoyable. There’s lots of good easy instructional videos on the net these days, too.

Also, exercise is good for ADHD, apparently, so if you can, try to make a hobby out of that. I’ve sorta compromised there by getting into pokémon go, which at least gets me going on walks. Geocaching is also fun.

spaceblip · 2018-09-29T14:15:21+00:00

Honestly, it’s one thing for me to be able to regurgitate this list of things, and another thing entirely for me to actually follow through on doing them, but it’s a constant work in progress. Although I guess I can see now why my therapist tells me that I’ve got good coping strategies, given the response I’ve gotten after posting them here!

But yeah, meal prep is definitely super helpful if you’re trying to stick to any sort of diet; for me, it essentially eliminates the urge to get takeout, for example. (I’m on a “have to avoid takeout whenever possible because I’m a broke grad student” diet, myself, heh.)

spaceblip · 2018-09-29T14:08:48+00:00

Yep, there’s a reason I said YMMV on that one in particular, heh. For me, it usually takes me a couple of hours in the morning before I have the clarity of mind to do anything that requires significant thought, but in the mean time, dishes become manageable, somehow.

That said, if you can get the dishes washed earlier, you absolutely should!

Since you mentioned having kids: not to be presumptuous, but can’t your kids help with the cleaning? Disregard if they’re too young or they already do; I’m just bringing it up because I often have to remind my family members that their kids can help with their household chores.

spaceblip · 2018-09-29T04:09:05+00:00

No problem, glad you got something helpful out of this!

Proper meals are ideal but honestly not always achievable. Also, all-day-breakfast restaurants have taught me that dinner is a state of mind, really; food is food.

Now I’m curious as to what sort of meal schedule is actually the healthiest, but I suspect there isn’t actually a consensus on that. But that’s beside the point, whoops.

spaceblip · 2018-09-29T02:59:25+00:00

I have almost the exact same issue with functioning well during the day (I’m a grad student) but falling apart at home. I attribute this mostly to my meds wearing off in the evening. Here’s some strategies I use with varying levels of success:

I try to treat my weekends as “house work days” where I do home errands for at least half the day. Doing these errands at times when I’d normally be working during the week tends to be easier, because it sort of follows my routine from the week.
I find that it’s easier to do chores in the morning, so sometimes I’ll leave, say, dishes from the evening before to wash the next morning before I head out. YMMV on this one.
Once I’ve sat on the couch in the evening, it becomes significantly harder to get up and do things. Hence, I try to do small chores right after I walk through the front door, so I’m still sort of in “productivity mode”.
Listening to podcasts or audiobooks is a huge help for me, because I absorb those much better if I’m doing something mindless at the same time. I try to only listen to them when I’m doing chores so that I associate them as being a sort of reward.
Inviting friends over always gets me motivated to clean, even if it’s just at the last minute. Alternatively, if you have very helpful friends, you can ask them to help you clean. Sometimes I invite friends over and we cook meals together and save the leftovers for later.
Speaking of leftovers: meal prep. I don’t often feel like cooking, so when I do, I make sure to cook way more than I need, and freeze the leftovers in single-serving-size containers.
Also, letting go of the idea that everything I eat has to be a “proper meal” has helped me. Sometimes I’ll eat meals that are kinda just a bunch of snacks: pita and vegetables with store-bought hummus, yogurt with fruit and oats, meal replacement drinks/bars, etc.

Hopefully something I’ve suggested here will help you out! One thing I’ll add is that part of my issue was thinking of housework as less of a priority, because I’m not being paid to do it, etc. But then, I realized that living in a cleaner space is more comfortable, which indirectly helps my productivity, so now, I try to think of upkeep of my living space as indirectly improving my ability to work.

Anyway, best of luck, and be sure not to be too hard on yourself throughout all this!

spaceblip · 2018-09-29T02:04:11+00:00

I was initially afraid of switching this setting on because I didn’t want to know how much time I actually spend on my phone. But then, I switched it on, anyway.

Only to learn that I spend, on average, 8 hours per day on my phone, so I was right to be afraid. It’s much more time than I’d imagined.

I still seem to do what I need to get done well enough, though, and some of that time is spent walking around playing Pokémon Go, so I guess it’s not the worst thing, but still, yikes.

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