Strategies for coping with cognitive difficulties

[Arnie Pye]

I found one of the questions on that quiz totally meaningless for me. This one :

I have trouble following conversations because I am distracted or because I am trying to remember what I wanted to say.

The choice of answers was 1) Often or 2) Not often.

The truthful answer for me would have been :

I have trouble following conversations because I'm deaf as a post.

 

[Arnie Pye]

I have had some improvement with my cognitive difficulties from changing my diet quite radically. I used to eat a high carb diet, and had ended up with pre-diabetes. Last year I changed to eating a much lower carb diet with far more fat. I only eat the kinds of fats and oils that would have been recognizable to people somewhere in the world about 200 years ago. I am more alert and slightly more energetic on this diet. I also think I sleep better than before.

I have had frequent relapses back into eating a high carb diet, and as a result I haven't lost any weight, but rather than give up completely as I have done in the past, I have been persistent and kept on restarting the low carb, high fat diet. I am managing to keep to it longer before relapse than I did at the start. I would like to lose some weight, but it isn't really my top priority. I just want to feel better, and I don't want my pre-diabetes to progress to overt diabetes type 2. I have succeeded in reverting my HbA1c back to non-diabetic levels, although it is still too high for my liking.

I also supplement a lot. I don't absorb iron well so I take a maintenance dose of iron to keep it within spitting distance of optimal. I take vitamin B12 (methylcobalamin) because I feel better with high levels. I also take a B Complex capsule and vitamin D most of the time. I don't go outside much so I need to supplement. I also take magnesium and potassium occasionally. I've probably forgotten one or two things I take.

I've been taking lots of supplements for years. I have to admit that changing my diet has had more beneficial effects on how well I feel than all those thousands of supplements I must have taken over the years.

 

[InfiniteRubix]

I think this thread has been very interesting.

"Executive Dysfunction Disorder"?

I kind of get the feeling that this is less of disorder per se, and more of a symptom of other things like ASD, ADD, ADHD. And those three are very possibly related anyway, with almost totally overlapping circles i.e. maybe the same thing.

And then there's the likely elevated probability of comorbidity of ASD with ME, which can't help cognition/executive functions.

But executive dysfunction seems a nice way to conceive of a specific symptom in any case e.g. versus pure memory issues, for example

I think along with finding strategies it's good to know what the deficits are exactly.

Exactly - this thread has been very useful for this

So, my contribution (familiar to most of you I guess):

Nice contributions

 

[InfiniteRubix]

I wanted to reference the below post here too - symptoms can be so different, but I think many people can relate to versions of this: the idea that some tasks are easier sometimes, and not at others, as if the dysfunction affects different parts of the brain at different times. I think cognitive elasticity, as a metaphor, can also explain some of the experience as a sufferer:

I would never doubt someone's diagnosis on the basis of what they are able to get done or not. This is only one step away from "well if you've got the energy to be such a vexatious patient, there can't be much wrong with you".

I get loads done. Not physically, because I absolutely can't, but I can prepare lessons and go and sit in a chair and teach them. Sometimes I can be unable to remember names of people I've worked with for 5 years and names of simple objects or maintain a conversation, but at the same time win a game of chess on the internet. I assume it's different parts of the brain. At other times I have a fully functioning brain. Sometimes visibly getting a lot done in the ME world is a sign of increased severity, because if all you can do is lie in bed and type, that's what you do all day.