Monday, January 29, 2024

Some thoughts on Executive Functions and how it affects my day to day

 Why is my house a mess?  

Well, Ron used to say the house was fine if the pathways were clear, his side of the kitchen, his shelves in the fridge, and the sofas.  

Theresa Kellerman is the foremost authority on Fetal Alcohol and she did a wonderful page on how the brain damage affects daily life for someone like me.  FAS and the brain

In my daily life I am generally far too ashamed to actually name my disorder because I don't want people to find the pages on behavior and inappropriate sexual behavior.  

Some of you act like it's a bad thing my medication killed my drive, I say it's a good thing.  I won't be stupid.  

Main FAS page, and yes I am the Heather on it.  

I literally don't know what to do.  When my stepmother was teaching me how to clean the bathroom, she had to say, use this spray here, let it sit 5 minutes, then scrub off.  Rinse the sponge.  Put Ajax on it, scrub the tiles.  Rinse.  Etc.  

So I look at my kitchen appliances everywhere where do I put them?  The cats love to hang out in the one cabinet so that's out.  I would like them more accessible than that, anyway.  And my little pantry, I need to go through it and do a good purge, I could probably put the appliances in there but when do I do this?  

Questions like that plague me.  

I have a good system for laundry, dirty clothes go on the floor in front of the washer, on my Friday night or day off I do it.  When I take it out of the dryer I hang up all the tops and fold my jeans.  Where the jeans go is another question...

Ron could never understand I really didn't know.   Homecare I got an A+.  Housekeeping I got a C minus.  That's just how my brain is wired housekeeping is just a lot harder for me than the average person.   

Is my house a hazard?  No.  Everything is "clear" I just don't know where to put things sometime, so I put them down wherever seems appropriate and then I lose them.  Then I have to tear up the house to find it.  That is probably what happened to my bus pass.  

But if I have a system, like taking my wallet and keys out of my jeans when I put them in the dirty clothes, and putting it on the front left corner of my table, I do fine.  

It's just complicated.  

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I have a dirty clothes basket in a corner of my bedroom, I carry it to the basement when it's time bto do laundry. You might try a basket and keep your dirty clothes out of sight until it's time v to wash them.
Clutter can make anyone depressed.

Anonymous said...

Can you get stackable shelving to put against a kitchen wall for your appliances? That will clear up the counter and table. I think they sell it at Walmart.

Heather Knits said...

I think I will take out all the clutter and take some photos. Basically I have a really tiny kitchen. Ron, in his wheelchair, took up all the floor space. I may put some appliances in the garage it is right there ..

Anonymous said...

Do you have a lot of appliances? What do you have in your cabinets that you have no room for them? What confuses me is all the containers you have on the floor everywhere. One of your problems is you leave things where you drop them that is just laziness you can't blame that on your mental capabilities. Do you think you use that as an excuse for things you simply don't want to do?