I Do Miss My Mind

living with brain fog

Oh, Brain!

Remember when you and I could keep all those plates spinning up in the air all at once? We could work and plan for the future and run a memory loop all at the same time. We could read fast and retain everything. We never forgot a name. We never forgot an appointment. We could do tasks and activities without even thinking about it. Several at once, in fact. We slept like a baby.

And now look! This is no fun, this slowing down, this forgetfulness, this agitation, this inability to hold onto more than one idea at once. To say nothing of how taxing it is to look at a screen.

And those sensitivities toward light and sound and movement… Sensory processing uses a lot more energy than I ever realized.

One of the hardest things about living well as life is winding down is embracing the person you are now with your diminishing brain. So much of our sense of self comes from what we think, how we perceive ourselves in the world, how much we can get done. So many activities are regulated by the brain, from the autonomic nervous system to cognitive processing, and everything in between. At this winding down stage, it’s no longer possible to think things through and figure them out the way we used to. It’s no longer possible to do several things at once. Learning curves seem impossibly long.

This past week Tim has been traveling, to one grandson’s graduation in Colorado and a granddaughter‘s birthday in Texas. I’ve been entertaining myself with the imagined journey I would be on if I could accompany him.

It used to be easy to toss a few things in the bag and off we go. Especially if it was a road trip. I loved road trips. I could drive all day and not tire it seemed. Now, an hour on the road and my head is spinning like a whirligig.

The fact that I can’t go along for these family occasions still stuns me.

I’ve been keeping a life map since my 20s and I took a look at it as I was writing this. You can see that I’ve highlighted all the roads that I’ve driven on, or been a passenger in a car when someone else has driven. I love remembering all the landscapes I have viewed.

I thought there would be a lot more new roads highlighted during my retirement years. Now, even as I contemplated what it would take to go along with Tim – all the pills and supplements, some of them refrigerated, all the props for when things go wrong – I got exhausted, just thinking through the preparation.

I don’t like being this frail.

Just writing this, I’m not really staying on track with what I started to say, as you might’ve noticed. Brain fog triumphs once more.

So, what’s the best way to live with all this fuzziness and misdirection?

Maybe…just accept it for what it is, and then look around over and over again and find 10 things you see that you like, right here, right now. And just like that you might begin to feel more grateful than frustrated.