Every day I have this feeling that I am unable to think as well as I was a few years ago. I look back at my high school career and I look at some of the papers I wrote and how well formulated they are with clear and concise language that conveyed a huge amount of emotion or information.
I also look back and remember how well I was at communicating my thoughts to other people and getting my ideas out. I used to give really good and constructive advice to all of my friends when they were in need. I loved doing that. I loved helping my friends.
Besides that, I feel my memory is failing me. My short term to long term transition memory is absolutely horrible.
Lately things have been different. I feel it's harder to get my ideas across. Reading the way this thread is written may not give much hint to the extent on how I feel. The thing is, I feel it more in when I verbally speak. I used to be a master of words verbally. I used to be able to say the right things at the right time.
Now I feel like every single thing that comes out of my mouth is fucking retarded. I feel stupid. I try to make a joke and it's so unfunny that people contract cancer from it. I try to communicate an idea, only to leave the other party scratching their heads. The only form of communication I seem to have gotten better at is choosing the right words. I seem to have developed the ability to choose the right language, allowing my words to manipulate others into thinking they they have the better deal, when in reality the choice of words I used gives me the final advantage.
At one point, people used to come to me for all sorts of advice, whether it was about relationships, or some family issue. I used to be able to get down to them at an emotional, yet logical level and come up with a step by step solution to solve, or even lessen the problem. To this day, people still ask me for advice. The only difference is I have no clue how to give it. I don't know ways to relate to their problems anymore and have no way of imagining the situation they are in in order to formulate even a basic solution. It's terrible, especially with my ex who deals with chronic pain that is so horrible it makes it hard for her to deal with everything else. No doctors can figure out the cause or an effective treatment even after 2 years. At one point I would have been able to help her deal with her pain and situation a lot better, but now I can barely formulate a sentence that even touches on her problem.
Going to my memory problems, it seems that I have a much harder time recalling information that someone [I]just[/I] told me. For example, someone calls my work wanting to speak with the boss. I ask who it is, and they give me a name and give me a brief description of what they need to speak to my boss about. I take about 20 steps to my boss's desk and by the time I get there, I forget part of the name and have no idea why they called.
Another way I feel like my brain is failing me is when I am around higher authorities or people who are smarter than me. A few years ago, I could place myself on a similar level and not feel intimidated by those who had more authority than me. Now, I completely become stupid when I am around such people. My memory is worse, my learning abilities decrease, and my attention to detail just drops.
Basically I feel that I am becoming more stupid with age. Maybe there is something physically wrong with me, I don't know. I scheduled a doctors appointment about it, but never got a confirmation. I just wish there was a way to boost my abilities to what they were before.
Right now I am 20 years old. I'm taking a break from college for various other reasons. I am staying busy though. I volunteer every Friday at the local rescue squad and am training to become an EMT. I am also starting a full-time security position for a popular strip mall in the area.
[QUOTE=Master117;26486283]Now I feel like every single thing that comes out of my mouth is fucking retarded.[/QUOTE]
you dont say?
Yourre becoming an old man.
Yeah, sadly, once you stop growing you start aging. Some people worse than others. For example, my cousin's 103 year old great-grandmother still goes skiing, while my 60 year old grandmother can't even leave her bed without collapsing.
I have been like that in periods of time, i speak, then in the middle of a sentence im trying to find the right word. wich could literally take 5 seconds, before i try to find a more simple and more "dumb/retarded" sounding word.
but its just in periods. then if you practice at talking/being social (the basement dweller i am) then you finally start to get back that quick thinking social abilities and so on.
And about the memory thing, yes
i feel also the same. i was much more fast in math 2-3 years ago.
but when i started to learn programming more seriously few months ago to present time.
my logical thinking have increased a lot. and my memory is on top again, just on a few months
and now when the logic thinking is up and running again, then i have noticed that its much more easy to communicate.
so yes, ive been there, done that.
youre not alone.
You become stupider, but wiser with age.
[QUOTE=Ryan2407;26486398]you dont say?[/QUOTE]
Avatar fits.
Doing something wrong.
It's just called getting older. You were probably very intelligent by the standards of the majority in your high school, but now that you've spent more time in the real world you're realising you aren't as great as your teenage years indicated.
Maybe people aren't praising you as they used to and so you aren't getting the reinforcement that came with it, making you a little depressed, which can easily be distracting from everyday tasks.
Hell, I'm only just 21 and sometimes I walk out of one room to do something and by the time I'm through the door I've forgotten what I'm doing. I'm also in university and despite my high grades in college and secondary school, I'm just an average student here.
I'm not sure if this can directly relate to you, it's just my personal experience and I hope you might find something reassuring here.
[QUOTE=milkandcooki;26486439] my cousin's 103 year old great-grandmother still goes skiing[/QUOTE]
Holy shit that's one awesome granny.
I half-hope I'll go senile and start to believe I'm one of my D&D characters.
Like a modern day Don Quixote.
[img]http://www.screenhead.com/~screenhe/wp-content/uploads/2007/01/don-quixote.jpg[/img]
Your brain is sort of like a muscle - if you don't use it, it will decay and weaken. Learn things! Remember the things you learn! Try to improve your mind.
And exercise the rest of your body, too. And [i]get off the internet[/i]. Or, at least, don't use it as much; the way you view information on the net can influence the way your mind works.
Mind rot. It happens to everyone when they hit 20.
Marijuana has made me slower and more forgetful. So if you smoke dope then maybe take a break from it.
I used to be able to make good posts but now I can't.
No wait who am I kidding?
[QUOTE=Ali Legend;26491542]I used to be able to make good posts but now I can't.
No wait who am I kidding?[/QUOTE]
yourself
I get that, but it's from excessive fapping.
Too much internet
Same here bro. Same age, same everything. Anyways, I really don't think it's really a physical issue.. more of a mental one.
My decrease started to speed up just 2 months before I got recruited.
[QUOTE=Dr. Freeman;26486503]You become stupider, but wiser with age.
Avatar fits.[/QUOTE]
[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i7gIpuIVE3k[/media]
sucks to be you op, my grandpa is 80 and he can do 20 pushups on his knuckles
My great grandpa was awesome, he drove his own car, took walks and flew across the country to host meetings. The only reason he died at age 100 was because he tripped and screwed up his spinal cord.
No, you are finally aware that when your teacher said "There are no stupid questions", she was lying.
[editline]4th December 2010[/editline]
[QUOTE=Archy;26492083]sucks to be you op, my grandpa is 80 and he can do 20 pushups on his knuckles[/QUOTE]
What does your grandfathers physical abilities have to do with the OP's stupidity stump?
I did think this. Then I remember how I'm intelligent in a different way than I used to be. I used to be pretty creative, and could help people out. Now I'm lazy, but much more logical. I blame programming.
Fuck that, I'm in secondary school and I think I was smarter in primary school. In primary school one or two of the teachers thought I was one of those "gifted" kids, I could repeat any fact that I read, my mind is still clogged up with useless facts I learned in primary school, they still pop out from time to time. Now I have to actually [i]try[/i] to learn stuff.
And spelling aswell, when I was younger I'd never get a spelling wrong unless it was my pen slipping, or mis-hitting the keys while typing, even writing this post I typed a word or two completely wrong and just stared at it for a few seconds before saying "nope, that's not right."
Age isn't getting you stupid.
It's the internet.
But it's brain-cells wells spent...?
Whatever you're going through, don't worry, it's more of a condition than aging. Are you depressed/ have you suffered from any recent trauma? Like loss of a loved one, job, etc? It's probably a physiological side effect resulting from dramatic change in your life, don't worry man, you'll get through it.
Because from what I've read in your post, there is a genuine amount of change going on in your life, which can be stressful. As we go through life we attempt to find out where we fit in with society, try not to look so hard into how you're performing or how you used to, take things one step at a time, and most importantly, relax if you're feeling wound up with something you enjoy doing.
I honestly feel like I am becoming dumber by the year. I think I might have a degenerative brain disease... Okay, maybe not quite that far.
However, I do have a hard time remembering basic language. I used to be fluent in multiple languages, now I can hardly remember my first language... Which is the one I am typing in now.
Then again, I wonder if it is all the Chemistry knowledge that I have shoved into my brain.
Moral of my story?
There are many different ways in which we forget information, also, here are the four ways information we remember, is lost;
Cellular Decay- Aging, Activities/Things that kill brain cells (Drinking, Smoking, Caffeine, toxins, etc), Inactive cells die out aka [B]if you don't use it, you lose it[/B] (like the Spanish you knew so well in high school)
Interference- Certain memories can take over other, less important/fading memories, depending on which type they are
Trivia- Just unimportant memories die out because of the lack of importance
Repression- Motivated loss of memory
I feel like that sometimes too, but I think in reality it's just there are good days and bad days, and I feel like you just haven't had any real chances to shine recently.
Man I feel the same way, when I was younger I felt so much more intelligent than I do now.
Sorry, you need to Log In to post a reply to this thread.
