Bad procrastination problem

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I am pretty sure I have AS, undiagnosed, along with a good helping of ADHD and OCD. I have what many aspies would consider a dream job. I work as a web developer as a private contractor position for a global web hosting company, from the privacy of my own home. Programming seems to be my savant skill, so it should be a breeze, right?

The problem is I have times when I get overwhelmed by the scope of a project, and lose the ability to focus entirely. I then find myself procrastinating working on it. Working from home without set hours makes this extremely easy to do. Then I find myself endlessly distracted with everything BUT what I should be working on. For example, posting here when I should be working. Then, it starts to snowball when I get behind, and then it becomes even more overwhelming, and even harder to regain focus and just bear down and get to work.

It seems the more emotionally off kilter I get, the worse the ADHD part comes out and the AS takes a backburner. It's odd actually WISHING that my AS would take back over so I could focus, but that is where I find myself.

Fortunately, I have a long history with this company and work as a contractor. I have some leeway and haven't been fired yet. This week I haven't been able to get anything done for a couple of days now. I wrote in and blamed it on a bad migraine, which isn't that much of a stretch because I get so stressed out in the procrastination loop that it can and sometimes does lead to that. I don't think they will fire me over it, but I am getting way behind and have done this so much now that I'm getting a reputation of being unreliable.

I know there are many on this board who are well adjusted and do well in their careers, but does anyone else go through this and have any advice?

When the scope of a job seems too much, pick a small ,easy to do part of it and do it. Keep doing pieces until you are done. Often by the time you get to the part that seemed insurmountable you will have been cogitating on it as you go so it will all come together.

I don't work at home, but I am like this as well. I usually do pretty well while at work, because of the set hours and the tasks are assigned by my supervisors, so I know what I am supposed to be doing and when to do it. I have also heard that ADHD people function well with strict guidelines and routines, such as in the military.

I was going to go to Procrastinators Annomyous, but I haven't gotten around to it.

Seriously though, I have a huge procrastination problem myself.

You are lucky thats for sure. I would love to have an oportunity to work as a web designer as a freelancer...

I have the same problems you have. I don't know what to say but... I read this once: "The true way to render ourselves happy is to love our work and find in it our pleasure."

I finally had to break it down for my boss today and explain what was going on. In the explanation I also told him about Aspergers, which he had never heard of. It might have been a mistake, but at least I still have my job.

My procrastination has gotten pretty bad in recent years. In my first year or two of undergrad I was a stellar student, always got stuff done, etc, but in the later years and into my Masters degree and now that I'm working, I've found more and more problems getting myself to produce, where I found myself relying more on extended deadlines or not handing stuff in at all.

I realized a distinction between these years: in the earlier years it was easy to sit down and just read a textbook - I could read it a sentence at a time, make notes, and when I finished the chapter I was done studying. In later years I started taking more essay-based courses, where there's a different demand on you to get work done. You can collect and read research articles, but ultimately you have to sit down and churn out the essay and then edit it.

These production assignments are more subjective - it's not a matter of right or wrong, it calls on your creativity and a bit of individuality, whether it's writing an essay or a story or programming code. I find I'm terrified of writing down crap and so I avoid writing anything at all. Ultimately the longer you wait to start, the less time you leave yourself before the deadline. If you end up doing the all-nighter to finish just in time for the deadline, then you can assure yourself that though you're turning in crap, it's because you didn't have enough time to do something good, not because you're incapable of doing good work. I think it's your subconscious fear that if you actually devote the time to it and it's still crap, you'll have no excuse.

I can't say I've dealt with this problem yet - I myself am facing down an extended deadline on an article for a night school class, and I keep delaying another article I tell myself I'm going to write (some day!). But the best advice I've received is that you stop pressuring yourself to produce great code, and just sit down and write code. Bad code, it doesn't matter. Just set aside a certain time each day where you have to sit down and do work. Give yourself permission to do bad work. Sometimes you need to start out with bad work to get into the groove of doing something worthwhile. Or you have to throw out 10 ideas to find one good one (or even if the first one was good, odds are out of the next 9 ideas, you'll find one even better). Then after you've gotten all this crap out, you can go back over it, satisfied that you've been at least productive, and then weed out all the garbage. Maybe you only keep 20% of the work you did, but you're still further ahead than if you hadn't worked at all. And once you find that 20% that is actually good, it's a greater motivation to keep working and building and finishing the project.

There are a few books written for writers on this subject, because writers are often so stifled by their fear of writing imperfect stories that they'd rather write nothing at all. But these resources can translate well to artists and producers of any stripe. A few classics - Anne Lamott's "Bird by Bird" (when faced with a challenging project, just tackle it bird by bird, ie one step at a time); Julia Cameron's "The Artist's Way" (about setting aside a time every day to produce something, and not caring if it's crap); and also Jack Heffron's "How to Get Ideas" (which gives some great ideas for being creative on demand). Any of these books make an aspiring read - just don't read them when you're supposed to be working on your projects!