Living with executive dysfunction - how to tidy up!

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I know how this is for, there are times I'm reminded to clean up from a laundry sense but, more than this I do sometimes have trouble keeping things orderly not merely from a sanitary sensse but, being able to keep track of things for, many years back a coma had given me the difficulty of memory related troubles as such so, I have to work most intensely to carry out daily tasks and so forth..

Some guy has been asking why I won't see him anymore.
I say we have nothing in common.
Of course, that's not informative, so he must be guessing.
Does he have executive dysfunction?

Some guy has been asking why I won't see him anymore.
I pretend to acknowledge him by saying it's because we have nothing in common.
Of course, that's not informative, so he'll just have to guess.
Do I have executive dysfunction?

I think I have this problem too. Sometimes I can actually 'feel' the mental block stopping the information going through. My mum said she could see it too (by looking at my face while my mind got 'blocked' while trying to just put something into a bag, but then again that might have been my auditory processing problems, becuase I was trying to follow her instrucions to put something in the bag). If this makes no sense then never mind lol

Does anyone know if medication for AD(H)D like ritalin or strattera can help with such issues of self-organisation ?

Thank you all so much. I am completely overwhelmed by the understanding response to this thread, just having responses from people who understand and have similar tendencies is beyond my expectation and is very welcomed!

Problem is we've gone way way beyond the 'pick it up and put it away when you've used it' type thing. I tried to take photos the other night when I posted the thread, thankfully for the sake of what little pride I have my camera batteries were dead but suffice to say that despite having a large flat there is very little floorspace to stand in because of the piles of stuff, I can't touch the walls of even the rooms we use daily cos there are piles of things on the floor 3 foot out from the walls. In the past I did 2 complete tidy ups on seperate occasions of my husband's flat when we were living there before we were married but it was a much smaller flat, and there was no help in keeping it tidy.

We moved his stuff into my flat when he was evicted from his (no fault of his own, it was sold from under him!) but it's just too much stuff and nowhere to unpack it to. I have 7 large bookcases in the sitting room holding a proportion of my own books, I cannot ever possibly get rid of books, it's not going to happen ever. The spare room could potentially hold several bookcases, but I can't put bookcases up when the room is full of boxes, and I can't empty the boxes to anywhere when there are no spare bookcases or cupboards to store the contents. I am currently sitting at a desk which is covered in 2 foot deep of papers, CDs, DVDs, bills, receipts, lottery tickets, coloured pencils, playing cards, maps, TV guides - and that's just what I can see! Under the desk is the same I have my feet on a pile of... I don't even know what is in the piles of stuff under there.

I don't blame him any more than I blame myself, it's just not part of the neurological makeup of either of us to either sort it out in the first place, or to keep on top of it.

I'm going to look through some of the links provided. I just need an ABC of tidying up and decluttering, in simple terms. I tried the "Getting Things Done" thing once, I thought it would be absolutely fantastic if I could ever get around to sorting through the clutter of my 'inbox' to determine what actually needed doing

Don't look at the task as a whole .. look at the task in small steps and start with the first step - ie one room.. one task.. if you think of it as the total task it is overwhelming.

That is so true, I know for myself if I try straightening up all of the rooms in my house I become flustered and overwhelmed. I am taking it at one room per day and its not nearly as overwhelming. I just got rid of some old clothes... time to give it away.

Part of the problem is that we both have a strong emotional attachment to 'things'. (Someone once suggested to me a theory about that which basically suggested that collection to the point of hoarding was linked to death phobia in that the aim is to leave a lot of material goods for others to sort through and remember you and your tastes/beliefs etc. upon your demise from this life, sort of like writing an autobiography with your personal posessions, very interesting in a psychological/intellectual sense but not of much practical use!)

I understand on a practical level though that actually my desire to hoard is most likely a desire to keep myself surrounded by familiarity, to keep change and uncertainty at a distance. A form of exerting control over my immediate surroundings in an otherwise uncontrollable world. Even if it is chaotic, I know that somewhere in the mess is stuff that I know and am familiar with.

And another part of the problem is prioritising and filtering - I don't trust my own 'relevance' filters with good reason, in some cases it is simply safer to assume you need to keep everything, if you can't be sure that you won't ever need something again. How do I know that if I throw that piece of paper away, even though I haven't needed it for the last few months, that I won't need it in a years time? This is an issue with which I have quite severe problems - sorting stuff into piles of relevant and needed or irrelevant and useless. I don't find that easy to determine.

It sounds like you need a " coach " .. who could be a close friend or relative to help you through the thought process.. standing beside you .. helping you think through do you REALLY need it.
If you are talking about Hoarding as in a serious psychiatric condition .. then you should seek some professional help over it. Otherwise you will eventually compromise your health, both mental and physical ( which is already happening .. you mentioned that it's really getting you down ) as well as making it harder for friends/family to be comfortable coming to see you.
Lets say a piece of paper is the issue .. if you have not needed it in the last few months.. and you throw it away .. what will happen if you then need it .. you can buy another, correct ?
There are some things that cannot be replaced, photos etc.. but there are many things that if you discover you * need * further down the track.. you can just replace the item.

The question is.. Why not ? See if you can answer it .

My husband and I are both avid readers and I love my books like friends.. but I also recognise that in keeping all of them they take up too much space and if I am honest with myself , many of them I am not ever going to pick up and read again. So they may as well be enjoyed by someone else. I keep all my special books, but the others I pass on to someone else.

It really does sound like you need some help with your clean up task.. and then continuing help with keeping the house tidy once it's done.. do you have someone you could ask that you feel comfortable with, to help ?

[quote="Saffy"]Executive planning is one of those things that effects a lot of people with ASD ADHD and TBI ( Traumatic Brain injury )

No doubt it effects a lot of other areas of your life too, not just the housework.

I have a few questions for you

1. What have you tried before ?
Tidying completely by myself when we were living in a smaller flat - within 3 days it was a tip again though! Bigger flat now + all our old stuff, more than 60 combined years worth of hoarding, don't even know where to start

2. Is your husband interested in getting the problem sorted also ?
He's actually worse at this than I am, he has taken a few days off in October with the promise of moving things where I tell him to put them because he can't figure it out himself - problem is I can't either - so yes he is keen enough but is as deficient in this area as myself!

3. Are you financially stable and have you ever considered getting a housekeeper ?
No, I am not working right now (find it difficult to secure and keep a job) and he is a charity employed substance misuse nurse on lower wages than are normal for his profession, we do not have an option to employ anyone at this time

4. Have you had any involvement from an Occupational Therapist that specialises in adults ? ( they work with Exectivie planning as do Speech Therapists - I'm a SLT although I work mostly with children now, I have done some work with adults with TBI around this area.)
Never, we were both born in 1971 and although we were both taken by our parents to child psychologists in early childhood due to our various differences from 'normality' there were no diagnoses other than 'hyperactive' at the time and hence no assistance - and neither of us are willing to go through adult diagnosis, we're not exactly highly successful in many respects of our lives, but having got to nearly 40 under our own steam we manage to get by and don't want labelling or interference.

5. How is it effecting your mental state ?
[b]I don't really understand the question tbh. I can describe the situation, but I find it infinitely more difficult to describe how I feel mentally. I've always been highly stressed and anxious, I think the mess is sort of one more bit on top of everything else that I would rather do without.

Realistically I know it doesn't matter too much in the grand scheme of things, but there's also the anxious part of me that despite overcoming fears and intrusive obessive type thoughts in the past always manages to pop up in my head with "what if the RSPCA knocked on the door (as if they would turn up spontaneously for no reason!), if they saw this mess they'd take the cats away", or "what if something caught on fire, we'd never get us and the animals out".

At the present time I have been unemployed for a while (since March) and am trying not to slip into complete agoraphobia, I don't need to go out so I don't tend to unless I force myself, when I do go out I am increasingly panicking about the prospect of having been burgled or fire breaking out while I've been away plus there are financial worries, I've had a few panic attacks over the last few years - the focus of my irrational fear changes but generally it centres on fear about losing whatever pets I have at the time (at the moment 3 cats and a parrot). I know I know I've gone completely off course in this response but maybe it will shed some light on why I can't throw stuff out, I recognise that I hang onto stuff for illogical emotional reasons of sameness and OCD type security.

I realise my issue is far bigger than lack of organisational skills although my disorganisation does not help. There is absolutely no-one I can talk to about all this besides my husband and he doesn't get it, it's sort of overwhelming.

I can see why it's overwhelming for you, and I can also see where you are coming from with regard to why it is hard to throw things away and also to stay on top of it, even if things are clean and tidy.
I'm happy to swap this to a PM and see if I can support you through this if you would like to give it a try ?

For me, it's figuring out how long I need to complete certain tasks. Finding time to clean in my busy college student schedule is one thing, but knowing how long I need to do certain tasks is another. This is often where I get stuck and I don't want to start something I can't finish. So I never start to begin with. Organizing a space has always been difficult for me--I have tried many ways, but can never keep them up. If I know I am going to Target down the street, occasionally I take my recyclables with me because the place they need to go is right across the street from Target. In this way, I piggyback the recyclables on picking up my medications. If I had a general idea of how long different cleaning tasks would take me, that would make things easier. I am going to discuss this with my therapist Tuesday and see if she has suggestions. My payee will not approve cleaning services for me, though I do believe this would help me. Saffy, I get overwhelmed, too, and can't figure out where to start. Doing little jobs is one thing, but I cannot seem able to plan for the bigger ones. Doing laundry can take a full morning because I have to go down to laundromat about 1 mile from my home and pay about 5.50/load to wash and dry my clothes. But other laundromats in my area are more expensive, so I go to this one.

Getting my house clean, and keeping it clean, has been the hugest triumph of my adult life. It's the thing I go to when I need to remind myself that I CAN do hard things, I can learn, I can grow, I can change. And really, there have been two important keys to it, I think: 1) simplifying, drastically -- keeping only the things I really want and need. 2) developing habits and routines, so that cleaning and tidying doesn't use up a lot of my limited executive functioning energy.

Have you read Marie Kondo's book, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up? She's really compassionate about the way we get emotionally attached to things, I find her attitude really helpful in letting go. For instance "it was my grandmother's!" Yes, but I have many things that were my grandmother's (she was a pack-rat, too!). So if the purpose is sentimental value, then maybe I can go through the things that were hers and select just a few, and then when I display or use them they are more likely to remind me of her in a good way. And Kondo would then have me hold the rejects in my hands and literally talk to them, thank them for symbolizing my grandmother's love and example, or whatever -- you get the point, and then let them go. Even if it's into the trash, I can let them go with gratitude. Also, if "stuff" generally has an emotional value for you, like an anxiety-soothing value or whatever, I think her approach of evaluating each item by its emotional impact (does it "spark joy"?) is really powerful. I think it makes it easier to let go of 90% of your stuff, if you get really clear that the stuff you're keeping isn't just because it's practical and useful, but because those specific things actually really make you happy. And then those happy things aren't buried under a lot of things that may have started out soothing anxiety but, at this point, totally create anxiety.

For books: I do regret letting go of some of mine, because my special interests are too esoteric for the public library, so if I ever want to refer to them again I have to buy them again. But I've learned my lesson, and now I am selective about the books I buy. Am I going to want to read it again and again? Is reading it on Kindle going to be unsatisfying? Mostly I try to buy books on Kindle, or borrow e-books from the library. I almost never buy novels, because once I know the ending, what's the point? Fiction is from the library. Non-fiction is Kindle, if that seems like it will work, or on paper only if I'm sure.

The other thing that I did that really helped me to cut back on books with less stress is to turn some of them over to an organization that has to do with my special interest, so I can still have access to them but without storing them myself. Make sure, if you do that, that they are going to keep them and share them! That way I'm also sharing them with other human beings who share my special interest, and it helps to create a social bond between us. You might even be able to keep ownership of them, and just let them use them indefinitely. Put it in writing (even if it's just an informal e-mail), then if you move, e.g., you can take them back -- just remember that you are sharing them, not just storing them, so they're going to be used, and they might come back with coffee stains or even some whole books missing.

For papers: Papers used to be a huge part of my problem. Now I save very little. I have a 2-drawer file cabinet, and even that could probably be half cleaned out. I'm single and retired, so my life is very simple -- you may need more than that. But nowadays most things can be accessed online. I get bank statements, insurance statements, all that kind of thing, electronically. Manuals for appliances and tools and things are all available online. Almost all my mail goes straight to the recycling bin. Most of my bills go straight to my bank, so my rent, utilities, car insurance, all that is paid without me having to look at it or print it out. If a bill comes in that I have to pay manually, I still put it in through my bank website and let them mail out the check, and I can schedule it for a later date if I need to -- so I can do it the day the bill comes in, and not let it pile up and get lost.

For clothes: I decided what fits, is comfortable and flattering, and that's it -- I wear the same basic outfit every day. I buy multiples. As a woman, especially, figuring out what to wear every day used to take WAY too much energy and drama. Even if I were still working in a dressy office, nowadays, I think I would come up with a basic uniform and just get it with a few different variations, colors or whatever. Takes up a whole lot less space, physically and mentally. Also for clothes: I put some hooks up in my closet, so that things that I've worn but aren't ready for laundry yet have an intermediate place to be put away, off the floor and out of sight.

For any category of things that you suspect you should get rid of, but the anxiety is too high: put them in boxes and find somewhere to store them, out of your sight -- ask around among your friends, family, church, whatever, if they have space and would be willing to help you in this experiment. You still own the stuff, you're just getting it out of sight -- if it turns out that out of sight = out of mind, after 6 months or a year, then you can let the stuff go permanently without drama.

OIhave trash cans all over the house. Bathroom, bedroom, two in the living room, two on the porch -- helps a lot. Dirty laundry goes in a basket inside the closet, out of sight. A covered hamper would do the same thing.

Ooh, that was long ... but wait, one more tip!

Schedule SHORT bursts of de-cluttering time -- maybe 10 minutes, using a timer, once or twice a day. Some days you might get sucked into it and keep going and going. The next day it will be like a hangover, that marathon will make it seem like an overwhelming task again -- but it's not. You don't have to go and go, you can do 10 minutes! You only have to do a little bit at a time, but keep doing it over and over. In the process, you will start to develop more awareness and understanding of the whys and hows, and 10 minutes will go farther than it does at the beginning.

Peace out -- we're all pulling for you!