Does a really bad memory have anything to do with aspergers?

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I am often the same. I will write something out and start skipping ahead a couple of letters/numbers and have to then back track and fill in the characters I left out so I end up writing some words in a none sequential order. I was diagnosed with dyslexia as a child but I considered myself largely over it - Maybe not now that I think about things like that.

Si

I fear that I'm coming down with a memory loss issue that could potentially affect my current job. I've noticed, over the last couple of months, my memory deficits. I've just started a new job and my trainer jokes about it but I can't help thinking it could actually be pre-Alzheimer's. That would suck. I knew somewhere along the way I'd start getting senile. I just hoped it wouldn't happen this early. I fear that I may be "put out to pasture" in just a few years. Unfortunately, it's not one of those things science can do anything about. I hate it, but such is life.

I have a bad short term memory if i'm told to do things, pick up things ect but i have a extremely good long term memory losts of people find it weird i can remember things people said years ago not even anything of significance , very good with attention to details, what i was wearing what other people were wearing.

I always thought really bad memory was something to do with Dementia.

I have excellent long term memory and am also good at remembering things that interest me. In college, I can remember most of the lecture and almost be able to give the lecture myself, but that was because what I was studying was an interest of mine.
In high school, I had little interest in math and science and just scraped by enough to pass. It was difficult for me to remember, let alone pay attention and not space out and go into my own little world.
At work now, I am pretty good at my job, but sometimes when it gets busy and my mind gets overwhelmed, I forget things such as entering new parts locations in the computer. A few weeks ago I went to the Calgary branch to preview the new bar code system, and the way the parts director was teaching it I found it hard to pay attention and learn, even while writing notes. I was writing what was said but it wasn't staying in my brain. Luckily I was able to pick it up when the reps from the US came to our branch in RD and I did hands on training. They were amazed at how fast I picked it up. This really must have confused our parts director.

My memory often deceives me, lands me in trouble or has the post-reference effect of speaking too soon or too loudly and wondering where the topic took place in the first instance.
I'm always wondering about the next latest thing or things which are more important than what may be lacking or taking place at the time of initial discovery. I just don't find things as interesting as I once did and the more I get older the more people I find cant seem to stop bragging about things they've done or what someone else has done and you just want to scream loudly and get it over and done with but they're still debating the odds, and its like what?
So, in all total honesty I am not even sure what I am meant to do with special skills if I can t even use them to programme them in my defence when all others are thinking about is their next paycheque. Really pimps me off sometimes. What's a memory if you cant use it anyway? in the past I was always the one remembering stuff for people who had a really crap memory and would often blame someone else for not telling them, which was really annoying and I soon realised that their stress was soon getting to me and I needed to find a way to escape from the initial responsibility they or their peers had landed.
I'm constantly seeking ways to innovate or improve myself but the status quo over the years is not all its cracked up to be and I am seriously thinking of immigrating abroad one day when all the current debates on question time are through.

I'm a visual thinker. Poor short term memory, very good long term memory.

When I was young I used to study faces and could recall them and draw them months later perfectly. Up untill my 30's I could say "I never forget a face". But these days I'm struggling to recognise the same face two days apart.

Names of people and places goes through my head and doesn't touch the sides. Extreamly poor memory of someones name. I litteraly have to work with someone 1, 2 or sometimes 3 or more years before I finaly learn their name.

I find the same with spelling of words. I can visualise the word, in a fuzzy shape like manner. I can see the shape of the word, but can't for the life of me remember how to spell it. The words "really" and "untill" I still can not for the life of me remember how to spell them. I try both ways and get it wrong both times.

I remember in school they used to take half a mark off an asingment for each spelling mistake. Getting zero wasn't uncommon for me. So to compensate to a degree, I would spell the words I didn't know various ways in the same assignment, hopeing I would get some right, and up my mark a little. The teachers were usualy baffled why I would spell the same word different ways in the same sentance. LOL

Thanks Lol, must be an age thing, still it seems that you may recall me saying to you its not what you remember but the way that you remember them.

Certain ways leave certain trails,
employed with them from the holy grail,
but if I weren't to make up my mind,
id say to them they were colour blind.

I've suffered with Asperger?s all my life. I'm quite good with technology and so forth but my short term memory is terrible. I'm an IT guy. I work in an IT job. I'm trying to learn new stuff in my job but I tend to forget things and I have to keep on asking for help and help on understand things. For me, I have to be taught several times until I 'get it' or shown in person. Well this is getting annoying for my fellow workers and I?m on temp until end of this year and I?m really worried that I might lose my job blamed on my dreaded Asperger?s which has ruined my quality of life and if only there was some way to make me remember things better and retain the stuff I learn, really I just can't! My self-esteem is very bad and because of this I?m quite a depressed individual because I?ve been bullied my whole educated and personal life, treated differently than everyone else...I tend to hate myself and I think I need to see a Doctor. I?m from the UK and Doctors here are terrible. I don't think a Doctor can help me to be honest.....can professionals help me get a better memory? No. Can a Doctor help me be less depressed and happier? No. So I have no idea what to do. No nobody seems to know or don't care on how to help me.

A number of years ago at a former company, the president of the company would frequently travel to see prospective customers all over the country.

It would always amaze me the way he could describe in detail every conversation when he would get back to town. About the best I could do would be to give my general impression about how well it went and a very few of the most major details.

I have these problems to but have found that if I put things in the same place and order all the time it helps tremendously.

My car keys I use to lock in my car all the time. I put one under the car and had to use it one time and forgot to put it back. I now have a keyless remote and now only lock my car with it. This ensures that the keys are in my hands when I lock my car.

You have to come up with ways to lesson the severity of your forgetfulness. Once you have done this your anxiety will lesson and you will be able to think more clearer.

People complain that I ask them again what I just asked them a few minutes ago ... yet they are astonished that I can recall word for word what they uttered in a casual conversation years ago.

I have almost no visual memory at all, and do not remember anything about how something (or someone) looked unless I made a mental note of just that particular detail when I saw it.

When it comes to writing, I have never had any problems with spelling correctly (apart from minor stuff) but when writing I often shift the order of the letters, so I immediately see it, erase it, and write it again in the same faulty order, so I have to erase it again ...

Last edited by JurgenW on 31 Aug 2014, 7:55 am, edited 1 time in total.

I can't remember.

My short term memory is terrible and I have learned to always keep checking items to avoid forgetting. For example, if I grab my car keys as I'm walking out the door, you will catch me repeatedly checking all my pockets to ensure I have my wallet, cell phone and keys. Even if I stop to put something in the trunk, I will go through the same routine of checking all items are on my person. Only, when I'm sitting in my car do I stop checking my pockets.

If I make a cup of tea or coffee and place it somewhere, I lose it and usually have to make another hot cup. If my mom tells me to clean up the living room, I will put things in places and have a hard time recalling where I placed them. The memory is faint in my mind like a word that is at the tip of the tongue.

At work, I have to write things down and you cant tell me to do multiple things at once; I need to write them down or I'll simply forget. I'll remember there is something else but wont be able to "place my finger on it"

For some reason with numbers its different. My numbers are colored in my mind and are represented by pictures. So its a story but its a subconscious process. For example, one day I was sitting at a café counter and directly in front of me was a post it taped to a phone with a wifi numerical password. Because the image was there, I can still remember that wifi password until this day because its a story in my head. Same with phone numbers or constants like PI=3.14159265359..its a story in my brain that's engraved.

My long term memory on the other hand is superb...especially any images. Studying textbooks at school was helpful because the images or diagrams would stick in my head from each page and during the exam I can bring that image up of the page in my mind and duplicate it on the exams. I remember when I was younger I was accused of cheating because I answered an essay question verbatim, I then always made sure I sat up front.. directly in front of the teacher.

My memory has been getting really frightening lately, usually with names of people I should know, like broadcasters I listen to multiple times a week.

Hoping it's not alcoholic dementia.