Dificulity Getting Started/Getting Stuck?

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Hey All

All my life I seem to get stuck in some kind of rut of doing the same thing over and over. I know in my mind what I need to do but can't seem to process how to do it.

Some examples

I would hang my washing up without pegs. I just automatically would hang it up this way. When the washing blew off the line, I would race out and pick it up. I never made the connection to buy some pegs, even though I probably had an image of pegs in my mind somewhere. Just not making the connection.

8 years later.

One day I saw an image on Pinterest of some wooden pegs in a craft idea to hang photos. Brain click! Oh, they would be good for hanging the washing.


I washed my clothes etc by hand for 3 years because I could not figure out how I was going to get a washing machine, where to get it and how to transport it. Just by chance someone gave me one for free otherwise I would probably still be stuck in the same cycle.

Same deal with a fridge. I had a crappy bar fridge for 3 years until I stumbled on a full size fridge on the FaceBook marketplace and the guy even dropped it off.

Same with food, I eat the same thing day after day because trying to begin cooking/eating something else is overwhelming. The image of other food is in my mind but I can't seem to get started.

It's like. I know where I am. I know what I need. But I can't figure out the steps to get there, or can't figure out where to start, or the whole thing is just too much.

It's like my mind gets stuck


Does this sound something like Autistic Inertia?

Yes it does.

definitely! Is there anybody in your life who you trust to help you find some things that might make your life easier? Occupational therapists are trained to help you find new ways to do things in order to make life easier. You might check with your doctor or counselor and ask for a referral.??? It seems like your life has been really hard in places it didn't have to be. Its OK to ask others for help... I know, sometimes we are working so hard to get through every day we don't stop and look around or notice there might be ways to help us as we struggle.

I love that word.

Something that sometimes helps me is to set my little kitchen timer and when it goes off, I have to get up and at least get ready to start whatever task

Haha! You sound just like my mother! She is like that!

With me I am very good at starting things but not so good at finishing them!

Have fairly recently had difficulties with remembering the process of how to do things after the last burnout. Things I used to do without thinking. Can get stuck on something wondering why and then as if something clicks inside and I am like "Oh yes. How come I couldn't think how to do that?"


Examples of my Mum though....

Years ago back in the very late 1970's a local insurance man (They would go door to door in those dsys) brought us two goats as we had land and in the coldvwinter there had been snow and he could not get to them. So he wanted us to have them.
One needed milking so my Mum got ready to walk down to the phone box in the village to phone for the vet to show her how to milk. The man who lived opposite asked where she was going and she told him, and he said "No need. I will show you as I used to have to milk as a child before going to school". So he came over and showed her how to milk.
That one goat was pregnant and we had a goat kid, and later had more goats... And my Mum would milk them early morning and in the evening, whilst doing other things like cut the wood for thr fire and the things needed to run the house (Smallholding).
After years of milking, another person we knew who kept goats came to visit and saw her milking in the morning.
She asker her "Why do you milk using just one hand?"

Mum thought about it. The man who taught her only had one arm! It never occurred to her she could milk using both hands! Haha! Thats my Mum!

Executive Processing Dysfunction

The cooking thing sounds like me. Been eating the same couple of foods for a couple of years. Been bored of them for a long time. Can't seem to be able to cook anything else

Obsessive compulsive disorder

Welcome to Wrong Planet.

Our devices come with schedulers and timers. Also their are many apps that perform the same functions. They will buzz/ring you if you program them to limit the time spent on activities you have trouble leaving.

I think of it as being efficient.

Once I have a solution to a problem I stick to that solution, even though there might be others, as well. Occasionally I will try something different, and if it seems better then I will stick to that solution.

For instance, when I go into a restaurant I want to get a good meal. If it is a restaurant I am unfamiliar with than I have to study the menu and try something; either it is good enough to warrant returning to the restaurant or is bad enough to make me want to avoid the restaurant. It may take a few trips but eventually I will choose the thing I will order in future trips to that restaurant...just about every single time.

I was amused when I went into one counter-service noodle restaurant. The cashier began ringing up my order before I got to the counter! And she got it RIGHT!!

At my favorite five sit-down dining restaurants my orders are very, very predictable. Depending upon the restaurant I will order either crab cake, cod, lamb, lamb vindaloo, or filet mignon...plus there are places I avoid (for instance, too much cilantro or too much noise). Similarly At the local submarine sandwich shops there are specific orders I favor at some of the chains, and some chains I avoid.

I find this to be very efficient!

Used to be my mum, the only person in the world who got me (and could unstuck me)

Unfortunately she passed almost 9 years ago and I've been living alone ever since.

Of course I never knew I was ASD back then. Only figured that out 2 years when getting a PTSD diagnosis. In the process of doing that I had one of those "Ah, Ha!" moments, when it all made sense.

I do practice mindfulness now, which has been life changing. And learning from others with ASD on Youtube has also made a huge impact.

I have my "own way" of doing things and how I absorb info. Which seems to confuse the heck out of NT's.

Ever see the movie Jurassic Park? All the Dinosaurs were on an island to keep them away from people on the mainland. Sometimes I think of myself as someone on an Island who can see the mainland. I want to get off the island so I wade into the water. But you see I am afraid of the water. It is strange and scary - and I don’t want to be in the ocean, I just want to stop being on the island and start being on the mainland. So I am so afraid of the water I get back on the I land. I avoid the water for a while. Then I look at the mainland and try again. Same thing happens. Again and again. Change is difficult.

Autistic inertia is definitely a thing.

Only you can do it. But you can’t do it alone.
Find people you can trust to help you change.

My mind has been stuck since the 1st of this month. I finally convinced myself to take the decorations off my tree today because it would give me a visual que that my Christmas vacation from working on my arts & crafts is over and it's time to get my hands busy again. Now that I've got that taken care of, I'm ready to loom knit more plushies.

i put up with a dodgy light fixture above my oven since 2008, my sweetie went ahead and fixed it for me, suddenly i now have a stovetop light that works brilliantly! but before that i was largely insensitive to it, i just put up with it being dim.

Maybe try to do something every day? It doesn't have to be much. Just to get into a routine as we often like to get into routines.