mental confusion while driving results in being badly lost

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i had to go to my honda dealer today for the takata airbag safety recall, i set the alarm early but i was so tired that the alarm blared for a half-hour before i was conscious enough to drag myself outta the rack and into the car for the drive. on the way there, the radio was blaring about the latest election news and i got so distracted that i didn't know i'd missed my freeway exit until i was in the next town over! i was unfamiliar with Tumwater [half hour south of Olympia] as i had never been there before, took me an hour to stumble my way out of that town after confusedly driving the same streets multiple times struggling to find a clear path to the freeway. i wasted a good 15 minutes asking a good samaritan to look up directions from wherever i was at, i could not follow them more than one step. damned wasted effort on both our parts. if my brain had worked today instead of going on vacation, i'd have made it to my airbag appointment with a half-hour to spare, but i ended up a half-hour late. luckily for me the dealer was able to squeeze me in despite the lot being packed with other honda owners there for the airbag safety recall. my mind was fried after that, i could not think sensibly and basically ran on fumes. that was the worst feeling, being lost without a clue. i think i am going prematurely senile. that said, i've done this sort all my life. mebbe i was born senile? i hope to hear other WPers' experiences along these lines, por favor

I can forget what I was about to do in a heartbeat. Is it normal? Probably not but I am in a near permanent state of brain fog and it seems to have got thicker of late.

^^^thank you i'm glad i'm not the only one, truly!

Not a driver, but I get a lot of mental confusion and could just forget anything.
Been dealing with some brain fog since teen years.

And had sets of strategies in case I get lost and overwhelmed, but a good half of what to do next or could do and just know is gone.
Spending half the time at the tip of the tongue in a mental sense.


... In my case, this isn't natural. Could've sworn I wasn't always like this.

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i hope you don't get worse.

I generally don't get lost. There may be a time or two when I might have missed an exit and wound up going the wrong way. Or maybe a road is closed and I have to reroute. The trick is don't panic. I just pull off, stop and study the maps and then figure out how to get back on track.

Answer: GPS. Note: I'm very glad it doesn't get sarcastic when I still miss a turn!

The short route to my nearest traffic light, etc, takes about an hour and a dozen turns which are not marked. Coming home one night, I counted one right turn as a left, and would have been in serious trouble if not for the moon being out to alert me that I was going back to the city. Another night, I missed one turn and had a very long detour to get home from a friend's house. The interesting bit is that both times, I couldn't rotate my mental map as a unit; I had to correct each road individually and reconstruct it.
There is also a store in a shopping centre near a cloverleaf that I had trouble finding the entrance to the first time, and I think I repeated most of the errors many times before finding the easy way.
Usually, I use maps with ease, if not speed. One morning, I had to drive through a large, unfamiliar city, and didn't have time to both scan for route signs and watch my mirrors, so I just drove faster than traffic and ignored those behind.

I rarely get lost but I'm often so scatter-brained that I forget sight of my goal along with the rest of the structure of the task at hand and end up uncertain of why I am where I am at that given moment.

I suppose it's slightly less distressing than getting lost (no goal = no rush) but it's still frustrating and embarrassing.

the feeling for me was like being a trapped animal. it was a pre-intellectual feeling.

When I moved to a hilly city on a peninsula, I would frequently go sightseeing and then get lost because the street grids were a patchwork at various angles and the main roads were all eccentric. The feeling was like having a fine puzzle to solve.

I think that men are generally reluctant to ask for directions because navigation was an essential life skill for most of our ancestors, so practising it is an enjoyable game, like other sports. Getting help is like someone telling you who dunnit when you are half-way through a mystery novel.

my problem was when i was in trapped animal mode, my brain could not take directions. it was just noise.

unfortunately, despite that being sincere and heartfelt brotherly advice, my trapped animal brain could barely hear, much less remember anything about geolocation of me versus the core.

I don't think that is even solvable when overwhelmed and overstimulated. Maybe, time to calm down is the only solution.