Need advice for concentration issues.

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I have a very hard time concentrating, and I know it's going to seriously affect me when I get to university, which, if all goes well, I should be starting by next year (hopefully...)

I find it very difficult to read. I just can't concentrate, and I end up skipping all over the place. I start out trying to read normally (ie, top to bottom), but my eyes jump around and I'll read the paragraphs in all the wrong order. It takes a lot of work to just read it normally. This isn't such a big deal when it comes to things such as forums, magazines etc, but when it gets to important issues, like class work, or instuction manuals, where you need to read from top to bottom to understand the information, then it's a problem.

I try to force myself, but when I do, I don't take it in. My mind wanders. I look like I'm reading, but I'm not paying attention. This is something I have little control over. I can zone out in the middle of something and not notice for a several minutes, which doesn't sound like much, but having to re-read something all the time, and having lapses in concentration so frequently, I can see myself running out of time in exams, or never finishing a book or paper that I'm supposed to do.

I also find it difficult to sit still, and constantly fidgit. I'll start out sitting normall on a chair, but give me 5 minutes and I'm cross-legged. Another 5 minutes and I'm sitting on my knees. 5 more minutes and my position has changed again. I never really noticed how much I fidgeted until I was at the library for a couple of hours a few weeks ago. I was on the computers and the room was full. It eventually dawned on me that I must be annoying the hell out of everyone moving every 5 minutes, as no one else was. I don't know how I'll sit still for so long in college or university.

I'm taking a college course this september, to prepare for uni, and it's a very intensive course, 2 years crammed into one. It's a full time course, with full days, and at least an hour of homework every night. My mum went on the same course 2 years ago, and I was amazed at how much work she did in just 3 weeks.

With my lack of concentration, I don't know how I'm going to cope with such a work load.

I really don't want to take medication, but I don't really know how else to improve this.

Any ideas anyone?

Sounds pretty bad, I am uni now and I have difficulty paying attention for a long period of time, I often wish that I can just get to the important thing but I have to read it all and have a lot of stoping and starting. I failed a subject as I had to do a crazy amount of reading usless stuff, but found the easiest way is to kind of create a comentary in your head about what you are reading. Try and make links kind of like putting mental postage notes, this is like when you think of this this information is relivant to that. I find that as long as it interests me I can keep some concentration, other then that I am trying to learn myself.

I've suffered a lack of concentration for years, doing one thing, getting restless after about 10 minutes and then either starting something else that I get bored of quickly or, more likely, standing around wondering what to do next and getting pretty frustrated. You feel that whenever you're doing one thing, you ought to be doing something else.

I understand that lack of conentration, as well as poor memory, are symptoms of depression, which in aspies is pretty common, most probaly due to frustration. I do find that when things are going pretty well, or the times I've been on antidepressants, I can knuckle down and do something for a couple of hours without getting bored, but most of the time, like you and no doubt many others, I'm just a butterfly.

There is always medication like dexedrine that will help with the concentration. If only to get you through university.

Edit: I say this because I was in a situation like you where I got into university but was kicked out due to low marks from being unable to keep my concentration. I wish I knew about dexadrine before then as it enables me to work all day if I wanted to on one thing without being distracted or losing concentration.