I suck at my job...

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I don't know if I should even be working at all. I fall somewhere in between moderate to high functioning autistic. I am lucky to even have a job, let alone a career. I struggle with severe executive dysfunction. I'm horrible at planning and organizing projects. I spend 50% of my day "stuck" in moments where I'm just figuring out what I'm supposed to be doing. I can take over an hour to make one single photocopy because I am very easily distracted and I simply cannot stay on task. I can walk across the lab five times before I remember why I walked across the lab in the first place. I can't multitask and being expected to shift my focus or become accustomed to having my train of thought derailed constantly is sure to result in a meltdown, and usually a subsequent shutdown. If a task seems redundant or pointless I will flat out refuse to do it until I absolutely have to.

Therefore I am not very efficient at my job. I have no idea why I have been promoted three times and why I've kept my job through the past three lay-offs.

All I do know is that my work day is on average 3-4 hours longer than a normal work day. I often come in early, work through lunch and leave late. My boss sometimes tells me to go home, and my coworkers often ask me why I don't take lunch, and I really don't know what to tell them other than I'm busy. Really the truth is that I feel like I need to work that much longer just to get my work done. It takes me 11-12 hours to do what they can get done in 7-8 hours. I am salaried so it's not like they pay me more to work more...

Even still, sometimes I feel like I should just resign from my position and let someone less mentally defective take my position. I wouldn't want to not work at all, but I sort of feel like I don't belong in a professional position. The thought of having no structure or routine to my day terrifies me. I wouldn't want disability, although I may qualify for it. And I'd have to find some way to support myself.

Maybe I'll jet get laid-off the next time they decided to do an " organizational restructuring."

If you continue to think like that, you will get laid off. Your getting the work done, it sounds like your doing decently well.

To improve on your speed, why not try various things like setting yourself minideadlines before the actual deadlines or carrying a checklist with you, I find writing tasks down then crossing them off really helps, and for bigger daunting seeming tasks I list the substages, then cross them off. One of the most challenging things to absentmindedness is those little tasks that there seem to be a lot of, they're very tempting to put off and easy to forget one or two, my way of solving this is to group them all together and solve them all at once.

You sound like your having problems, but don't give up, there are plenty of ways to get more organised and it sounds like you have shown a lot of dedication to your job by going to such lengths to get things done. Try not to be so hard on yourself.

Asked and answered.

My job doesn't really have concrete deadlines to begin with. It's not like my boss says "I need that report by Thursday afternoon at 2:30." Occasionally my boss needs something done right away for a meeting and it's something she was too busy to do herself...so it's usually one of these...."drop everything and do this now" sort of things when there is a concrete deadline in a matter of say 15 minutes. Other deadlines for the various stages of my projects are constantly being moved around. Often involve tasks from several different departments that won't agree with each other until after the original deadline is passed. As far as keeping up with what I'm supposed to do with all of my projects I'm actually okay. I usually do what needs to get done and usually on time. But sometimes I encounter issues like I can't obtain a raw material I need for a few weeks because it's on back-order, or someone who needs to sign paperwork or prepare a document is on vacation for two weeks...in which case I do not make my deadlines. Yes, it is my fault.

My job is similar to working in a busy restaurant kitchen, only instead of working with food I work with chemicals, and instead of creating recipies I create formulas. I'm sort of like a burger flipper at a fast food restaurant, but I wear a lab coat and make more money. I know am the least important member of my department. I get the least important projects and I constantly get brushed off by my bosses when I need them to review something (mainly because my projects aren't important)...this often brings my progress on my unimportant projects to a screeching halt, and I can spend a week or more just waiting for my boss to review something...in which case I have to find something else to work on to look busy while I'm waiting.

But my main issues at work lie more with my mental ability to do the job. Some days I can't even write in a lab notebook. I skip letters, leave out words, write letters and numbers backwards...I find myself aimlessly wondering the halls of the building I work in because I forgot why I left the lab the minute I walked out the door. I go into a stockroom and I have no idea why I'm there, and it might take me a good 30 minutes to figure out what I needed. Sometimes I make careless mistakes while weighing out raw materials, and I catch them after the fact and I create double the work for myself. It's for all these reasons I end up working longer hours than everyone else.

Some medications can help me focus better, but they worsen my aggression and irritability and make me stim much more. There are medications that do help with the aggression and irritability, but those make me tires and make my brain work too slowly. Medication is not the answer. I've tried that before. I have to either figure out how to get my brain to function properly or I need to leave my job.

Your post reminds me so much of how I have felt at EVERY job I've ever had. The difference is that you are able to articulate it. Last time I had a job (I'm a stay-at-home mom for the past 12 years), I had no idea about AS or any concept that I might possibly have any kind of official "disability". I didn't know what to think, really. I just knew that people seemed to keep busy and get things done all around me, and I mostly felt confused and useless, and afraid that someone would notice my lack of productivity and I'd get in trouble for being lazy. (I often got talked to about my "attitude" and "lack of confidence" and "lack of initiative".) I remember often feeling like I ought to ask someone to clarify what I was supposed to be doing, or how to do the task, but I had already interrupted people's work enough with annoying questions, so I'd try to figure it out myself...but then not be able to think at all, so I'd go out for a breath of fresh air. I require specific details of how to do the task, but it most jobs, it's up to the individual to figure that out, because the rest is just busy work. And someone like me, with a university degree, is expected to be able to handle anything. In other types of jobs, I would focus on minute details of a particular job so as to avoid the parts that I wasn't able to do for some reason (like a fear of making a phone call, or an inability to plan and organize something).

I know, I'm just waffling about me, and not being helpful. It's just that your situation sounds so familiar.

Being that it's so hard for people to get jobs nowadays, though, you might think twice about quitting.

Not always. I came early, stayed late, cut down on lunch time and still lost job. I know how he/she feels about always worrying that they think you suck. Not a fun way to work, so let's change it.

I know this response is very late and this post is probably long over but I just had to say:
Your experiences at work are so much like mine its not funny.

I think my main difficulties are a big lack of initiative and speed. I feel like it takes me twice as long to do almost anything (unless Ive being doing it for a really long time or it has become part of my routine), but I also executive funtion issues.

I also frequently make writing mistakes where I will miss words/letters or write the wrong word or start writing the letters in the wrong order eg if I have to write the word 'lane' I will start writing it with an 'N' Therefore I seem to spend a large portion of my time at work checking my work to make sure Ive done the right thing and/or correcting it. This contributes to my slowness but it isnt the only thing affecting it.

I also I have a problems distinguishing between insignificant details and things that are actually worth paying attention to. Instead I pay attenition to as many details as I possibily can only to find out later that I did not even have to worry about most of it. On the plus side this makes me very thorough and sometimes I pick up other mistakes which other people have missed.

I have a science degree but finding and keeping jobs continues to be a major problem for me. I currently do not have a job and havent for about a year. I always seem to come back to this stage regularily in my life where no matter what I do I just cant find a job, even with that I have had some experience in or think I could do without to many difficulties.

Every now and then I get to the stage where I have been looking for jobs for a long time unsuccessfully and I start getting sick of it but dont know what else Im supposed to do so I start considering study again. At the moment Im studying library and information studies part time (still looking for a part-time job). However I am never able to just assume that just because I have had no trouble studying something and completing the course that I will just automatically be able to find and do the job successfully.

The study seems to keep me busy or distracted for a while but sooner or later I will be looking for jobs again, and not getting anywhere. When I actually have found a job I have often been let go because I have not preformed to the standard they want,

At 35 I have worked in numerous different areas and have still not found the one perfect job or industry/area for me and I dont know if I never will.

All I can do is try to make the most of the jobs which I can do for as long as I can and then try and find something else.

I also constantly worry that I suck, especially about being too slow. Every job I start (even the ones that work out) I worry about being fired any day and me not being able to do anything about it. Most jobs I have had (and work experiences) the people I have worked with have not told me what I am doing wrong or given me a chance to improve. They have just suddenly decided thats it, I have to let you go and thats it. They havent even given me much of a reason, or the right one. THey dont even think about it.

Be very lucky you have a job, if other people are satisfied with your performance and dont see the need to let you go, and you can deal with the pressure and sensory demands of the job it would probarly be good to keep the job.

Hello:
You are obviously valued at your job if you have been promoted three times and avoided layoffs espically the most recent ones in the worst recession since the great depression.
Like you said you get bogged down in little details and your missing the larger picture. The larger picture is that you're your doing job really well and you too stuck on perfecting the little details. I have ADHD and so some of the problems you mentioned I have as well. Not as severe but I often forget what I am thinking(working memory) about and have short term memories issues. To help with that I put all future dates and deadlines on Microsoft Outlook weeks or months before; I also use the Tasks function to remind myself of what I need to do no matter how small or easy to remember it may seem. I also write myself little notes throughout the day and if I need to I plan out how I need to do something to stay on task. Ex.) 1. go to stockroom. 2.) retrieve chemical , et cetra.
I know it may sound silly to most people but by doing so not only do I accomplish much more I feel BETTER. I never knew I had adhd so I would always blame myself, it was my fault, I could have prevented that mistake from happening, et cetra. Once I knew what was causing it I stopped blaming myself, I accepted I will always be this way because I have a disorder. e. Stress only exacerbates your issues, critizing myself for not remembering, frantically trying to remember, getting angry for always being so distracted just created this immense amount of stress in my life because I was so certain it was "my fault", that I could "fix it". THe more I did it the worst I got and as result I would become more irriated, believe me beating yourself up does not help. Maybe if you accept that you will always have those problems you can move past it and find ways to accomdate your weaknesses as opposed to trying to eliminate them.
If all else remember: Perfect is the enemy of good.