Due to a situation I find myself in, my daily habits have changed to a more simple daily schedule.
However, recently, I’ve been noticing that I struggle to recall certain events that happened the previous day:
What I ate for breakfast, what I did at work, what I learned in my classes, etc.
I don’t know how long this has been happening. Am I just overthinking it?
I do it often, perhaps it’s just that you don’t feel like you need to retain the information and you’re coasting?
But, as I have answered on other similar posts, this seems common for people on the spectrum like myself too.
Yeah, I deal with this. Most notably for me is during the “daily standup” at work in which everyone on the team is supposed to recount what was worked on yesterday, what they’re working on today, and if there are any roadblocks.
Even though I know I was busy the day before, I often struggle to recall precisely what I worked on.
I have this issue too, caused by the anxiety I have knowing that the moment I have to speak publically my mind goes completely blank and the more I try to recall the worse it gets. To help overcome the issue I take a few minutes to make a brief list of notes at the end of every day that outlines what I worked on that day and where I left things.
It ends up in me mostly reading off a list but since I work remotely I just put it on another monitor and it’s not a big deal. I give it helped a ton and I feel much less put on the spot at the beginning of each work day.
I think from time to time, it is normal.
a lot of people don’t really pay attention to day-to-days unless there’s something specific or particularly attention grabbing about it.
if I understood the post as it meaning you find yourself in a steady decline of remembering, that might be something else.
If it’s a sudden change, might be worth talking to a therapist.
I had exactly the same thing, and would come to my senses (for lack of a better term) every so often and be genuinely confused where days or even weeks had gone. One thing that has been really helping me is writing all the little things down such as what I ate or learned in classes as you mentioned.
I personally started using Logseq for this but basically any note taking application will do. The most important feature that I use is linking topics, for example I would mark a bullet point with #food and so on, which eventually organizes the thoughts automatically. It’s really nice to be able to just write and not even think about organizing it as that’s the computer’s job.
How is your sleep? So you take anything to help you sleep?
Kinda depends I guess, each person has varying degrees of recall and you can improve your recall if you’re willing to work on it (barring any actual health conditions that would interfere of course).
Personally, if I’m asked on the spot a question like, “What’d you eat for breakfast last Tuesday?” there’s a pretty good chance I wouldn’t remember and I don’t think that’s too unusual for most people.
If you’re experiencing increasingly poor recall (or just suddenly your recall is noticeably worse), then it’s probably worth getting checked out by medical professionals if you can afford it but not always having perfect recall or even slightly worsening recall as you age is pretty normal.
apart from mot enough sleep, another cause can be if you have too much routine. the human brain compresses and deletes everything that’s daily routine. like brushing teeth, having breakfast, etc. you always brush teeth and have breakfast, so why remember every instance, when the brain can just remember that you generally brush teeth and have breakfast. if most of your life is routine like that, you will forget a lot of it. you can add an exotic fruit to your breakfast and you will remember it a bit better, except if you start doing it every day.
Did you forget the content of what you learned yesterday or are you just unable to place when you learned it?
Also sometimes this type of memory loss can be a symptom of bed bugs, check your sheets.
