Memoir Shard — You need a tether or an anchor (The packing will not get done) 3 pm Entry

Memoir Shard — The tether slips (a metaphorical one) 

(The packing will not get done)

Sometimes you need a tether or an anchor, and I don’t mean a literal one. I mean something that holds you in place long enough to finish the thing you’re trying to do. Today I feel like every tether has been cut. The children have left home. My husband and I live independently inside the same house, not codependent, not intertwined in the way that used to keep me focused.

I need something metaphorical to tie me down, but nothing is sticking. Packing should be simple, even lucky — packing for a holiday — but for me it’s one of the worst tasks. I can’t gather outfits or essentials and put them in a case in any practical order. It’s like dyslexia but with objects: I think I’ve packed something, but I’ve skipped it entirely. Pants, socks, my wash bag — the important things slip through the cracks.

I used to try the Ziploc method, the organised system, but it felt too structured. Too rigid. I start one thing, then drift into another, and the whole system collapses. It’s like I need a ball and chain, not a literal one, but something that holds me in one place long enough to finish the task.

This is the problem with my ND brain. My shelf is always full. My mental desk is piled high with things I’m doing, things I should be doing, things I forgot I started. Everything is cluttered. I can’t see through it. I don’t know where to begin. I pick something up, put it down, pick up something else, put that down too. The whole day goes like this.  I block my self with more joy but then I get no where, no where required or necessary.

Now I’m standing here asking myself how to bring my focus back, how to stop being pulled toward everything that doesn’t need doing while the things that do need doing sit untouched. This is the menopausal neurodiverse brain: a shelf overflowing, an art table with too many projects open, and no clear place to start.

I have my hand on a thing the thing i should be doing and then I am looking at the thing i should not be doing, trying to make the mental note to do the task at hand (in hand literally)  not the one my tractor beam eye line is wanting to do.

And I could cry 

Footnote & Feelings

Part One was 9am.

Part Two is 3pm.

And I’m still circling the same suitcase, whilst utter Chaos.