ADHD

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Relevant Lemmy communities:

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founded 3 years ago

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116

I can't stop when its time to stop (lemmy.today)

submitted 5 days ago by Remy@lemmy.today to c/adhd@lemmy.world

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Hello, I have a big problem that interferes with every aspect of my life. And I want to ask you all if you experience this too and/or you have any ideas on how to improve this behavior?

The Problem

When I do anything interesting, or anything that just isn't completely boring, I can't stop when it's time to stop and start the doing the next thing. I always think, something like "Just five minutes more" and then I sometimes finish hours later than I had planned. This breaks all time-sensitive plans and also causes me to go to sleep far too late.

I don't think that its simple procrastination, because what I feel when I do it, is not about not wanting to start the next thing, but about not wanting to stop the current thing.

List of things I already do / have already tried

Setting up alarms that remind me that I need to stop doing the current thing and start doing the next thing
Creating schedules
Configuring the Wifi Router to turn of at certain times: This is very effective (when I have taken out my SIM card before), but its only helping with cutting the wifi at the end of the day for bedtime, not other time sensitive tasks that are necessary to even enable me to sleep on time (like eating dinner early enough)
Buffer time: Most of the time I can't get my self to view the buffer deadline as the actual deadline
Reading books about habits: I read some books about habits, but these books are mostly about starting an activity, or don't starting an activity at all, but I need to do certain things, and stop doing them on time.
This list is probably incomplete

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[–] Rhynoplaz@lemmy.world 9 points 5 days ago (6 children)

I completely understand what you're going through.

The one thing that concerns me is that you keep setting reminders, and completely ignoring them. Lord knows I've started playing a game and suddenly realized it was 10 hours later, but when the reminder goes off, you must obey it.

You set the timers because YOU WANT yourself to be on time. When the reminder goes off, you're saying past me was wrong, I'll do what I want. Future you eventually realizes past you was right all along and you repeat the cycle.

I think you need to make the choice to follow your own rules. Set reminders early and often. Give yourself a 15 minute warning so you can find a good point to stop what you're doing. When the next alarm goes off 15 minutes later, you shut it down no matter what.

Living with this is not easy, but it only gets harder when you sabotage yourself.

[–] Remy@lemmy.today 2 points 3 days ago

Disobeying my own schedules and reminders is one of things that I disrespect my self the most for, but I just can't really figure out how to make my self obey the reminders.

I wish I was one of these people that have a relation to their reminders like the reminder is some military sergeant and you do what it says, without resisting the authority.

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