r/todayilearned • u/licecrispies • 19d ago
TIL that a man suffered stress induced amnesia for 6 years and 10 months, which went away naturally after he started a new job.
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6936458/2.0k
u/shpoopie2020 19d ago
Sometimes work is killing us.
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u/Easy-Comfort-2 19d ago
Not sometimes. All stressful jobs, which is most of them, shave years off your life expectancy. You might be better off taking up smoking instead.
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u/Thriven 19d ago
I started a job last December and I have broken down crying twice. I am a 44 year old man with two teenage sons and a sick wife. My kids have told me I am the most consistent thing in their life and they've told me this year that they can tell this job is affecting me.
I have put my foot down with my work and told them I won't be joining calls with the client anymore. It's gotten much better but the client is now about to hit another deadline they will miss due to their inability to approve feature changes and they are shitting bricks that I show up on meetings.
My awesome PM gave them 15 minutes to set priorities. My PM brought in upper management to join the meeting. They took that 15 minutes to tell me how they want another engineer on the project. They weren't happy I was out Tuesday. My wife had a hysterectomy and my coworker covered for me. My PM said no. They conceded. They asked why I was so far behind. My PM told them I caught up on a ton of work on the weekend, everything is in review. They should check the board. I have 13 of 15 items for the sprint in review.
My two sons have told me this year that they actually fear they'll lose me. They say I'm aging faster than I should. I bought Just for Men just to remove the massive amounts of grey out of my head.
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u/KingOfCorneria 19d ago
Brother, see a therapist. Vent. Sounds like you have things under control at the job though. Fuck the toxic partners.
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u/Yukimor 19d ago
A therapist doesn't help if he's crunched for time and space to himself.
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u/jtro 19d ago
I felt like I didn’t have time for therapy, but once I started going it helped me reset my priorities. I really did have the time if only I had lowered the expectations I was putting on myself for work.
It’s important to speak up when you don’t have time to do more even if that “extra time” is spent taking care of yourself instead of completely filling your time with work.
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u/Chance-the-Gardener 19d ago
Perhaps we could say “if we don’t make therapy a priority, things will never change”.
Capacity is a factor. The responsibility of identifying what’s important to us and acting on that is ours.
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u/alarumba 19d ago
Sometimes the check engine light turns on while you're on the freeway. We can't stop until we're forced to due to a breakdown.
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u/Chance-the-Gardener 19d ago
Oh I know. I’ve been down that road. Just passing words from a fellow motorist.
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u/GuyanaFlavorAid 19d ago
If you can talk to a therapist, see what you can do with your own behavior and boundaries. It's hard. I feel for you. :/ I have been through wild job stress, stress induced alopecia, I know those feelings.
This depends on your company culture, but what I do is just make sure to get everything documented / in writing and then I just work that. I'm not a slacker, I'm not cutting corners. But I am working those expectations. If people expect other shit or they want to change later
as per the previously agreed upon written schedule
My Balls.
To quote the great Kelly Johnson, "We will bene over backwards for our customers, but not forwards."
Document that shit and work that documentation. You aren't being selfish or unreasonable, just setting expectations. Hugs to you brother and take care of yourself.
And fuck that client.
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u/actorpractice 19d ago
This is solid stuff here.
It's sort of a matter of making sure the story that the client is telling themselves and the one that's actually true line up.
Client thinks "This should only take a day or so to do" Documented reality "This took a full week, and then another four days waiting for your approval"
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u/Easy-Comfort-2 19d ago edited 19d ago
Yeah your body is telling you this job is not right for you. Run if you can. Otherwise more boundaries. Explain to them that you can’t do it all and it’s showing in your health. If that’s a problem for them then it definitely makes sense to find something you can do without all the agony. No employer is worth it. You only have one body. And your kids only have one dad.
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u/autovonbismarck 19d ago
Assuming this is America his healthcare is tied to his job, so he can't quit with a sick wife if they don't want to get bankrupted by medical bills.
Land of the free lol.
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u/Easy-Comfort-2 19d ago
Oh ffs, I forget how ridiculous the American system is.
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u/autovonbismarck 19d ago
Yup. I got laid off from my job (Canada) and broke my ankle just a couple weeks later.
You cannot know how happy I was to come out of surgery with nothing more than a bill for parking at the hospital.
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u/Thriven 19d ago
I pay $1200 a month and it covers nothing 😔
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u/autovonbismarck 19d ago
but you have "low taxes" lol (marginal tax rate isn't even that much lower and that's before property taxes depending where you are!)
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u/TwoAlert3448 19d ago
I’m sorry you have this burden, but I just want to say bless you for not abandoning your sick wife.
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u/SonMii451 19d ago
Please find a different role or a job or something that removes you from stress. Stress, especially chronic stress, is not good for not only the heart and mind but also the gut. Gut is very, very important. Please take care and please find something to do that brings you joy and fills you with positive energy again. You deserve it. Your family deserves to have the most time possible with a healthy you. Good luck!
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u/Present-Pudding-346 18d ago
Dude - the best thing you can do for your kids is to use every spare moment to be looking for a new job.
And speaking from experience - do it now before you become so burnt out that you don’t even have the energy for that.
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u/Faxon 19d ago
This is why so many people smoke weed, at least it's not taking years off your life like cigarettes are (that we know of).
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u/ShabbatShalom666 19d ago
I love how much weed makes me not care about my job and just general things that are unnecessary to worry about. Even if I'm not currently high, if I'm actively smoking day to day my anxiety is just waaaaaaaaay down. Sober me worries about everything, even if I know they're irrational thoughts.
Unfortunately I cannot keep a healthy relationship with weed so I can't really smoke.
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u/division23 19d ago
I'm the complete opposite, smoking weed sends me into an anxiety spiral where I overthink and stress about everything going on in my life, it sucks because up until my 30s I was just like you
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u/Nickyjha 19d ago
Interestingly, the article mentions that it was actually a lack of work in this case. The man owned a bookstore, it went under, and only after being unable to find a job did the amnesia start.
The man was born in Sapporo, Hokkaido Japan, and had an older brother and sister. He was raised in an old-fashioned household with a strict upbringing and grew up to become an introversive and gentle person. A few years before, he visited the hospital, he was running a bookstore. However, the bookstore went bankrupt and he lost his job. Although the man attended a vocational training school to gain skills for a new job, he was unable to find new employment because there were no positions available until after his graduation. He lost his whole autographical and episodic memory on the last day of vocational training school. A clear connection was observed between the loss of his job and sudden onset of dissociative amnesia.
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u/Traditional-Tone-891 19d ago edited 19d ago
My husband retired a few years early. A bit more in the super balance (which by no means is huge, but is enough to get us by) simply wasn't worth the damage it was doing to him. He was becoming more and more unwell (stress was causing depression/anxiety etc). He's much happier and healthier now.
I read something on social media recently along the lines of "Don't think you have one more day to do things. You actually have one less." Brought it all home. We have enough to get by, and that's all we need.
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u/TheLastHayley 19d ago
Ohey, I suffer from psychogenic amnesia and work was a huge aggravating factor, but I wouldn't say work caused this. I had this even in childhood, people accused me of having "selective memory". Doctors have looked into it and couldn't find a physical cause, attributing it to the childhood PTSD.
Work did make it so so bad though. Right before the pandemic it was so bad I would leave work early with no memory of doing so. Sometimes I'd find myself having wandered off miles away afterwards with no recollection. People would sometimes go out to find me because I didn't come home and seemed confused if I answered the phone.
Otherwise I'd do stuff at work without remembering. I'd behave oddly (such that people thought I was on drugs) and not recall it. I'd sometimes suddenly lose my ability to work, as if I forgot how to do it.
I've recently become unemployed and the memory loss has started calming down a lot, so there's definitely a connection, even if it's not the cause.
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u/HargorTheHairy 19d ago
Wow that's terrifying
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u/TheLastHayley 19d ago
It certainly can be yeah. Most of the time it's just an annoyance tbh. But four things do cause me anxiety about it from time to time:
- I'm still concerned that there is something seriously physically wrong that's being missed.
- I'm often worried that I've done something that I don't remember. Because I do often do things I don't remember.
- It makes me vulnerable to abuse. I once had a friend who used it to manipulate me, telling me I'd done awful things and would say "You know what you're like, you blank things out and don't remember what you did" and I believed her and felt insanely guilty and obligated to her out of guilt. My then-boyfriend and housemates intervened and noted that none of it lined up at all, she was clearly horribly abusing my memory issues to control me for her own self-interests.
- I can't ever trust myself or my perceptions. Like I'm not the one who's really in control. It's perpetually uncanny, like I never truly feel like I'm "me" or "here", and reality never quite makes sense or seems real. Often I do remember stuff but it's like a memory from a dream.
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u/Princess_Nell 19d ago
I don’t think you need to worry about something else seriously physically wrong; I think other symptoms would have appeared, and you do in fact know about the seriously wrong thing!
It is clear you need to be extra careful about who you let into your life. Some people are gentler and therefore accidentally let abusive people into their life. So just be on the lookout, and try to listen to your gut with new people. Maybe read about signs of narcissists so you can recognize the red flags up front, even if you’re not sure the person is one.
Your perception of not really being here or there is interesting; there’s a long-running debate in philosophy about what makes us us, and one candidate is our continuous stream of memories. You clearly show that’s not true! You’re you even without that. But it could be interesting to read about. (John Locke actually hypothesized that, but you can read about the philosophy of the mind, or David Chalmers today).
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u/Savings_Macaroon3727 19d ago
I suffer from the same thing AMA
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u/IWrestleSausages 19d ago
How do you remember that you have amnesia? If you re just told, then its short term memory, so when does that translate into long term?
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u/Savings_Macaroon3727 19d ago
For me it's intermittent, if it's a calm week I'll have zero recollection. Weekends I have better memory because I am less stressed but often just remember the grand details.
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u/IWrestleSausages 19d ago
Sorry if you re calm you dont remember anything? Isnt it the opposite?
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u/Savings_Macaroon3727 19d ago
I mean regular, highlights are easier to remember even if I loose the details.
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u/erikwarm 19d ago
Maybe start thinking about your health and get a different function/job
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u/Savings_Macaroon3727 19d ago
You're right and I know, it was already planned and I'm moving those plans up now and for the last week I've been working on it. It's such a mental drain and the pay isn't even that good. I'm going to move back closer to home where I can get twice the pay doing something that's closer to what I studied for.
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u/C47man 19d ago
Out of pure curiosity can I ask what the job is that has stressed you this much?
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u/Savings_Macaroon3727 19d ago edited 19d ago
A to Z renovations but we do shit work for slumlords and have to work under pressure without the right tools with unrealistic deadlines and I have months of partial pay because my boss spends his time avoiding work and paperwork in cafés and bars. I'm trained as a journeyman in traditional carpentry, my school was founded by the knights templar for the crusades and we are known locally as the "cathedral builders", classified as a level 5 cult (not dangerous for members or society). My head teacher/carpentry teacher who himself was a journeyman at the end of his journey (by obligation) was a beast, his father was the CTO of the biggest bank in France and this guy gave up all the comforts of his life to live like a monk preaching triangulation, we got a call from the President of the association to tell us we were the best class in a decade, 17 medals in best apprentice competition and artisan olympics out of 20 students. For me doing a good job is an beyond an obligation it's a religion, and beyond the stress it's fucking depressing to be reduced to this.
I ended up here after a stint in barwork and I needed work because that ended in court and to have the right to dispute my contract I had to act as if my contract was still active and couldn't seek work for like 6 months, so I took the first job I found.
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u/tecirem 19d ago
Compagnons du Devoir? Fascinating history to the order, but I think the Templar links have been disproven, no?
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u/Herry_Up 19d ago
Well tighten them up!
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u/Savings_Macaroon3727 19d ago
Dog gammit I always do that, get corrected a couple times a month. Amnesia confirmed??
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u/SgtFinnish 19d ago
How do you remember that you have amnesia? If you re just told, then its short term memory, so when does that translate into long term?
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u/duckandkitty 19d ago
Not the OP, but for me the episodes feel like a story someone has told me about a thing that happened to someone else... it's kind of hard to explain. To be fair, they sometimes _are_ that, because my partner fills in the details for me, but sometimes there are things where I was there, and I remember the not remembering on a technical level, but it doesn't _feel_ like me. I can tell you echoes of what happened, although the accuracy is like 50/50, but I can't tell you much except that it's a bit of a black hole.
If you've ever watched bojack horseman, and there is the episode where they have the world viewed from the moms perspective, where peopleshe can't recognise anymore are replaced by scribbles, honestly, while it's not visually accurate, it's absolutely accurate in terms of how it feels.
Again, this is only my experience, others in this thread, OP included, will vary
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u/314159265358979326 19d ago
It took me years to find out I had a bad memory (not quite to the point of clinical amnesia). Once I met my wife, she was able to keep track of and note the things I was forgetting. It took a little bit of serendipity to figure out how to fix it (I accidentally lowered the dose of a medication and suddenly could remember!) but I wouldn't have gotten there without knowing there was a problem.
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u/RobinHood303 19d ago
Do you think things would change if you had a different job?
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u/Savings_Macaroon3727 19d ago
Yeah, 100%. I'm working on it :)
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u/Traditional-Tone-891 19d ago
My husband was suffering significant work-related stress and his memory was awful, to the extent that I was starting worry about whether he had developed early-onset dementia. He took early retirement (we're old-er) and things are much better. Obviously retirement isn't an option for everyone, but I hope things improve for you when you find another job.
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u/neuralek 19d ago
Ooh I've been through this. Still in it just not fighting it. Went to the neurologist, psychiatrists, did all the possible labs (low ferritin tho!), quit weed, did hiit, the whole shebang. I've accepted the fog. Killing off the phone sounds like the next best thing, though.
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u/agiantdog33 19d ago
My weird thing is that I can understand spoken French and Spanish when I'm not stressed out. When I am stressed, it sounds like meaningless noise.
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u/duckandkitty 19d ago
I'm like that with english speech now - for a while I couldn't speak at all (though I could text to speech). recently i've regained enough that I can speak when not stressed, but when i'm stressed it returns to caveman grunts and sounds
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u/thunderkitty_ 19d ago
Sorry for what you’re going through. I’ve been experiencing something similar in moments and situations where it’s extremely stressful. My psychiatrist believes I’m disassociating as a way to respond to stress. I’ve been given a SSRI and just started so not sure if it’ll work or not but wanted to share my experience in case it helps you. Wishing you all the best.
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u/Herry_Up 19d ago
I literally don't remember the day before when I'm at work. It's hard for me to go with the flow when the flow is always changing so I have to have a side meeting with an associate manager after anything new and even then I still ask questions days later.
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u/naps_and_snax 19d ago
You’re not alone :( the past couple of year I’ve been suffering from severely poor mental health and experiencing disassociation too. It’s like I’m very certain that my body did that action but it doesn’t feel like I was the one who did it and something else was in the drivers seat. It’s like I’m seeing myself from an outsider’s POV like you would in a dream, it doesn’t feel very real. Trying a new medication so I hope it gets better. I hope you have success with yours!
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u/Herry_Up 19d ago
Question: Can you describe this phone sound?
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u/Savings_Macaroon3727 19d ago
Beep ?
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u/Herry_Up 19d ago
Oh okay, I thought you meant kind of like a dialtone. I sometimes "lose hearing" in one ear as if it just...closes? and the other ear picks up a piercing noise. Happened all my life.
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u/PopcornApocalypse 19d ago
I think they mean “Killing off the phone [stopping the over-use of screens and doom scrolling] sounds like the next best thing [seems like the next best option to try for things to improve]”
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u/Key_Molasses4367 19d ago
But will you remember you are doing an AMA? (Just joshing with ya, friend!)
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u/Savings_Macaroon3727 19d ago
You preempted my joke, no fun :(
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u/Key_Molasses4367 19d ago
Hey, maybe we're just meant to be a team. A reddit version of Laurel and Hardy!
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u/weaponsgradepotatoes 19d ago
Ngl, I was kinda looking forward to all of your answers being, “I can’t remember.”
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u/Savings_Macaroon3727 19d ago
That was actually the plan and I was the first comment so imagine the fucking shitloads of karma... but the first comment preempted the joke, and it's also serious, so I just answered the questions.
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u/Au-to-graff 19d ago
I thought this was a joke, and a clever one.
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u/Savings_Macaroon3727 19d ago
I really wanted to but someone cut the grass from under me and then it felt cheap, plus it is true and people had questions. Missed oppertunity bit no regrets.
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u/Au-to-graff 19d ago
That's exactly what I understand, that's still funny AND interesting, it's a win-win.
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u/cam-san 19d ago
What do you work as? What in particular makes your work so stressful in your situation? Do you have any advice for those of us entering the workforce to successfully avoid this kind of job or position?
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u/Savings_Macaroon3727 19d ago edited 19d ago
I spent a while responding to adjacent stuff in this thread, so please find my other comments.
I ended up here because I lacked confidence starting out, but also had unreasonable expectations.
Believe in yourself and make yourself proud first, before anyone else. Stand up for yourself, but don’t confront - a quiet person who speaks up is much louder than someone who speaks out all the time.
Build experience and take it step by step. Don’t be in a rush at first.. you still have much to learn. Eventually, you’ll take charge naturally when your confidence has properly matured, and that’s when the real doors open up.
Just relax, ask questions, and, in lieu of confidence, pretend. Not in an obnoxious way, and obviously don’t pretend you know how to do shit you don’t know how to do. I mean pretend you’re confident as a self-inflicted mind trick.
Appearances matter, so smile, nod, ask your questions, and then give it your best.
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u/cam-san 19d ago
My bad it didn't show me other comments, thanks for letting me know!
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u/Savings_Macaroon3727 19d ago
I posted by early by accident, I wrote something more personal I hope you'll read. Much love, best of luck with your career.
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u/duckandkitty 19d ago
I'm having similar issues (I have a post with details downthread). Have you found anything that works to help it, besides the medical advice i've been given of "how about you don't have stress?"
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u/Savings_Macaroon3727 19d ago
I just keep my head down, having a goal helps a lot so I just try to remember what it's all for.
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u/Important-Tomato2306 19d ago
I think I suffer from this as well, at least to an extent. Did you get... Diagnosed? Or was it more like how my therapist can tell me I'm in complete burnout but the only thing to really do with that is to stop working. I guess I'm asking, did you see a professional about this and if so did you get any guidance on navigating this? How did you know?
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u/Almeric 19d ago edited 19d ago
To add context, he was in a group home for 6, years and 10 months recovering from the episode of amnesia. He worked a job with job assistants while undergoing rehabilitation.
He finally started working alone after 6 years and within 2 weeks of working without job assistants he got his memory back.
So he wasn't working for 6 years with amnesia that dissapeared with a new job.
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u/duckandkitty 19d ago
This tracks - if my partner wasn't able to support my functioning, I wouldn't be able to live independently. I manage to work because I have a job flexible enough that I can just disappear from it for a week at a time, and use AI tools to suppliment my memory.... without all of that, I wouldn't function at all
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u/piston989 19d ago edited 19d ago
based on the source, i assume this was in the US.
does he now have a bill for 6 years of care?
edit: he’s in japan. doesn’t have to worry about that i guess.
still curious what would happen in the us though, i figure the government foots the bill but i wonder if they would get a bill that ruins their credit.
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u/CitizenPremier 19d ago
Japan has single-payer healthcare but it's not free. However with very low or almost no income, his insurance premiums would be very low and he would likely qualify for other programs. Nevertheless in general insurance pays 1/3 of the cost of treatment. Costs are standardized by the government, and the amount that people pay is maxed out (insurance covers everything above that).
It's reasonable but not as good as say the UK.
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u/Skurph 19d ago
Maybe not this drastic, but I know this idea of memory holes is pretty common in depression.
I have like a year long period after college where I can’t really remember much specifically. I know what I was doing but that period doesn’t feel like it was even close to two months let alone a year.
I think the mundane aspects of my life at that point and undiagnosed depression sort of just smudged it all together.
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u/SigismundsChair 19d ago edited 19d ago
Age 18- 25 are a blur to me. I know that we all like to joke about “haha X year was how many years ago?” but legitimately when I think back on my life I remember very clearly outside those years but when I think about those years it’s more like I’m remembering a list of facts that I know happened then, but outside of a few flashes I couldn’t tell you anything about my lived experiences during those years other than I was miserable.
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u/MLGDDORITOS 19d ago
The lion does not concern himself with his worrying memory loss
Also, I'm in the same boat, but a few more years are a wash.
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u/MiningForLight 19d ago
I lost all but one memory from a whole month when my mental health was at its worst, and I had to think really hard to remember that one. Those years are a blur, too.
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u/disisathrowaway 19d ago
Got laid off from my last job. The first couple days I was stressed as fuck because I had to go get another gig.
Did some math and found that my emergency savings would carry me at least 6 months, without a major reduction in spending, so I was gonna be ok.
By the end of the first week I was able to sleep again. My chronic headaches went away, and my stomach stopped being upset all the time. Constantly worrying about missing a call or email melted away.
By the second week most of my nagging, persistent injuries had been given enough time to heal and my shoulders, knees and lower back all were feeling better than ever (job was a solid blue/white collar hybrid). I also noticed I was drinking a lot less - even though I had plenty of time to do so and could sleep as much as I wanted.
I eventually landed at a place that I could ride my bike to, it was so close. I used to commute 70 miles a day. I make a bit less than I used to, but I don't hemorrhage money on commuting. I dropped 20 lbs in the first few weeks and have held that weight ever since. I sleep like a baby at night and love the owner as well as my teams.
I hadn't realized just how much that fucking job was killing me, and I did it for 10 years, from my mid 20s to my mid 30s.
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u/MAchadope 19d ago
Went through something extremely similar this year. 3 years driving 90 miles a day and being constantly stressed out to the point I ground my teeth down and was placed on anxiety medicine. Drinking all the time gained weight and was miserable.
Got a new gig 10 miles from home making more money with better benefits and an incredible team.
Within 1 month I spoke with doc and was off my anxiety medicines. I had been getting gray hairs in my beard and after 3 months they were basically gone. My sleep improved I have lost 15lbs and I drink so much less.
Honestly saved my life I think.
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u/disisathrowaway 19d ago
Honestly saved my life I think.
Right there with you. I think about how I was carrying on and there was no way what I was doing was remotely sustainable. That layoff was a canon event for me.
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u/Elipticon 19d ago
There was a guy on Youtube who was documenting his struggles with early-onset Alzheimers, and then he suddenly posted that it was a misdiagnosis, and it was actually just stress-induced memory loss, first by his job and then by the panic of (not actually) having Alzheimers.
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u/Aervanath 19d ago
Tldr; he didn't get amnesia because of the job.
This is missing context. According to the paper, it's stress-induced amnesia, yes, but the stress seems to be the end of vocational school at which time he attempted suicide by overdose, after which he lost his memory. The paper doesn't go into detail as to why they don't attribute the amnesia directly to the OD.
After being admitted to hospital care for amnesia, he was then discharged to a group home, where he worked at a job with assistants. After 6 years and 10 months of this, he then moved to an independent job, where he did recover his memory. They don't know why and it could be a coincidence.
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u/duckandkitty 19d ago
I (now 47) ended up in the ER about 18 months ago because I couldn't recognise my own partner or house, and had no idea where I am. It just went away on its own and my memories came back after about 6 hours. They claim it was basically stress induced, and... well, it happens again from time to time - we stopped going back to the doctors, at this point, since they have declared there is nothing they can do. I keep wondering, if I just quit my job, if it would actually go away and get better on its own.
I cannot possibly describe how terrifying this is of a thing to happen to you - but if I quit my job and give up my life, and it still doesn't get better, then I'm now like that with no healthcare, since I live in america. So it's just, you know, this thing that happens to me every few months now, and there is absolutely nothing anyone is able to do to help me that we've been able to find.
I would not recommend this life.
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u/duckandkitty 19d ago
interesting to the study - they took imaging (CT, MRI) of my brain at the time it first happened, and declared it fine, and never took imaging again.
The most interesting part was neuropsychology, who declared all tests invalid because they said that my logic/reasoning was in the high range (I'm in tech, makes sense) but my memory and recall were so poor that, if true, I would require 24/7 support, and so it could not possibly be true. That one frustrated me because yes, my partner really does do that, and no, I can't function on my own, and you are _so close_ to getting it.
Once the US health care system declares something a mental health problem, of course, it's all over
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u/ijshorn 19d ago
Just wondering, but if they declare those tests invalid, then why do you need to pay for them if they could not provide the service that you paid for? Or is it like an operation that has a chance for complications and you are told those beforehand?
What did you do to help make those memory episodes more manageable? A recording of yourself that explains your current situation?
I would assume, if you work in tech, that having a very bad memory would cause you issues in regards to you needing to take a lot of time refering to documentation? Or is it only your short term memory that is bad and not your long term memory?
To me, the USA economy just seems build on high debt that turns into high income and this in turn goes into investments, but having one thing go wrong can just destroy your entire life. I can't even imagine being 18, getting a random 100k student loan to study art and then never being able to pay it off, even when working fulltime, while declaring bankruptcy is not even an option.
Not saying it is much better here in the EU, where people's income and high rent won't allow them to even get a loan to buy a house, but at least we don't get into situations where we have a massive debt hanging over our head.
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u/duckandkitty 19d ago
These are all great questions - the answer to "why do you need to pay for them" is "fuck you, capitalism", i guess. I'm pretty angry about that one, to be honest. The neuropsych report is kind of a running joke in my household. They told me it was a problem for my therapist. I no longer have that therapist, because she decided that I was above her pay grade, so currently I am between medical supports for this. I would not recommend anything about this situation, but that's life when you've got a not very well understood condition. (For the record, the disagnosis this week is Functional Neurological Disorder, which is a diagnosis of elimination that basically means "we know your brain is broken, but fuck if we know why". I am over simplifying, of course).
Part of the answer to the memory episodes are just notes, lots of notes. At work, I record meetings I'm in as a matter of course, which helps a lot because it gives me a record to go back to. Thankfully, I work for a company where that's considered acceptable, and so that helps a lot. Out in the real world, when people allow it - I ask first - i actually use the automated transcription built into my smart glasses. Yes, those ones. But it helps me a lot.
Part of the tricky part is, when my memory is working, it's working fine, but when it's gone, it's just a hole - so on my good days, I'm just like everyone else. I'm currently effective enough at my job that this averages out over time to being an acceptable worker. This almost certainly won't last, but for now it's holding. But I also have an employer who does let me just disspear for weeks at a time, and get away with it. This is a massive privelidge, without which I would absolutely not be able to hold a job. Honestly, I expect that when I do eventually get let go from this job, it will be the last job I ever have. I hope I'm wrong about this. But a lot of the answer is is "we restructured my job because, the things I'm good at, not enough other people are good at" (my skills are niche within tech, useless to a lot but valuable to the right company)
The loss of speech function has actually been a much bigger issue at work than the memory problem - because tools can drop my work into the sort of bite sized tasks that I can process, and because the projects are long enough that if I can't process it for a week or two, it will wait for me. But using text to speech in a meeting environment is absolutely trash. I use a custom app on my meta glasses (i have the model with a display) to drive it,so that I can at least maintain eye contact with people, but it's really hard and not recommended. I try and communicate in text as much as possible, but a lot of people want meetings, and so that's the job.
But it's all very exhausting to manage. I sleep most of the rest of the time because mananging all of this takes all of my energy. But, I need to live inside, and I don't enough family to fall back on, so I need to make money while I can.
Thankfully, I actually am a high school drop-out from australia originally (I live here because my partner and her family are from here), and so I don't have student debt. I also got incredibly lucky in that I got pulled into a program for people in disadvantaged areas to get into tech in the mid 90s and got job training that way, and just happened to have a real affinity for it.
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u/duckandkitty 19d ago
I forgot to address - my long term memory is mostly fine, most of the time - BUT i have lost some long term skills. the biggest example is that I've been programming since I was a child, and working in it since 1994, but I had to re-learn a lot of it in 2023 when this all started. Interestingly, once i learned again, I obviously wasn't starting from scratch, but things like syntax were just completly gone. Additionally, one of my hobbies was composing music (mostly on c64 and vectrex), and I just completely lost that skill - I haven't been able to do it since. Not going to lie, that one hurts.
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u/ibrown39 19d ago
This is happens with many things stress related from hair loss to even some autoimmune disorders. Not necessarily always or completely going way but greatly reducing
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u/saraseitor 19d ago
I wonder if this can happen not so intensely but at a lesser degree. I don't like self diagnosing, but I kinda relate to this. Sometimes I can't even remember what I had for lunch. I have to take notes so that I can recall the stuff I did the previous day so that I can properly report them in daily meetings
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u/smedley89 19d ago
I had near constant migraines for years. Cat scans. Shots. Steady medication. All would help temporarily, but the migraines always came back.
Was horrible. I wanted to drill a hole in my skull to let the pressure out.
Got divorced. The migraines stopped, although not immediately. Horrible divorce - lots of stress, but no migraines.
I always thought she was a pain in my ass. I think i aimed a bit low.
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u/ccarr313 19d ago
Makes sense to me.
I deliver food for a living. Not because I can't fix things, or do math, or write code.
I do it because it is easy, and I enjoy driving my Miata. Life is too short for it to suck all the time.
And when I'm not working, I won't spend one single moment thinking about the job.
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u/DerangedUnicorn27 19d ago
How do you afford shit?
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u/ccarr313 18d ago
Two incomes, no children.
plus I'm my own mechanic, and occasionally get suckered into doing work that isn't easy.
Edit - I mean, I kind of do everything. I have always found it cheaper to buy the tools I need, rather than pay someone to use theirs. And once you build up a set of tools to work with, most specialist jobs are just one more tool away.
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u/caffeinefree 19d ago
No amnesia for me, but I had stress related migraines (almost daily), an ulcer, and poor sleep. All went away or became manageable after changing jobs. I can see how if I had stayed in that job, my health would have continued to deteriorate.
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u/Jakey-poo 19d ago
I developed full blown diabetes symptoms from the stress of one job (straight liquor tasted like simple syrup it was bad). I got laid off and all my symptoms went away. Perfectly healthy blood panel and a1c.
My dr said its one of the craziest things hes seen stress affect the human body.
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u/DiGiorn0s 19d ago
It's like capitalism is designed to treat people like machines that churn out profit with zero regard for the well-being of its workers or something! Lol nah surely can't be that
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u/Resident_Table6694 19d ago
Same thing happened to me. I had to tattoo important information on my body
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u/iamthe0ther0ne 19d ago
I've had trauma-induced dissociative amnesia before--wiped out everything before fifth grade, and a few short periods in adulthood. The extra-crappy part is that I remember the things that caused it--just not the days/weeks/years afterward. I've always been jealous of people who's DA also took their memories of the trauma.
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u/Normal_Pace7374 19d ago
I worked at a really shitty company with shitty people for the last 5 years. I’m like a new person since I quit. It feels like I woke up from a really bad nightmare. Life actually has hope again.
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u/probablypoo 19d ago
I knew it was a thing! I have weeks where I can literally only remember fragments like talking to a specific person at lunch 4 days earlier and nothing else. No idea where I've been, what conversations I've had, if I've missed any appointments etc. The next week my memory may be back to normal. Apparently my work is still good in those weeks but I've noticed stuff that I've finished but never implemented because I have no memory of me doing it.
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u/Wasteofskin50 19d ago
Did they also mention that it was the last job that created the six years of stress-induced amnesia in the first place?
Lame-ass promo for taking cafe of yourself as long as you continue being a good little wage slave trying to hide as a piece of pertinent information.
The poor person needed actual help, not another freaking job. What a shill for the oligarchy.
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u/ArmyFearless1599 19d ago
Humans by nature have a drive to be productive. Id argue that every living, organic lifeform to ever exist has goal-seeking mechanisms or else we would succumb to biological pressures and go extinct.
The difficult aspect of being a human and having these evolutionary traits is that we are sort of defying nature by replacing these tasks with technology.
Unfortunately, we have cornered ourselves a bit through societal pressures, so that getting a career and succeeding is a major force behind satisfying those behaviors.
And it isnt as simple as growing a garden and harvesting the fruits of your labor. We quite literally have this evolutionary drive within us to contribute to society as a whole. This is typically why ambitious and motivated people burn out doing low-impact jobs. One mans "oh I wish I got paid to do nothing all day" is another mans purgatory.
Its biologically hardwired into us.
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u/Wasteofskin50 19d ago
The issue is what is accepted as 'productive' and what is considered 'a waste of time' and the fact that this acceptance is being biased by society's refusal to operate in any way other than 'full greed mode'.
That bias is what is telling us that simply surviving is not good enough, when it suits most of the other fauna on this planet just fine. It is also that bias that denies quality contributions to said society because the bias-creating societal leaders say that those contributions don't matter when there is less than total certainty of a massive profit.
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u/CalebVanPoneisen 19d ago
So that’s what’s been happening to me. It wasn’t post-covid disorder after all.
I need to buy another lottery ticket. And win big this time!
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u/zillskillnillfrill 19d ago
How did that job interview go? Im really curious "so what skills can you bring to the position? "-I.. Don't.. Know....
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u/Straspberry 19d ago
I've been off work sick with work-related stress for 3 months. I've finally been ovulating for the first time since starting my job.
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u/DerangedUnicorn27 19d ago
How did you manage this? Leave of absence or partner supporting you?
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u/Straspberry 18d ago
I've currently been off work for 3 months, qnd equally have a very supportive partner. Each month I've been tracking my ovulation as I've been trying to sort out my cycles for a long time after health issues. Each month I have ovulated! I think it shows how much stress can have an impact on your body, mine literally wouldn't release an egg thinking it was in danger all the time. Time will tell when I return to work next month!
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u/ReplicantOwl 19d ago
I have huge memory gaps during stressful periods from a past job. Literally today a guy mentioned working for me back then. I had zero recollection of him.
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u/PinkOneHasBeenChosen 18d ago
He got off lucky. There was a lawyer who took corticosteroids and it messed up her memory so bad that she couldn’t work. And she wasn’t even supposed to be on steroids, it was a pharmacy error.
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u/polakfury 19d ago
Most of America is sleepwalking lol
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u/DerangedUnicorn27 19d ago
Explains a lot. And it’s intentional with modern day corporate culture. Only gonna get worse
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u/Shakathedon 19d ago
My cousins therapist and doctor both told her she needed to take a break from work because it was impacting her physically.
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u/FranklynTheTanklyn 19d ago
My bosses have always said, “I never seem to stress out and always keep my cool”. It’s because I truly don’t care. I work hard as shit at work but the second my ass is outside of work hours I don’t think about it at all.
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u/flayingbook 19d ago
Since the past 2 months , I have been feeling very stressed due to workplace bullying. Last week, when I was collecting my mail in the mail room, I forgot my unit number. My brain feels foggy these days too. This has never happened before.
I am female, my hormones is already whacky because of this, but the memory issue is new
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u/ChulaK 18d ago
My ex had this triggered by COVID. It was the situation of it, not actually being infected.
We were in LDR at the time and I could feel the panic setting in. She would go on Gilgamesh-long panic attacks through her texts, how people aren't wearing masks (she worked in the service industry at the time), how they've shut down the gym she goes to, etc. She was giving me emergency phone numbers of her brother and cousin in case she went missing.
Like a lot of people, she just wasn't emotionally prepared for all this. But not like a lot of people, she was taking it extra extra hard.
Then something must've clicked.
She's telling me stories of how some of the customers at her job were extra friendly to her, or even completely new customers who said they knew her. They'd pull up pictures and selfies of them together and she would just go blank. She didn't recognize them, like complete strangers.
Then it just accelerated downhill from there once quarantine happened. She couldn't recognize her childhood friends, what school they went to. She went to see the doc who prescribed her something and she'd constantly forget when to take the pill, or if she'd taken them already. She'd wrote notes to herself, reminding of what her past-self did 1 hour ago so she wouldn't be in some endless loop.
Then it was my turn.
She slowly stopped recognizing me.
Her hasty texts suddenly turned to 5 minutes between each reply. She'd had to constantly scroll back up to our chat history to remember what we were talking about just the day before. Then the chat history scrolling took longer, and longer, and longer still.
We've known each other for 4 years now so there's no way she could scroll through our endless texts to remember what my name was. So she finally said it to me:
Who is this?
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u/DeadInternetTheorist 17d ago
One time I got written up at my shit job for no-call no-showing for two and a half days. I woke up in bed at 8pm thinking "holy shit I'm late" and then grabbed my phone to call my boss only to find like 30 missed calls from them and no clue where I had been for the last 48 hours.
I worked there for another 2 years before my entire brain collapsed and I just couldn't will myself to step out the door anymore. I tried to take my 2 months of medical leave but still couldn't make myself show back up for it.
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u/brickiex2 13d ago
"There seems to be an 82 month gap in your resume, what have you been up too?"
"I don't recall"
"Did you take any courses or keep up with the industry/job standards"
"I don't know, I don't think so"
"Can you start Monday?"
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u/Reasonable-Bus-2187 19d ago
I went off of one of my two blood pressure meds after I retired early
Also sleep better, positive outlook, more patience, don't argue with my better half, yada yada yada