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Orion
Yellow-bellied Woodpecker
Yellow-bellied Woodpecker

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Joined: 21 Sep 2006
Gender: Male
Posts: 51

14 Oct 2018, 5:14 pm

I'm a 16-year-old community college student, I've been a part time student for 1.5 years and have just started as a full time student.
Recently, I've been having difficulty focusing on my studies. I spend my whole day procrastinating and as a result, my grades are suffering. In the past I've always gotten exclusively B's and A's, but am in serious jeopardy of failing my physics course if I don't get better about studying. And while I certainly don't want to fail, I don't really care that much, even though I know it would wreck my GPA and my plan to transfer to a state school at the end of the year. I do enjoy my studies, I'm focusing on math and science, which are passions for me; but lately, I've been having difficulty engaging even with things I love.
Everything feels unimportant. I feel numb (I haven't cried or felt the need to in 8.5 months). I lack motivation to even do simple things--like eating or sleeping--and whenever I sit down to study or do an assignment, it just doesn't get done. I know it sounds like I'm describing clinical depression, but that's really not it. I'm not depressed, just apathetic and disorganized. I'm also a life long pacer, there's been a loop where grass does not grow around my house because ever since I was a little kid I've paced back and forth constantly, but recently it's out of control (up to 4 hours every day).
I've recently (a couple months ago) stopped attending therapy due to my former therapist retiring, which might have something to do with all of this. I will be meeting a new therapist later this week. I don't really feel I need it (it's required, which is why I do therapy), but I don't hate it, I just tend to keep my own council. I don't think I'm comfortable talking about this stuff with my therapist, since they will be the official authority on my mental state (which for reasons I'll leave unspecified, I do need to reflect mental stability). I don't want to worry my parents by talking about this stuff with them either, but I know they will worry if they find out I fail my physics class.
Has anyone had a similar experience? If so, how did you get yourself motivated?



serpenEncipheror
Hummingbird
Hummingbird

Joined: 18 Jan 2018
Age: 22
Gender: Female
Posts: 24
Location: China

17 Oct 2018, 11:57 am

I'm 17 and for quite a while I also felt quite apathetic.
I didn't exactly walk out of it myself. Parents and teachers will discover your change sooner or later, and the stress they press naturally gets you out of the situation. Even though stress is a negative thing, but if you really want to gain your motivation back, I guess it's important to let people know about your situation so that they can offer the stress.

I've considered about the cause of such apathy. Mine was probably because I stayed in my comfort zone for too long. My comfort zone is working alone, doing math and computer science, also hanging out with a fixed group of friends. At the beginning of this year there were quite a number of math contests which offered me a valid reason to stay alone and work on the stuff I like, but without challenges I seemed to just loose motivation?

If it's the same case, I guess the way to regain your spirit is to do something which I're not comfortable doing before? When I was forced to do things I don't like, I just started to feel alive again. I guess trying to survive makes one feel alive? At the very least, I had other things to do aside from my special interests, which helped me to regain passion and concentration on my hobbies.

I'm still not exactly feeling right now, but it's a lot better. Now I'm no longer apathetic, yet I constantly feel either too happy to stay focused or too anxious to work. It feels much easier to concentrate during nights, so I tend to stay up recently (yeh it's 1 am in my time zone now).

hope it would help


_________________
Your neurodiverse (Aspie) score: 106 of 200
Your neurotypical (non-autistic) score: 107 of 200
You seem to have both neurodiverse and neurotypical traits.

I'm pretty sure about being neurotypical though, since my neurodiverse traits never caused me any trouble and I get along well with other neurotypical people.

Maybe this means I can get along well with neurodiverse people, too? I never get a chance to prove this because in China schools don't enroll students with ASD and therefore I have no neurodiverse people around me.

So I am here!