# Witnessing your own mental decay **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [August 12, 2023, 2:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/witnessing-your-own-mental-decay/988436 "2023-08-12T02:01:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Pardel-Lux](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pardel-lux/32/20182_2.png) [@Pardel-Lux](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pardel-Lux)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2023, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/witnessing-your-own-mental-decay/988436/21 "2023-08-12T15:25:14Z")
Three weeks ago I lost my reading glasses. I have worn glasses or contact lenses since I was a little boy, over 50 years ago. I never lost glasses. Never. I mean: how could someone possibly lose glasses? You need them! Well: I did. And I still wonder where and when it happened. I don’t know and probably will never find out. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2023, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/witnessing-your-own-mental-decay/988436/22 "2023-08-12T15:27:26Z")
Metal decay usually is a result of corrosion or fatigue. Now as soon as I find my keys I have to get out to some store to get something I can’t remember. ---
**Author:** ![Prof.Pepperwinkle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/prof.pepperwinkle/32/13627_2.png) [@Prof.Pepperwinkle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Prof.Pepperwinkle)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2023, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/witnessing-your-own-mental-decay/988436/23 "2023-08-12T15:28:59Z")
I do exercises and puzzles every day to keep my mind sharp, but it’s just slowly the decline. If it wasn’t for Google, I’d go forever without remembering who played in what movie, or who sang that song. Madame P. is younger than I, but had a stroke 5 years back, and I can see her fading faster than myself. ---
**Author:** ![FairyChatMom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fairychatmom/32/21906_2.png) [@FairyChatMom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FairyChatMom)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2023, 3:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/witnessing-your-own-mental-decay/988436/24 "2023-08-12T15:33:33Z")
> [@Al128](#): > > sometimes a need to pause a second for a “there or their” check, etc To be fair, when you see it done incorrectly all the time, you start to second-guess yourself. At least I do. > [@Fear\_Itself](#): > > I find myself reaching for words. I can visualize the word, I just can’t vocalize it. This is me all over! So frustrating, especially when watching Jeopardy - I know the answer, really! Stoopit brain. Most maddening is short-term memory - like thinking “As soon as I finish this, I need to…” then I finish and for the life of me I can’t remember what it was I needed to do. Or I’ll ask my husband a question and while he’s answering, I’ll forget what I asked. Scary… ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2023, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/witnessing-your-own-mental-decay/988436/25 "2023-08-12T15:36:13Z")
Contrasting with my earlier comment … I’ve had the occasional problem of being unable to come up with the word even though I can clearly see the concept in my mind. It’s always a noun, never any other sort of word. So I can readily visualize the thing I’m speaking of, whether it’s a car, an apple, a pillow, or whatever. There’s the image hanging in space in my head and the word. Will. Not. Come. For a few seconds at least then there it is, just like always. This happened when I was a child, it happened when I was in high school, and it still happens now. As best I can tell the frequency is unchanged. So no evident deterioration there. Brains be weird an’ shit. At least mine is. ---
**Author:** ![filmore](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/7993a0/32.png) [@filmore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/filmore)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2023, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/witnessing-your-own-mental-decay/988436/26 "2023-08-12T15:46:53Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > It’s always a noun, You might have this: > **[Anomic aphasia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anomic_aphasia)** > > Anomic aphasia (also known as dysnomia, nominal aphasia, and amnesic aphasia) is a mild, fluent type of aphasia where individuals have word retrieval failures and cannot express the words they want to say (particularly nouns and verbs). By contrast, anomia is a deficit of expressive language, and a symptom of all forms of aphasia, but patients whose primary deficit is word retrieval are diagnosed with anomic aphasia. Individuals with aphasia who display anomia can often describe an object Anomi... Since you’ve had it as a child, it’s probably a part of your brain wiring rather than the more typical case of developing as you age. ---
**Author:** ![LurkMeister](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/3da27b/32.png) [@LurkMeister](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LurkMeister)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2023, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/witnessing-your-own-mental-decay/988436/27 "2023-08-12T17:17:46Z")
I’m two weeks short of being 71 and for the past few years I’ve been having occasional problems with coming up with the right word. Fortunately, most of the times this has happened when I am talking to myself (or is that another sign of my mental decay?) so at least I’m not embarrassing myself in public. I do have two dry-erase boards. One includes a calendar where I post all of my appointments and plans for the current month (in addition to having them on my phone) so I can easily keep track of them. The other is outside my office door and is used to post reminders of things I need to do or general notes to myself. I haven’t quite gotten to the point of having post-it notes all over the house so I don’t forget to feed the cat or take out the trash, but the day may come. ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2023, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/witnessing-your-own-mental-decay/988436/28 "2023-08-12T17:22:01Z")
[quote=“TriPolar, post:22, topic:988436”] _Metal decay_ usually is a result of corrosion or fatigue. [/quote] (emphasis mine) So you’re rusting in place? ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2023, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/witnessing-your-own-mental-decay/988436/29 "2023-08-12T17:32:05Z")
And quite fatigued as well. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2023, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/witnessing-your-own-mental-decay/988436/30 "2023-08-12T17:40:09Z")
I find just now that fatigue is corroding my faculties. Said another way: > It’s naptime! Ain’t bein’ older just grand? Yes, sometimes it is. 🙂 😴 ---
**Author:** ![Al128](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/al128/32/16541_2.png) [@Al128](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Al128)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2023, 5:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/witnessing-your-own-mental-decay/988436/31 "2023-08-12T17:59:12Z")
> [@Knowed\_Out](#): > > I can remember something stupid I said 45 years ago, but I can’t remember the reason I just stepped into a particular room. THAT!!! I often have to leave the room and then enter again to remember why I came here in the first place … > [@Chronos](#): > > The trick is to keep learning enough that the increased knowledge and experience more than offsets the decreased sharpness. while I agree, its now so much harder to learn and so much easier to forget than it was 10-15 years ago … I used to retain info read from a specific article (or post) quite well, especially numbers … today I am “better” (iow: I suck less) at retaining the bigger idea … but don’t ask me about any “detail” information on the article but I completely agree: up to a certain extent, the increased experience can (partially) off-set the forgetfulness… but hardly ---
**Author:** ![wolfpup](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolfpup/32/10618_2.png) [@wolfpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfpup)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2023, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/witnessing-your-own-mental-decay/988436/32 "2023-08-12T18:07:05Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > Contrasting with my earlier comment … > > I’ve had the occasional problem of being unable to come up with the word even though I can clearly see the concept in my mind. It’s always a noun, never any other sort of word. So I can readily visualize the thing I’m speaking of, whether it’s a car, an apple, a pillow, or whatever. There’s the image hanging in space in my head and the word. Will. Not. Come. For a few seconds at least then there it is, just like always. > > This happened when I was a child, it happened when I was in high school, and it still happens now. As best I can tell the frequency is unchanged. So no evident deterioration there. > > Brains be weird an’ shit. At least mine is. I have a similar problem with words but in my case it’s age related. I find myself often referencing a thesaurus to try to zero in on the word I’m looking for, and then getting frustrated because all the words are too similar in meaning to my keyword. I feel like screaming at the thesaurus – “if I wanted a word with that exact meaning, I’d just use my original word – I’m looking for a word that’s sorta kinda like my keyword, but has a distinctly different nuance!” In general, my memory isn’t great. I’ve been known to go to the grocery store for one or two items that I specifically need, get distracted by other stuff, and bring home a bag full of groceries missing one or both of the items I actually needed. 🤪 ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2023, 7:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/witnessing-your-own-mental-decay/988436/33 "2023-08-12T19:59:57Z")
> [@wolfpup](#): > > I feel like screaming at the thesaurus – “if I wanted a word with that exact meaning, I’d just use my original word – I’m looking for a word that’s sorta kinda like my keyword, but has a distinctly different nuance!” Ah, yes. The Kindathesaurus. They went extinct quite awhile ago; hunted to extinction. That is to say hounded unto death. Eaten to the last Mohican. Passed on without issue. > [@wolfpup](#): > > and bring home a bag full of groceries missing one or both of the items I actually needed. Lists, dear boy, lists. I have maintained a groc list as a OneNote page shared between my various devices for years. It’s categorized by store genre: groc, pharmacy, hardware, liquor, Target, Amazon, etc. I always have my phone with me, so things go on it immediately as and when I think of them. Then when I go to that kind of store my phone and therefore the up-to-date list is right there with me. In groc stores I usually shop by circulating up and down nearly every aisle. Which pretty well ensures a few serendipity finds. But armed with the list, it pretty well ensures I won’t come home missing something I already knew I needed. Back when my late first wife was alive we shared that page so we had a joint buy-stuff list. Either one of us could add to it at any time and either of us could clean things off it while at whichever store. Worked slick. Modern magic sez I. IIRC you’re a techo-phobe. Oh well. Some sorts of modern conveniences really are that: modern and convenient. And yes, my nap was very nice. Quite restorative. ---
**Author:** ![wolfpup](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolfpup/32/10618_2.png) [@wolfpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfpup)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2023, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/witnessing-your-own-mental-decay/988436/34 "2023-08-12T20:25:37Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > IIRC you’re a techo-phobe. As a former IT consultant, once employed by a major computer manufacturer to support their largest corporate accounts, and then freelance, I would object to being disparaged as a technophobe. 😉 More accurately, in my capacity as a cranky old fart, I am a change-o-phobe. My belief is that the modern world is going to shit, and much of modern technology with it. Microsoft, which has practically taken over the world of IT, doesn’t know how to design reliable operating systems (or anything else, for that matter) – never did, never will. Cell phones, formerly very useful mobile phones, have turned into gadgets – gadgets so heavily infested with “features” that they’re practically unusable for the basic function that cell **phones** were intended for. If there’s any justice in the afterlife, Steve Jobs has been issued with a cell phone so sophisticated, so advanced, so loaded with features, that he can’t figure out how to make a phone call with it. But it has 16,777,216 CPU cores and several bazillion TB of memory and can foretell the future! As for groceries, I do make lists. I merely take one of my many unnecessarily wasteful paper bills which is usually blank on the reverse side, and write a list with my Pilot G-2 ballpoint pen – a fine modern invention, I must say. The tragedy of my sad tale is that there’s no need to make a list if you’re only going out for one or two items. Except in my case, apparently there is. Although it occurs to me that if I did make such a two-item list and stuck it in my pocket, I’d probably forget I had it. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2023, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/witnessing-your-own-mental-decay/988436/35 "2023-08-12T20:32:43Z")
I’m sorry to have mischaracterized you. I ought to have remembered the change-o-phobe from our prior exchanges. Yes, that is quite different. As an off-and-on IT type myself I have always been a late-adopter. I haven’t given verbal orders to a computer or mobile device yet. A pen-and-paper list did fine for me for many, many years. But all too often I was here and the list was there. Getting to the store for a dedicated shopping trip then recalling the list sitting in its appointed spot in the kitchen became the norm, not the exception. That’s when I made the jump to the lowest tech solution then available. Which I still use some 20 years on. IIRC you’re a bit older than I, and I suspect we both hit techno-stasis at about the same age. Which means that my stasis is differently newer than yours, but perhaps not so differently static. It’s just not got so much vintage yet that it’s quite so far off the mainstream. Yet. ---
**Author:** ![wolfpup](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolfpup/32/10618_2.png) [@wolfpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfpup)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2023, 8:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/witnessing-your-own-mental-decay/988436/36 "2023-08-12T20:46:34Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > IIRC you’re a bit older than I, and I suspect we both hit techno-stasis at about the same age. Which means that my stasis is differently newer than yours, but perhaps not so differently static. This is basically correct, though not to imply that you are experiencing (or will experience) techno-stasis. My impression is that you’re more open-minded and cheerfully accepting of change than I am. I just growl at it. 😄 🐕 ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2023, 8:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/witnessing-your-own-mental-decay/988436/37 "2023-08-12T20:49:59Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > Lists, dear boy, lists. Yes, since I was around 50 I kept having a problem forgetting some of the things I needed to pick up at the hardware store. It used to be as simple as going through the current projects in my mind and I’d remember what I needed for each one without any more conscious effort. But then it became more difficult, I’d forget items for one project, then I’d forget some items from more than one project, then eventually I forgot items for all the projects, and of course next I’d forget about some of the projects. So I made a list of all the things I needed at the hardware store. Then when I got there I’d find out that I forgot the list ☹ But technology has come to the rescue, my flashlight also has a built in camera and I can take a picture of the list and I always have my flashlight with me so I can find my keys. ---
**Author:** ![Kropotkin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kropotkin/32/18045_2.png) [@Kropotkin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kropotkin)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2023, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/witnessing-your-own-mental-decay/988436/38 "2023-08-12T20:51:17Z")
I have solved the problem of witnessing my own dental decay by not brushing in front of the mirror. ---
**Author:** ![TheCuse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thecuse/32/2854_2.png) [@TheCuse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TheCuse)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2023, 8:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/witnessing-your-own-mental-decay/988436/39 "2023-08-12T20:57:30Z")
I’m 60 and I have problems with words that are on the “tip of tongue.” And names. I have issues at times with left and right. Was fine until the stroke back in 2019. ---
**Author:** ![Railer13](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/railer13/32/9742_2.png) [@Railer13](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Railer13)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2023, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/witnessing-your-own-mental-decay/988436/40 "2023-08-12T21:47:27Z")
I turned 70 earlier this year. For me, it’s names and sometimes faces. For instance, recently I ran into a guy I had worked with 30 years ago. He knew me immediately, but I had no clue until he told me who he was. Last month, a former co-worker introduced me to his neighbors Larry and Nancy. When I saw them the next week, I remembered Larry’s name, but had no clue about Nancy. And thank Og for Google Calendar. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/witnessing-your-own-mental-decay/988436.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/witnessing-your-own-mental-decay/988436.md?page=3)