Chemo brain wierdness - I have a lot of trouble typing these days,

[hedgehog]

so please excuse my spelling! WHat have you noticed?

[Tab]

1. Noticed?

About you, or us?

Chemo brain is real. It's not unlike states you realize when on other drugs or plastered (alcohol) or others. I cannot sometimes put two and two together on chemo brain. There's a substance-abuse saying about "move a muscle, change a thought" which is supposed to mean if you're thinking of using, get up on your feet and do something else and forget about it. In my experience, it's more like the thought is "I have to go into the kitchen for this..." and I move a muscle, get into the kitchen and my thought changes, to being "what the hell did I come into the kitchen for?"

[hedgehog]

2. The other odd thing I've noticed is that it is hard to write -

I have to make an effort to make my letters and numbers normal sized.Otherwise, they shrink to about 1/4 normal size. I;m sure this is related to some of the traits seen in early Parkison;s.

[Tab]

3. I don't know about sizing

but at various points in my treatment I had all sorts of levels of shakiness. Sometimes I couldn't hold a can of soda. Not so much now - relatively steady as she goes, but for a while I couldn't write or type for shit.

[Tab]

4. Actually, in re-reading the question

I see I got it wrong. My point still holds, but it wasn't what you were asking about. I don't know about handwriting (I assume) issues with Parkinson, size-related, specifically micrographia (small, cramped handwriting). Apologies if I focused on the wrong aspect.

- Tab

[hedgehog]

5. Hey - no sweat - I was just curious as to what happens to other people.

[Tab]

9. Hey, consider that an example of chemo brain

which I guess it is

[morrisseygeek]

6. Definitely having typing problems

I have been on chemo (first doxil and then taxol) for a little over 7 months and I have a really difficult time typing. I am not using autocorrect and I misspell words, substitute similar words, leave out words, etc. It's very difficult and I have to proofread a lot. It's becoming very frustrating.

[Solly Mack]

7. I go to a room and forget why I'm there.

I get so annoyed with myself.

[Contrary1]

8. I couldn't do simple math on paper...

It was very troublesome, as before I could do it in my head. (Thanks to the nuns at Holy Spirit Elementary).

Anyway, here is what I did: I forced myself to read entire newspaper articles. No easy trick, as my short-term memory was shot. Sometimes, I had to read it 3 or 4 times. I did crossword puzzles, Logic Problems, online word games. Anything that would challenge my memory.

After a few months, there was major improvement. I was almost back to where I was pre-chemo.

Brain exercises are essential to getting back to normal.

A short side-story: I could not for the life of me remember the little girl's name who lived across the street from me. She was probably about 5 years old, and would skip on over whenever she saw me working in the yard, and talk about her day.

I finally ended up telling her that the medication I was on caused me to forget a lot of things, and that was why I didn't address her by name. After that conversation, she would still skip across the street to greet me. But she would announce herself, "Hello, It's Elizabeth from across the street, how are you today?"

I will never forget that. This small child could understand what so many adults couldn't.