Loss of Focus – Frantic Shanti

Making Meditation Easier

So the recurring theme in my posts about meditation is the struggle that I have with maintaining focus. This has been complicated by breast cancer medications that are associated with cognitive effects, not to mention the eventual menopause and “brain fog” that has resulted from them.

And while I’ve taken all sorts of classes and scoured meditation how-tos, I used to wonder, am I even doing this “right”? Shouldn’t I have an easier time with this by now?

A recent “Daily Trip” contemplation on the Calm smartphone app, narrated by meditation teacher Jeff Warren, reminded me that it’s important not to overthink what we’re doing.

The breath is a wonderful point of focus because it moves through our body and elicits sensations in a number of places.

Often in mindfulness meditation, we’re taught to use different aspects of our breath as an “anchor” or point of focus. The breath is a nice anchor to use because it helps us move inward while still staying present. It’s also a moving target, so to speak, so it might be more interesting to watch (and therefore focus on) than a static sensation.

But people are different, and if it’s really not working for you, or if focusing on your breathing actually makes you feel more anxious, you can switch to another focal point. How about the sensation in the hands, the feeling of your body’s weight against the surface on which it rests, or the distant sounds around you?

Maybe you even use several anchors within a single meditation (consider dual focus). The idea is to remain present and aware of what is happening now, even if you have open all your senses in order to do so. What anchor(s) work(s) best for YOU? It is, after all, YOUR meditation.

What really matters is just that you make it back to the present.

And then, instead of worrying about maintaining focus, what if we let go of that? It’s okay, even expected, for your mind to drift off. I would argue that losing focus is an integral part of mindfulness meditation. Because it gives us the opportunity to be aware that we are no longer focused. And once you realize this, you have returned to the present. Nice job!

The more you practice this back-and-forth, like tossing a beach ball between your anchor and your errant thoughts, the more adept you will become at realizing that your thoughts have carried you away. The more you do that, the easier it will become to return to your anchor, and that’s the whole idea.

It doesn’t have to be more complicated than that.

A Loss…and a Laugh

I lost my Costco card today. Somewhere between the entrance and the check-out line. It’s not the end of the world since I was promptly issued a new one, but the old one had a photo of the pre-cancer me on it.

Reminders of that “old me” are disappearing as I redefine who I am. Yes, life is constantly in flux and change is inevitable but I’d be lying if I said it doesn’t hurt.

Cancer has been about loss for me. Loss of weight, loss of hair, loss of concentration, loss of physical fitness, loss of over a year spent in treatment. Loss of a friend to the disease. Out of nowhere, losing that one seemingly insignificant warehouse card brought this all back.

There have been gains too, and much to be grateful for. I could draw up a long list. But today I can’t write about them.

Today I longed for what was gone. Tomorrow will be better.

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The clouds parted, the sun shone forth and nothing really changed but my attitude.

So, after all that angsty serious talk, I got home and realized that my old Costco card was in my back pocket all this time. D’oh! I’d forgotten that I’d stuck it there!

Wow, I felt silly. They say hindsight is 20/20…well, looking back at how darkly I’d taken this, it did seem a bit ridiculous that I’d packed so much meaning into a piece of plastic.

And in a swoosh, the clouds cleared out, the sun peeked through and the world looked different. I still have that new post-cancer photo on my Costco card, but I’m laughing at myself and it doesn’t seem that bad.

Same situation, new perspective.

And then, if we realize that we can change our perspective…?

A Mini-Guide to Surviving Chemo Brain; or, “Wait, what were we talking about?”

While it’s not my intention to write advice columns for breast cancer patients, because I posted ‘getting through chemo‘ tips, I might as well follow up with what I’ve learned about handling the memory and focus issues associated with chemo brain.

Note, first, that chemo brain may not be all chemo. There may be various factors involved (chemo, tamoxifen, onset of menopause, even the tumor itself) and it’s difficult to tease out which one is the main culprit. Be that as it may, it still sucks when you’re standing in your closet, wondering why you went in there…for the tenth time today.

I put a lot of blame for this lack of focus and fleeting short-term memory on the estrogen-blocking drug tamoxifen, which is given to women with hormone receptor positive tumors. I can’t tell you how many physicians have assured me that it’s a “great drug” for decreasing risk of tumor recurrence. And an equally large number of women who have told me that their lives improved after they got off it.

Regardless, for now chemo brain is a fact of my life, so in the spirit of accepting what I cannot change, here are my best practices for making sure that chemo brain doesn’t get me fired from my job:

Write down your thoughts. And do it immediately. I’ve actually lost thoughts as I was scrounging for a writing utensil. If I have to remember something, I put it in writing, often on a sticky-note that goes on my computer monitor or bathroom mirror. Some place that I look at multiple times a day. I do this to excess, with notes everywhere, but it works. It also decreases my stress levels because I know the thought has been recorded.
If you can’t write it down, repetez! Repeat it in your head. Sounds obvious and overly simplistic? Perhaps, but you only need to do this until you either no longer need the thought, or get to a place where you can jot down a note. Of course, I ruined the last part of a meditation retreat for myself because a load of great post topics popped into my head and I had no place to record them. On the bright side, I realized I could juggle seven items in my head for a half hour if I concentrated on them!
Narrate what you’re doing. I’ve had to resort to this, especially when working on a multi-step process where accuracy counts. Yes, I’ve made mistakes on the “I-must-be-smoking-crack” scale, and this is often one of the best ways to avoid that. When I hear myself say what I’m supposed to be doing, I stay on task and am less likely to wander off.
Avoid distractions. This is probably the most critical piece of advice I can offer. Distractions are death to my thoughts because I go down rabbit holes before I’m even aware of what happened. The Google page of my Firefox browser at work suggests articles to read based on my browsing history, and let me tell ya, there are few feelings worse than suddenly realizing that you are lost deep in an article on body language when you should have been finishing up a report that’s due in a hour. How’d that happen? Anything that breaks my concentration — even a tickle of a distraction — can sidetrack me for minutes before I come to my senses.

Bottom line is, stay present. If there were one general rule of thumb to preserve your functioning while in the grips of chemo brain, that would be it.

The above hints may seem obvious, but I went through a lot of frustration until I accepted that my brain had changed and it couldn’t be ‘business as usual’ anymore. Once I started working around my limitations, things got a lot easier.

Invisible Effects: Helplessness

Suffice it to say, simply having cancer can leave you feeling helpless. Ignorance of the cause, uncertainty about the future, fear of treatment effects — that lack of control is frightening. But that’s not the helplessness that I’m writing about here.

In my last post on chemo brain, I alluded to the disorientation that comes from distractedness, brought on by lasting effects of chemotherapy on brain function. Here, I want to drill down and describe the feelings of helplessness that arise.

In WHY Did I Just Do That?, I wrote about a humorous dream in which I couldn’t understand the reasons for my weird behaviors. But the more sobering side of this is that I often feel that same way during my waking hours. There are things that I’ve done — treating a red light like a stop sign, as mentioned in my previous post — that make absolutely no sense to me and make me feel like I’m not in control of my own behaviors.

To make matters worse, I am not aware that I’m doing anything wrong (or dangerous or illegal!) at the time. When I realize what I’ve done, I’m horrified. Want to feel helpless? Not being able to trust yourself is a pretty good way.

I’ve been told that the main issue is loss of focus. Mindfulness helps immensely in these types of situations, but as anyone who has practiced mindfulness can tell you, you can’t be mindful 100% of the time. In my case, I’m fearful that this distractedness can put others or myself at risk.

Want a few more examples? Some are rather benign, like almost flooding the bathroom because I left the water running in the sink. Or writing an important email and leaving it unsent. Most of us have done something like that at one time or another, likely due to juggling too many tasks at once.

But the things that leave me feeling desperate are the ones that are not easily remedied. Having to learn things over and over again because I’m not retaining information. Having trouble expressing myself and not being able to retrieve words. After working as an editor at one point, this is unbelievably disheartening.

However, one event topped them all: I fell for a (well-designed, admittedly) bank scam where I gave out my Social Security Number despite having taken my work’s cybersecurity training course the previous week, and having received constant reminders from my bank that they will never ask for my SSN over the phone. Besides making me feel unimaginably STUPID, it cost me a good deal of money, time and nerves.

“Helpless” is not even the best word to describe how I feel. “Hopeless” is a more apt term. “Exposed” and “vulnerable” work too. This begs the question: how much more damage will I do to myself before things start improving? I should be working full-time instead of part-time, given the cost of living in my area. But how can I even think of looking for another job when I’m on such shaky ground? Cancer knocked me down in ways that I never anticipated. Yes, I’m grateful for being alive, but YEESH!

Building new neuronal connections, identifying what aspects of my memory issues are most severe, practicing mindfulness as much as humanly possible — it will take all that, along with a healthy dose of patience, to start seeing improvement. Hope I don’t get distracted and drive off a cliff before then.

Invisible Effects: Chemo Brain

Ah, chemo brain: the eater of thoughts. I should note that what I’m experiencing might not just be the effects of chemotherapy messing with my brain cells. This could also be influenced by the estradiol-blocking drug Tamoxifen that is forcing me into menopause before my natural time, or it could simply be the menopause “fog” that women complain about. So I don’t know exactly what it is, besides being infuriating.

I lose thoughts in an instant. Sometimes I actually “see” them disappear in the distance. It’s such a weirdly tangible sensation. I can try to grasp at their coattails and occasionally I’m successful in latching onto the thoughts and pulling them back. Other times I need to stop and walk back through my thought processes to retrieve them. And then sometimes they’re just gone. My desk at work is covered with post-it notes as a testament to what’s going on in my noggin. If there’s something I need to do I need to write it down NOW, and it’s not unusual for me to lose the thought as I’m in the process of getting something to write it down on!

This is what a walk down my memory lane looks like.

I can juggle up to three things in my mind at a time if I keep repeating them over and over again and work to maintain focus. Any more than that and it quickly crosses into the realm of hopelessness — it’s like knowing how to juggle three balls but if someone tosses a fourth at you, they all crash to the ground.

Then there are those chunks of awareness that disappear. It may simply be distraction and losing focus, but it feels like a hiccup in time that I don’t notice until it’s happened. It’s that “huh?” feeling as I return to present time when I realize that I’ve been gone for a second or two.

More disconcerting is a strange myopia that prevents me from reacting normally in a familiar situation. For instance, several months ago I treated a red light like a stop sign, and this was a familiar traffic light in my neighborhood that I’d been through many times. I briefly stopped at it, then drove through it. It was a “T” intersection that’s not terribly busy, but I did get shocked back to reality by the angry honk of a car that had the green and was probably wondering WTF I was doing.

The bottom line is that I’m distractable beyond belief. My train of thought gets derailed before it even leaves the station. The first time I noticed this, my oncologist ordered a brain MRI, way back in February. Nope, couldn’t blame it on a brain tumor — it’s just chemo brain.

This feels demoralizing, especially since my memory used to be so good. I lament losing all those awesome thoughts and ideas. And I know they were awesome because I remember having them — I just can’t recall exactly what they were. Yeah, there will be more, but I better have a notepad nearby to write them down. I even had a better ending for this post, but, you know…