My therapist has been helping me work to be able to better express my experiences with executive dysfunction to others, so she wanted me to write about how it feels when I'm struggling to start and complete ADLs. This isn't necessarily a complete list of all the stuff I struggle with around ADLs, I didn't go into some of the sensory stuff and such that only applies to specific ADLs. But I thought it might be a good idea to share what I wrote and maybe hear from other people and see whether this resonates with them at all or whether they experience these things differently.

CW for mention of body focused repetitive behaviors and self-injurious stimming in the very last entry on the list

When I’m struggling to do my ADLs it can feel like

• Not being able to pull myself away from the computer while playing pet games because doing so means working against my brain. My brain sees stuff that's special interest related as higher priority even when I know going to do the other thing I want to do would be more beneficial to me. It’s kind of like trying to not pet a dog while in a room with one, animals take precedence over everything so doing anything else means fighting my brain to get it to recognize the other task as important. Fighting with my brain & emotions this way takes an immense amount of processing power and I often just don’t have that kind of processing ability to begin with.
  
• I actually NEED to play with my virtual pets/animal games for at least a few (2-3) hours per day, it’s my primary way of regaining processing power. If I go the whole day without them or only play for a short time I become much less able to perform other tasks. Much more easily overwhelmed, overstimulated, and much more likely to run out of processing power and ‘crash’ (ie. have a meltdown or shutdown).
• Initiating and changing tasks takes processing power, even more so if I’m moving from a task that’s special interest (animal and/or game) related. But even with tasks that aren’t SI related I sometimes just don’t have the processing power to do it and when that happens it feels like inertia. If I don’t have the mental energy/processing power to push past that inertia I can sit there trying to move or begin the task and tell myself what I need to do in my brain over and over but can’t translate that into actual movement, like my body doesn’t respond readily to what my brain is saying. It makes me feel really frustrated or guilty sometimes, which often leads me to giving up on the task so I don’t push myself into a meltdown. But then I end up feeling even more guilty or ashamed for not doing it. This way of getting ‘stuck’ also happens when moving to a new step when doing larger tasks like showering which, is why they often take me longer than they take for other people.
• Sometimes I just can’t figure out how to start a task. This is worse when I’m low on processing power, I’ll be able to tell myself the task I need to do (ie. get dressed for the day) but I can’t mentally break it down into steps on my own or organize the steps into a coherent order (ie. get up, go get a shirt, get pants, etc.). I’ll try but it takes tons of processing power and often I’ll just get confused, overwhelmed, and exhausted by it before I can even start the task. This is one of the things that gets in the way of me getting food or water when I need it.
• Even if I figure out how to start I can often have issues with finishing tasks for the same reason. Where I just can’t figure out what I need to do next, trying to figure it out is like hitting a brick wall. Doing things in the same order every time helps with this since at least then I know that information actually is behind the wall. But if I’m low on processing power, and I almost always am, then I can still not be able to get past the wall to get that info so I'll just sit there staring into space while fighting internally to retrieve the information in my head.
• I tend to be very in my head so I often get stuck there and find myself thinking, daydreaming, or otherwise ‘zoning out’ instead of doing the task. This typically isn’t intentional or something I want to be doing, but it’s incredibly hard for me to stop doing it and restart a task without being interrupted by something external. This makes tasks take far longer because I will be sitting there staring into space instead of continuing what I’m trying to do.
• Performing most tasks is overstimulating & overwhelming to me because of the degree of processing power they take. This is worsened if they require physical activity (overstimulates my sense of Proprioception), intense mental focus (requires extra processing power), or use of my hands (motor skill issues make my hands hard to control). This can manifest physically, in addition to the mental overwhelm & fatigue, with profound physical fatigue, dizziness/lightheadedness, and a variety of other unpleasant symptoms. This makes it very hard to push myself to do things, even things I otherwise like & really want to do, because I'm dreading the way they make me feel physically and mentally.
• I also have an extra hard time with tasks that I haven’t done before and am still learning how to do, tasks where an element of it has changed from what I’m used to, and tasks where I have to follow complex, non-specific, or verbal instructions. But that doesn’t apply to most basic ADLs.
• My BFRBs and BFRB-like stims can interrupt tasks that require me to use my hands. I have a tendency to pick at my skin and also to bite my fingers until they are injured enough to produce the kind of pain based sensory input my brain is seeking. Tasks that require me to be unclothed/only partially clothed or that occur near a mirror often trigger the skin picking and the biting is something I do at any time and don't typically do consciously. Like with ‘zoning out’ I have an incredibly hard time interrupting these behaviors on my own and I don’t always realize I’m doing them. These behaviors cause me minor injury, come with a risk of infection, and I don’t like the scars and visible injuries they create. I really want to stop but I need someone else to interrupt me, otherwise I will continue for quite a while and cause myself additional injury before I manage to stop and redirect myself.