[278/365] losing things

[cosmolinguist]

I mentioned after the camping trip that I hadn't appreciated until then how much I rely on leaving my everyday things in a particular place, just so I know where they are the next time I need them so I don't have to use my spoons on looking for them.

It turns out I'm still not appreciating that enough. Because, fortunate as I feel to live for the first time in a house that can pay for cleaners, I have also run into that thing I've heard about so much: I can't find something because the cleaner moved it.

Most things I could find eventually: the bedside lamp wasn't where I reflexively reach to turn it on but it was only a foot away and I could move it back. Or they weren't too much work: I was briefly baffled by where my coffee press was this morning but then saw it tucked into the corner of the kitchen countertop (with the metal filters, which I'd taken apart to clean, inexplicably but easily found, just the other side of the paper towels). But this morning I spent the last ten minutes before an important meeting frantically and fruitlessly and frustratedly trying to find the headset I use for online meetings.

Keeping track of where my things are is not just good in saving me eye spoons, it saves a lot of mental health spoons too because if I can't find something I am very quickly miserable. I am somehow always right back to a childhood of being told "it's right there! right there!" about anything I've failed to locate.

I don't remember being given more helpful help, I certainly don't remember having anything to compare this fear and shame to until I was an adult with other disabled friends (or adjacent) who would give precise instructions and check with me whether I understood their landmarks ("see that white thing there?" and if I did they'll say something like "it's behind that" but if I didn't see the white thing they'll recalibrate their starting point).

Even with the kindness and solidarity, I still hate to be witnessed in this process of being unable to spot something. But alone, unwitnessed, is no better because I just hate it differently. Owning up to my shame is worth it if I can get help, even if the shame is compounded by how trivially easy a sighted person can often find the thing for me. Without that potential for help, I very quickly descend into despair and helplessness at the utter futility of my efforts, and then rage at the helplessness because it's so uncomfortable a feeling, and then the rage is so uncomfortable and so counterproductive too...

My fellow humans were both upstairs so I had lots of time to think about this as I looked angrily around the room. Not angry at the cleaners, maybe angry at myself, maybe just angry because sometimes you can almost feel yourself being, say, less than a foot away from the thing that would make your life so much better right now and yet still so completely lacking in it. It's a horrible, itchy, chest-burster feeling, no doubt actually adrenaline and whatnot but it feels like its own specific torture.

Anyway, I found the headset with a couple minutes to spare: tucked onto a small shelf only as tall as it is, the USB cord tightly and uselessly wrapped around itself.

Of course immediately I thought about mitigation strategies.

Get a box and throw anything of mine that might get moved around into that? Maybe. But it's hard to know what might get moved: an external keyboard and my mouse were right next to the headset yet, if maybe detangled a bit, not moved away from my laptop stand so I don't know why the headset, right there with them, clearly in the same category of computer peripherals, was the only thing that got bafflingly moved.

Leave some kind of instructions not to move my stuff? But they have no way of knowing what's my stuff (my laptop is in a shared space) and what counts as "where I expect it to be" -- I'm fairly tidy but wouldn't want to claim I'm precious about every single thing's precise location because I'm not.

I can be specially careful of the headset next time -- maybe tuck it away myself; there wouldn't have been anything inherently awful about where it'd been put if I knew to look for it there -- but I don't expect it'll be the headset next time, it'll be some other random thing, just like it was some random thing this time that I wouldn't have expected.

I'll figure something out. I'm just writing this as a reminder to myself that I do need to think about this, that where my things are is more important to me than I usually give it credit for.

Comments

[ljwrites]

After reading this post I was positive that there was a technological solution out there for putting a sticker on items and tracking them radar-style or making them beep, and some of the ones I found are EZ-Find, Stick-N-Find, and Tile. The Tile seems to come with the best reviews, with the other two having poor user reviews on performance and reliability, but the trackers are also pricey as hell! A four-tracker pack retails at about $70 on Amazon. Keep track of all your things? Not unless you own only four things lol. It's a fun toy a useful item for some stressful situations, though, so if you have a limited number of valuable items you want to track maybe this will make a nice Christmas gift?

[cosmolinguist]

I've heard good things about Tiles from ADHD friends in particular, indeed I just recommended them to a friend the other day who's having a lot of trouble keeping track of their mobile phone and again can quickly spiral into really negative feelings when they need it and can't find it. They have very different issues than I do, stemming from different causes, but it's interesting to see how similar the mental-health spiral can be over lost things. But yeah, $70 is such a lot! And I don't have four specific things to put them on. :)

[ljwrites]

Sometimes I joke that a housemate or partner is someone to call your phone when you can't find it in the house :) It would be so neat if all objects could similarly shout out their location at low cost without requiring SIM cards and caller plans!

[diffrentcolours]

Couple of hopefully-useful ideas re. the headset specifically - it's large enough that we can use a label printer to put a "DO NOT MOVE THIS PLEASE" sticker on it. Also, don't forget I have an identical one so if I'm not in a meeting myself, you can come grab that in an emergency.

[cosmolinguist]

Yeah there are definitely things I can do for the headset particularly, but like I say I don't expect it'll be that next time, I would expect it to be some other random unexpected thing. I've given myself the more difficult problem of trying to deal with the general case rather than the specific instance. :)

It's a good point though about you having an identical one, I'd forgotten that! Even though that's why I have the one I do!

[moem]

Maybe it would help if you got some small, brightly coloured stickers and used them to mark your stuff, and then explain to the people who do the cleaning that this means 'please don't move this'?
Just a suggestion. No idea whether it would work.

[worlds_of_smoke]

I thought of this too. You wouldn't have to mark everything because that might be impossible. But you could mark the stuff that's absolutely vital to put back where it belongs, like your headset or keyboard.

[sfred]

This sounds like a really frustrating thing.

[sfred]

(That might not be exactly the right word. Anyway, I hope you find good solutions.)

[cosmolinguist]

Oh, frustrating is exactly the right word! Thanks.

[sfred]

<3

[otter]

It's so hard when adult situations put one back into those childhood trauma places.

[davidgillon]

I don't know why the headset, right there with them, clearly in the same category of computer peripherals, was the only thing that got bafflingly moved.

I suspect there's probably quite a sizeable section of the population who won't file headsets in with computer bits, but instead think "goes with phone" or "goes with stereo".

[cosmolinguist]

Oh for sure, but when it was, either plugged into my laptop or with a USB tip just next to the USB port? (I don't have a better place to leave it really than "right next to my laptop", heh; this incident has made me reflect on how that might be an issue worth fixing. :) ) And there's no stereo in the house, no phones except the others having their own mobiles with them (I wasn't home at the time).

[silveradept]

Oh, dear. That sounds very frustrating. (As someone who puts things in places so I know where they will be when I need to find them again, I have had many frustrated arghs at my own brain for not sticking to the system.)

It may be worth talking with the cleaner as to how you conceive of physical organization of spaces, so that even if they move things in trying to organize them, they can do it in a way that you will be able to understand or have less frustration about where things are.

[cosmolinguist]

I was at work when they were here and I'm not sure if I'll be around when they come back, so I have been wondering if it's worth leaving a message/instructions/anything with my housemates, but again since I don't have a specific list of things or specific places any of them should be, I'm not sure that adding a game of telephone to that will make it easier for anyone or more effective. :)

[silveradept]

Maybe the instruction to leave is "please tell us what you moved and where when you are done?" Which might seem like a silly instruction, but you might be willing to play up a certain amount of "being low vision means I can't easily tell when something had been moved from where I last put it" as a possibility of why they need to tell you when stuff gets shuffled around?

Or this is unhelpful. If so, please ignore.

[worlds_of_smoke]

I hope you can figure something out. I have an idea or two, though they would only mitigate the problem rather than completely eliminate it.

[barakta]

As others have said this sounds like frustration caused by people who aren't bad, and don't know that it's a thing how to communicate a vagueness of something to people who may be different each time.

I hope you find a solution that works for you and are able to manage the impact of the stuff that you struggle to find in the interim.

It's always difficult to know how to cope with something that is SO hard for us disabled people cos of impairment and yet are easy for people without that impairment and how to deal when assistance is and is not available. I know most sighted people just don't appreciate how useful being able to see stuff easily is, cos it is usually just easy for us. I am glad that your current company people are usually good at finding a mutual landmark and working with you to go from there.

[finding_helena]

That does sound really frustrating. I hope you can come up with a mitigation strategy. Tbh I don't really know why the cleaners are moving your stuff anyway. I thought that cleaners *cleaned* and the home's residents were responsible for tidying up/putting away stuff before the cleaners showed up.