Chemo brain - what are your experiences?

40 years old and 1.5 years post chemo here.  I have the same word/name issues as everyone else has mentioned.  I also have an impaired short term memory.  If I get interrupted in the middle of a task, I will completely forget what I was doing and sometimes don't remember for days.  Quite the problem at work!  I'm training myself to ask people to hold on for a tick while I write down a reminder of what I was working on.  If you use Outlook at work and are mainly desk based, I'm a huge fan of "Ctrl+Shift+K" for making a quick note that goes in your task list.

For me, a year out of chemo, it has become a "two steps forward, one step back and dance a little on the spot" thing.  I'm a librarian and words are my thing but they are often tantalisingly out of reach and my spelling has suffered badly.  Some things have disappeared into a black hole seemingly forever (anything to do with King Lear, a text I had to deal with when I first got back to work) is not in my retrievable memory at all.  In some ways, this is a good thing (ha ha!, I hear you laugh) because it means that I ALWAYS check anything to do with this.  I also try never to trust now that I KNOW something - I generally do know it but I feel better checking that I've got it right.  Going back to work terrified me and a lot of it was to do with fatigue and cognitive dysfunction. And I did make some blunders but nothing huge, thank goodness.  I recognise now that I went back too soon for me.  On my psych's advice, I started to better record what I was doing  whether it was written down or doing something mindfully. 

In the past, my notes were mostly for other people but now they are definitely for me and that can include names of things or people.  This has been a major learning curve and something that has been a bit difficult to accept.  I also have to be careful when I get too many interruptions, particularly if it is to solve problems, as my resilience is just not there.  I can easily become frazzled and start making mistakes myself particularly later in the day as I get tireder and things build up.  My boss was on leave for a few months and another person joined the team.  She's lovely but does not recognise the need for breaks (not in a mean way, but will keep asking questions about work) and I HAVE to have those breaks now to recharge.  Now that the weather has improved, I have started going for walks or just sitting outside sometimes during my break times - better for my health but really important for my ability to concentrate.  If all else fails, I have been known to take a few minutes longer in the loo - no-one bothers me there.

So, my advice for what it's worth... Go easy on yourself.  If you work with others, let them know if you feel you can.  Try to devise some strategies such as notes or mindfulness to help you get through memory lapses.  Insist on your breaks to recharge even if all you can do is walk to see someone rather than make a phone call.  Go easy on yourself.  Recognise those memory areas that have gone AWOL completely.  Keep a thesaurus tab open on your computer.  If things are getting too much, find something to do that will allow you to get time out on your anxiety and get it under control.  Did I say, go easy on yourself?

It's taken me two years to stop gibbering when I get tired or nervous. Really quite embarrassing to get half way through a sentence and have to revert to interpretive dance because I couldn't find the right words or the wrong ones come out or I've forgotten entirely what I was trying to say. I still get muddled up occasionally, but I've learned to stop, take a deep breath, a small pause and resume. I bungled a couple of job interviews and spent too much time sobbing in the car because I felt like a complete fool.
The thing that is really bugging me now is my spelling. TF for spell check, but if I have to write something by hand I can end up with an illegible scrawl.
It really is a 'thing'. Some are worse affected than others and recovery time seems to vary wildly.
Like many chemo side effects, the improvement can be so slow and incremental that you don't realise you are getting better/speaking more clearly/moving more freely until it dawns that a whole week has gone by without being mortified or crippled by mysterious pains. I'm pretty sure the hormone treatments don't help, but there's not much that can be done about that. Mxx

Sounds like chemo brain to me. I constantly forgot words, and forgot I'd been told something. It cleared up after about a year. My oncologist said that reading had been found to help it. The official name for it is Cancer Related Cognitive Impairment (CRCI). The fatigue on the other hand still hits me from time to time. That can linger for a few years. K xox

I still have days I can't recall names...it's definitely much worse than pre chemo. When I first went back to work I even had trouble fibding the right word for everyday items. ..not unlike a stroke.
But some exercise, a nutritional diet and a multivitamin supp plus decent sleep it has definitely improved.

Always do you health checks though as Thyroid function and if anaemic etc can also impact on memory.

SWell, I forgot my PIN number and burst into tears in the bank...mortifying. Forgot names or mixed them up a la Freudian slip. Called my daughter in laws mother by the step mother's name...yikes!!! Any word with more than four letters became the "thingy". Cutty thingy - scissors. Click thingy - remote control. Pully outy thingy - tweezers. Sucky outy thingy - USB stick. (it sucks information out of one computer and spits it out into another). Also typed letters in the wrong sequence (still do). Not fat finger syndrome where the next door key is presses, but the correct letters in the wrong sequence. Phos for shop. dlich for child and so on. Very noise sensitive...came very close to madness from neighbour's yapping dogs. Super elevated startle reflex...someone drops something and I almost collapse. It has improved but some things are still there, like the typos.