https://brightonbipolar.wordpress.com/2015/07/03/bipolar-and-memory-loss/
For Bipolar sufferers, the part of the brain that stores memory is much smaller than usual, making the formation of memory, management of emotion, and learning difficult.
Studies found that a particular protein (Rap1) which participates in the formation of long-term memories, is lacking in the brains of those of us diagnosed with Bipolar…
https://brightonbipolar.wordpress.com/2015/07/04/bipolar-aches-pains/
Pain in the lower back, neck, head, legs and joints are very common in those of us diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder as well as headaches or migraines. Personally speaking, the aches can often feel very similar to having the Flu…
Psychiatric disorders are often associated with, or sometimes even caused in part by, abnormal changes in the way we process pain. Neurochemical changes in the brain that occur as a result of Bipolar Disorder can also increase pain by making an individual more sensitive to pain. The Depressive phases of Bipolar can also magnify pain, making it more difficult to carry on with normal daily activities…
http://www.jneurosci.org/content/30/38/12806.short
Low Nociceptor GRK2 Prolongs Prostaglandin E2 Hyperalgesia via Biased cAMP Signaling to Epac/Rap1, Protein Kinase Cε, and MEK/ERK
Hyperexcitability of peripheral nociceptive pathways is often associated with inflammation and is an important mechanism underlying inflammatory pain…
Neurological science reads like gibberish to me, but I just wanted to point out that the memory problems found in chronic pain patients are similar to those found in depression and bipolar.
All Things Chronic 
I rather doubt the veracity of that science anyway
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You doubt the veracity of neurological science? How come? Seems to me that medical conditions can all be traced back to how our brains are functioning.
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Maybe it is the diagnoses of bipolar and depression that I sometimes question. The reason I made the last comment is the link with memory. I certainly know nothing about neurological science, but I do know that our emotions affect our functioning
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Perhaps all these conditions are connected to some kind of inflammation in the brain, which messes with the synapses and makes neuronal connections a lot harder to accomplish.
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Could be, but what do we really know?
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I always suspected I have a pea-brain 🙂
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Don’t be so hard on yourself… I’m pretty sure you have a larger vocabulary than a pea. 😀
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for a year or so i have been aware i’ve been having memory issues, especially being able to finish a thought without losing the entire topic to the void that is my brain, but an inability to find the right words, instead of rhyming words, assonant words, similar in meaning words. this has made it all so much more difficult to socialize, as half way thru an answer or response, i just drift off, can’t maintain a conversation due to this issue.
but i was not aware of the link between bipolar and difficulty making and maintaining memories. but now it makes so much sense. bipolar also causes cognitive dysfunction, like alzheimer’s.
but fibro also causes wandering pain that shifts and varies in intensity, and it causes ‘fibro fog’ where the person has difficulty thinking, processing, finding words, following a conversation thru…etc.
no i know why i can blog so well (if i lose words or the topic, it is there in writing for me to see, if i am responding to a comment or commenting, same thing.) it is there in writing for as long as i want. sometimes it takes hours to finish a post or comment, but it doesn’t look like it. it looks organized and thought out, like i just ‘said’ it all at once. but socializing is a different story.
i tried socializing last nite with some neighbors. they were grilling, and grilling other neighbor’s meat too. i brought a fruit salad cause i had no meat. i got to know the one’s grilling better, and met a few other neighbors. We drank a bit and relaxed and ate and ended up just bs’ing…and i found i couldn’t follow what anyone was saying past a few minutes. then i was lost, like i didn’t even hear them. when i had a response or something to say, i just started talking, but halfway thru my thought, i just ended up fading out because i lost the topic, my comment, everything. i think they were a little worried about me, like maybe i was ill. but i was fine. i just couldn’t maintain focus, couldn’t remember what i heard or was saying. and i got anxious as hell trying so hard to listen, to know what was going on around me. and it just got worse. now, today, i am so embarrassed. how do i explain why i was so out of it without sounding like i have alzheimers? this is why i socialize very little, and have (only) one irl friend.
thanks for these links!
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I would have just said I have fibromyalgia, a chronic pain condition, or suffer from headaches (depending on how specific you want to be), and sometimes the condition can make me lose my train of thought. Then you can make a joke, like, I swear, it’s not from smoking too much pot. 🙂
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ya, that’d be a good one, except we did, and they’ll think that’s what it was.
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So, you have an excuse, right? That pot messes with your memory. Or you could just say you have an inoperable brain tumor. 🙂
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brain tumor! yes that is the one im going with! lol 😉
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I don’t understand it either, but that’s interesting, as I too am very forgetful, even mid-sentence sometimes, but I blame that on mommy brain. My husband is shocked sometimes when I’ll come across a movie on Netflix that we’ve apparently watched a time or two that I don’t remember at all. Or of somewhere we went several years ago when dating that I don’t recall.
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