It all started a in around May of 2011. I bought some new video games, got bored of them very quickly, and then made the worst mistake of my life. I gave myself an idea "Maybe I don't enjoy video games anymore". Shortly afterward, this thought crept into every aspect of my video gaming hobby. I started recording my play sessions to see if they were increasing or decreasing as time went on.
Through this I found out that my attention span is around 40 minutes. This turned out to be another gigantic mistake, as I started timing myself and frantically looking at the stopwatch every few minutes until it reached the 37-44 min mark.At this point it's almost as if my emotional status changes from happy/content to bored/unhappy, and I have to turn the game off.
You're probably thinking "so what, guy got bored of video games as he got old, it happens". The problem is that it did not stop there. I received a kindle last Christmas, which I was very stoked about. I purchased a couple books, and on the first attempted reading session this terrible idea crept back into my head: what if I don't enjoy reading anymore either? Rinse and repeat what happened to my gaming hobby, I am now unable to complete a book because I doubt myself into being unable to do so.
Gaming and reading down, not a big issue right? Well it didn't stop there. Soon the same thing happened to movies and television, painting and biking. I've set an artificial limit of 40 minutes on every activity in my life, and it's given me several severe depressive episodes.
Is there anyone out there who has experienced something similar to this? If it helps, as a child I was diagnosed as having ADHD at the age of 10, shortly before being clinically diagnosed with high functioning autism at the age of 12. But why would this issue wait until I was 19 to creep into my life? Is this some sort of hormone problem? I took concerta (methylphenidate) from age 8 until my 18th birthday upon which I quit taking it cold turkey, but resuming concerta has not helped this issue at all.
I'm seriously at my wits end. Someone help!
Added (1). I'm convinced it's the obsession that is the real problem, but the sudden change in emotional status upon reaching 40 minutes seems to be legitimate short attention span.
>>> An idea so powerful that it saps the enjoyment out of my life?