A Most Unusual Underlying Cause of Disorganization

My client was a successful professional organizer.  I had known her for years, and she had taken a leadership role in an organization that we were both a part of.  She had played a key role in making it run smoothly   So I was surprised to see that on the day of her appointment, she called to cancel because she had double booked her appointments.  She rescheduled, and again she had to reshuffle things, but this time she made seeing me a priority.  This was not the organized professional I knew her to be!

In her session, I asked about what was going on, and why she was struggling with organizing, and she confessed to feeling particularly scatterbrained lately.  She said she had really been struggling to keep her calendar straight over the last few weeks, and that it was interfering with her ability to do her job.   As an organizer, she said that she was in her words, “a mess” and very embarrassed about it.

We had to make addressing this a priority. 

What made her suddenly struggle with organizing?

What could make a person who was so organized for so long, suddenly not seem to be able to do so?  My first thoughts were that maybe she had extreme sleep deprivation, or something more serious like a mild cognitive infarction (a mini stroke).

In asking her subconscious, it turned out there was just 1 underlying cause:  A parasite!  She had acquired a parasite from a dog in a home she was at 23 days before our appointment.   I had her get an anti-parasitic herbal remedy, and over the next few weeks, she slowly started to notice that things were getting better.   At the end of her course of treatment, she felt like her old self.  She said she could now mentally keep track of things, and that she was now regularly checking her planner, which she hadn’t been able to manage to do in her scatterbrained state!

I had known for awhile that parasites can change the behavior of their hosts in some interesting and yet terrifying ways.   But I haven’t found evidence for a parasite that effects it’s hosts ability to plan and organize.  Research on the behavioral effects of parasites is only in its infancy, but by catching it early, it is possible that we prevented an early onset of dementia or even death!   But more research needs to be done to have a better idea of what could have happened.

I’ve helped other clients who struggle with organizing.  Usually the underlying causes have nothing to do with pathogens.   Sometimes the root of it is about challenges making decisions, for others it could be about letting things go.    Sometimes it is about determining what is important, or sometimes the idea of organizing feels heavy, or overwhelming, or no fun.   Regardless, releasing barriers to organizing can make all the difference between procrastination and getting it done.

Are you ready to make organizing easy?  Learn more about the Body Code here and contact me here for your complimentary consultation.