It’s a running joke in our house. Where are mom’s glasses? Mom, that would be me, is constantly putting them down and forgetting where they are! I don’t think it is an aging thing because the misplaced glasses have been misplaced for years.

Oh and this happens to my cell phone on a regular basis as well. Thankfully, someone in the house just has to call my cell number and I am like On-Star, unless I forgot to take my phone off vibrate!

Apparently, I am not alone in my misplacement of objects. According to an article in the Wall Street Journal, the average person misplaces up to nine items a day! Hey, I am way below the national average here.

And thank goodness this tendency to misplace doesn’t mean I’m heading into dementia. People of all ages forget things. However, the does brain begins to shrink with aging (meaning in our 20s)  and it does worsen this tendency to forget.

The problem is that the number of things we have to remember in a typical day doesn’t decrease with age. And to top it off, we often multitask, making memory even more difficult. It’s a wonder we don’t lose more than 9 items a day!

Some German scientists think that our memory and distraction are related to a certain variation in a gene we inherit. Regardless of the cause, what works is finding a regular spot to put something. At night, I put my glasses on top of the dresser, same place every night! I don’t lose my car keys in the house either because I put them on a hanger the second I walk in the door. There they hang in the same place every day. If you are losing things, put them in the same place every day!

But when it comes to remembering  things that don’t have their own special place, I have to be intentional and make a note of where I am putting something. For example, I can’t tell you how many times I come out of a store and forget where my car is parked. The reason is that when I park, I might be on the phone, deep in thought or simply thinking of other things. If I don’t want to lose my car, I have to look around, get a few markers and tell myself to remember where I parked. If I am tired, upset, or highly stressed, my memory is even worse and so I pull out my cell phone (when I can find it) and put a reminder with an alarm on it. This works unless I forget where I put my cell phone or leave it on vibrate!

So if you want to stop losing your checkbook, keys, office items and cell phone, make a mental note of where you place those things, find a consistent place, and add a little reminder via your phone or a note to self. Refuse to lose 9 items a day or you just might lose your mind!