Family member, autism and time keeping

[Nursenance]

I am asking this because I want to learn.

Currently on a family holiday with adult relative with undiagnosed high functioning autism (this has been suggested by psychiatrist who also tried to explain this may be a trait to family ).

Relative is constantly late. We all try to be patient and give a million prompts. We tell him to meet 15min earlier than we want him there. We ring. We text. Reminders and prompts. We beg him to please be on time. He is always late. So 14 of is go to a restaurant and he arrives half hour late. Its fine to say just order without him but it makes it so awkward and stressful every time.

He gets mad when we prompt him and says "oh I'll just follow on in a bit'...with no acknowledgement of how this messes up the evening for rest of us.

It's not just meals, it's meeting to go out for the day, meeting to do an activity.

He says he just struggles with time and cant think how long stuff takes. I just don't understand how, if he knows he has an issue, why he doesn't just check the time more?

He seems to have zero thought for the impact on rest of the family.

Can anyone relate to this? I try really hard to understand but can't help but get mad with him.

Hes a lovely bloke but just appears to never consider anyone else's plans!

I have a friend like this. And as someone who hates being late and who factors plenty of contingency tone into any plans, I've found it maddening in the past.

But I've learned to just get on with my plans, and there's absolutely no reason why, in your situation, 14 people should be waiting for this person.

Fundamentally, he will never try to overcome this trait if he's always protected from its results, because everyone waits for him. If you all get on a bus/train/taxi without him and he misses the activity, then he is faced with the consequences. And it's only that kind of result, repeatedly, that is going to lead to him trying to address this issue.

Incidentally, my friend is now much better at timekeeping. It'll never be easy for him, and he's still poor at it when he's the only person involved, but dealing with the results in the past has led to him being much better when it comes to arrangements with others.

I feel your pain. My daughter has always struggled to be anywhere on time. At school the bus regularly had to wait a few minutes for her. She then got a Saturday job that she was always late arriving to. I used to tell her she'd get the sack but they were very relaxed. She later got a job that had Flexi time so generally got there about 10.00 am . They started asking her to be there by 9.30 and she struggled and rarely did this. Since COVID and permanently working from home I have no idea when she starts but often works till 8 or 9.00 pm so don't think it's very early. She is in her 30s now and it is only recently looking back on other behaviours too that she is obviously on the autistic spectrum. We never realised when she was younger and it used to cause us a great annoyance and lots of arguments when she was never ready for anything. I just never realised it was a thing with autism.

In my family "ill follow on" is pretty much code for "I need 15 minutes of no people"

I can identify with that. Especially on holiday with 14 people.

You'd be better to kindly explain the reasons it effects you. Autism is a disability and requires adjustments. People wouldn't be annoyed at someone in a wheelchair not being able to do or go to certain places.

So that means you dont invite that person on a holiday with 14 other people.
You see them in a very small group when being flexible isn’t as much of an issue. (Assuming @Nursenance isn’t talking about their partner). Because otherwise, the adjustments we simply impossible to make
Eg you can’t make a taxi wait 15 mins and sometimes you have to be at a certain place at a certain time (let’s say the start if a guided tour)

Just like, as a wheelchair user, I wouldn’t go on a hiking holiday with 14 other people and then expect them to carry me, find only wheelchair accessible paths etc…
As a family we do activities that fit around me. And then, they also do their own things wo me because most of the stuff they really enjoy are things I can’t do anymore.

Btw, my dh is autistic. So is dc2.

Neither of them are constantly late. They are always right on time. If you say 10.00am, they’ll be there at 10.00. Not 10.02 or 9.55am. (And yes neither if them cope well with arriving 5 mins early or late….)

It does sound infuriating, OP.

I think you need to just plough on with stuff and let him catch you up as and when.

If you're going to play crazy golf, just let him know when you're starting, and if he arrives late, he can either join in from that point, or (if that's not possible) stay on the sidelines and watch. Let him know when you have booked the restaurant, and order as soon as it suits you. If he ends up eating out of sync, his lookout! Taxi? Just say "We're going to get into a taxi at 10am. If you want to join us, be there before 10. If you want to come later by yourself, that's fine, just give us a message to let us know you are on your way."

Don't start organizing your day around him and then get angry and resentful as a result.

I think that even without autism, holidays get very stressful when there is an expectation that everyone has to be joined at the hip and do everything together.

It's more relaxing to have the expectation that people do what they want and then they coincide and spend some time together some of the time, even if that means cramming somewhat fewer activities in.

How old is he? How would he react if, say for this example (dinner out), you were to order starters and drinks without him? If he would have little to no reaction I would simple press on ahead without him and he can join when he arrives. If he gets upset then I would explain in simple and neutral terms that if you are late then we will have to start without you.

With regards to flights and taxis, again what happens if he misses a flight? Does he freak out or is he unbothered? Is he able to make alternative plans for himself?

You can only really fix this if he wants it "fixed". It might be he's avoiding things, it might be he struggles with task initiation or transitioning between activities, or it might be that he does just have a very poor concept of what an "hour" feels like for example... or anxiety...

Some of them you can sort easier than others - phone alarms etc to count down towards events... some of them you probably can't sort and it's just meeting him as he is and working with it.

My stepfather is chronically late and we've worked out he just gets bloody distracted as he's leaving and will suddenly notice that a shelf is crooked and get drawn into faffing about with that - so we just give him good natured shit about it, or tell him a slightly earlier time!

And just for balance, not all of us autistics are chronically late - I'm chronically early for everything... it's my way of keeping my anxiety in check and I work with a team who are very much "yes, we get delayed and it happens - sorry" and sometimes they drive me flipping barmy! My lovely boss though, who has a reputation for functioning on her own unique timezone, knows I am how I am because of my anxiety as a strategy to manage that - and she's really made an effort to improve her timekeeping when she's meeting up with me - bless her!

Hrs said for you to reckon order if he's late. So do that?

Crack on

Thank you everyone. I'm going to tell rest of family we are making it worse keep reminding him.
I'm going to stop worrying and leave him to it. Thank you

Same, not to that extent but I would not be more than 5 minutes late. Unless I'm dealing with late people, then I sometimes arrive deliberately late as i am sick to death of constantly waiting for them every single time. What I don't get is why poor time keepers are never early?

In my case if I’m late it’s because I’m so paranoid about being late that I tend to get to places an hour early and then wander off and get distracted / think I have time to do something and lose track of time.

I do usually manage to mitigate this by setting several phone timers, before anyone jumps on me for being inconsiderate.

I think you just need to leave him to it unfortunately.

I can’t ask you to grow another 10cm to be a better height in the same way that he just can’t do what you would like him to do.

go on without him and let him figure it out and join in best he can when you get there! Good luck!