If you're always late, can I ask why?

[CulinaryUnderbelly]

Is it because you think your time is more important than the person's who is waiting for you? Or do you just not care that you're going to be late?

I've had this for 15 years with someone and I'm sick of the excuses, like "we had to do X on the way".

The worst time was when they cancelled the night before because they had arranged something else

It would be very difficult for me to not see them anymore, but I would just like to know how people get through life always being late and disorganised. Is it because you're always forgiven?

It’s the folk who are massively late every time due to just being shit and disorganised

Yes, and many of them will have undiagnosed ADHD. I'm mid 40s. I just thought I was shit at life until very recently. Actually I can tell you exactly when I the penny dropped and I started pursuing diagnosis for ADHD, it was because of a thread on procrastination on Mumsnet a few years back, and someone linked to a list of ADHD symptoms.

Here's a quiz from Totally ADD for anyone who's curious: totallyadd.com/do-i-have-add/

(ADD is now usually called Inattentive ADHD)

who assume that those who are waiting on them have all the time in the world themselves or are just being ‘uptight’.

Are you sure they think this or are you assumign it? There seem to be a lot of assumptions about the motivations of late people on this thread, which - as a chronically late person myself - I don't recognise.

Their are loads of coping strategies, time keeping apps and habits to get into to help ones punctuality, if you can bothered.

Yes, and I have tried loads of coping strategies, time keeping apps and tried to create good habits. What makes you think I haven't? Is it that I'm still late? Well, perhaps there are reasons for that that the strategies can't fix, did you consider that?

So, yes, to the other poster who got upset at the ‘try harder’ suggestion, sometimes that’s all it takes to see improvements and sometimes, the person being late is already trying as hard as they can, and still failing.

it is the subconscious nature of your self-importance that we are picking up on

This is total projection. I can assure you I don't feel self important. I have low self esteem (another symptom of ADHD) and feel frustrated, chaotic, panicky, disappointed in myself most of the time. I won't show this to you as I'm trying my best to act normal. After a stressful morning trying to get out of the house on time, I will try to turn up unflustered, I don't want to share my stress with you, I want to have a normal day. But self-importance? Doesn't come into it in the slightest.

I hate being so disorganised. It's fucking my life up. I'm intelligent yet a chronic underachiever. The friends I grew up with are on five figure salaries, or doing stuff they love. I'm stuck in admin jobs earning not much more than minimum wage, due in large part to my ADHD.

It's a kick in the teeth also to people go on about how I must be like this because I think I'm so important, or because I disrespect others or because I'm lazy. You have no fucking clue what it's like, or what I've lost because of it.

*sorry I mean six figure salaries!!

Mine is a heady mix of chronic inability to properly estimate the time to get somewhere, trying to please everyone and a failure to account for unexpected delays

Example:

I finish work at 5.30 in canary wharf.
I agree to meet a friend for drinks at 6 in carnaby street. 30 minutes to do that seems perfect. No trouble.
5.20 comes around. 'Right' I think 'I'll just send that last email' it takes longer than I expect or I'm interrupted.
I start packing up at 5.30. Someone asks a question on my way out. I say 'I'm so sorry I must go' they try to continue to conversation.
I finally escape their clutches and I call the lift. Everyone leaving and busy lifts so I'm now leaving the building at 5.45.
I remain confident...
Tube station is 5 minute walk. But! Huge queue adds another 5 minutes. 3 minute wait for tube.
10 minutes to green park. Shit. There's a biiiig exchange at that station to Victoria line
Get on next tube at 6.05. I'm already 5 minutes late. Tube takes 10 minutes. It's bloody ages to get out at Oxford circus so I'm exiting at 6.20. 5 minutes walk to bar.
Friend now hates me.

Bang. Despite any good intentions I'm half an hour late. In the quick calculation in my head 39 mins works because my head I leave bang on 5.30. There is no one else in the world to stop my direct track. The tube arrives when I want it and it's pretty direct. I forget about the other little bits that somehow add on 30 minutes...
And, sorry it's usually other people who have contributed to that by believing their question is more important than my need to be somewhere.

You could either fine them for every minute late like nurseries do (and my clients pay for my time so in a sense people like I am are alread paid for people being late) or just not have them in your life. I cannot tolerate unreliable people so I might put up with a bit of delay a few times but then it would be over and out for me.

However I am very sorry for people who cannot make appointments on time. It has a massive impact on them. They don't get jobs. They tend to find it harder to find a husband as htey don't turn up for dates on time. They don't pay bills on time. Poor them - it's an utter nightmare. However that does not mean I will choose to have my time stolen by them. I don't.

If I was regularly late for work I'd get a warning and, if I didn't change, be sacked

This^
Exactly. This is why previously I said there's a choice with people who are always late. There is an underlying process in their thinking that decides who or what matters. If it costs them, they wouldn't keep being late.

Nakedavenge74

Why would you arrange to meet someone at 6 if you finish work at 5.30?
It would seem obvious to most people that would be cutting it fine? It's setting yourself up for a fail. It's no good blaming the email you decided to send or the people who stopped you to talk to you or the queue at the tube station!

Can't you see you created the problem by arranging a meeting time that was totally unrealistic?

nake

Usually when I use public transport I will arrange to meet or person will try to arrange to meet me and it's usually more a case of "bus/train gets in at X time" or "I usually make it home by X so I will aim for the bus >

Then tbh you kimda mentally factor in the fact that the bus can be late or some old lady takes forever to find her bus pass or a frail old man takes a long time to get on and get seated and then walking frok.bus stop time. So in the kinda instance you describe if I was meeting you if happily wait because i know you are on public transport and I've factored in a few eventualities that could affect that plus.

I'm Usually more pissed off when someone says he round mine for X and I have to sit and watch them flap and faff for an hour. All these moaning rat 5 minutes early is ruder then quite frankly if you have any more left to do than putting shoes on locking up and feeding the cat you were never going to be on time. So it's unfair to blame those people for being 5 mins early for the reason you were late.

It's the blow by blow accounts on face book that make me most annoyed as you know they know where and when as they have documented the entire process of getting ready and you cab see the faffing evolve before your very eyes. Get off face book and WhatsApp and by ready ffs.

Can't you just factor in the inevitable lateness when meeting. Surely it's stupidity to expect them to be on time after 15 years of the behaviour.

“Any offers of advice come from wanting to help the person.”

Of course, but there’s no real understanding... I know someone who keeps telling me I should write everything in a calendar like she does. I’ve told her I do, I suspect she thinks I tried it once or something because what I haven’t done is expose quite how shit I am at functioning by going - I have two calendars, with everything duplicated, I put everything in my calendar in my phone and my laptop, with alarms, none of that had helped, so what am I supposed to do now?

“There is an underlying process in their thinking that decides who or what matters. If it costs them, they wouldn't keep being late.”

Except there’s quite a few people on here saying they are late for other things, that it does affect things like jobs...

I'm going to leave this thread for now as I need to get to work. I'm late starting work (I work from home).

Why? Partly because the internet went off last night. I phoned the company to get it back on, after the school run just now. I was put through to collections. They said my bill hadn't been paid. This is a surprise to me as everything is on direct debit, as I can't remember to pay bills reliably. As they're talking, I remember that the direct debit was automatically cancelled as I missed two payments earlier in the year. I've forgotten about it.

I asked why they didn't tell me. They say they did text me. I have no recollection of this. I look in my phone, I see they did text me on 20th April. Once I see the text I remember it, and also I see a text from my other half reminding me that we owe them money.

Until I'm on the phone talking to the person, or until I see these things with my own eyes, I have zero recollection of them, it's as if they didn't happen. When the internet went off, I didn't suspect for a second that it was due to non payment as I had no reason to suspect that, having not remembered about it.

The other things that's made me late is replying to this thread! But

a. I was annoyed by the sanctimonious, judgemental people who seem gleeful in sticking the boot into others who are really struggling

b. hopefully someone else reading this thinks - hang on, maybe I have ADHD, follows it up and start on a path to understanding themselves better.

Here's a Ted Talk for the ADHDers, this makes me smile -

Here's another great Ted Talk on ADHD:

See if I was finishing work at 5.30 in Canary Wharf - I would know that realistically I would not be in Carnaby Street by 6pm. That is obvious to me.

In order to achieve that, everything would need to run completely smoothly and exactly to plan. I would not expect that to happen.

I would be telling friend, I would be there at 6.15, but hopefully earlier.

At around 5pm I would be thinking of my exit strategy. I wouldn't be thinking about last minute emails at 5.20. Because I would know that doing that email, packing up and dealing with the faff of leaving the office (including lifts and conversations) would take me past 5.30. Lifts are always busy at that time on Friday. People often chat on the way out.

You only have yourself to blame here. Everything that happened was reasonably foreseeable and should have been factored in.

See if I was finishing work at 5.30 in Canary Wharf - I would know that realistically I would not be in Carnaby Street by 6pm. That is obvious to me.

Part of the problem with ADHD, for example, is poor ability to judge time. Just because you can do it easily, doesn't mean others can.

But it's a crazy stress for anyone to put themselves under.

I mean when coming off buses I would always have a meet time as an "around" time so not dead on and expecting delays.

But then I always deliberately over estimate how long it takes precisely so im.not stressed cos I can always go pop into a charity shop or grab a coffee in vetween arriving and time to meet.

It's not about guessing times surely?

If you do a journey often you know what to expect. You don't need to know exactly how long it takes you can just take the favt you know it's busy and difficult and then not leave things so tight? Arrange to meet at 6.30 instead . No need to worry about time at all then

Most of the population don't have ADHD though - I totally get that people with ADHD would struggle

Part of the problem with ADHD, for example, is poor ability to judge time. Just because you can do it easily, doesn't mean others can.

Do you ever judge it wrong the other way though? I'm actually terrible at judging how long things will take too but as a result I'm often places ridiculously early.

It's not about guessing times surely?

Yes, one of the reasons chronically late people are late, is because of being a poor judge of time.

But I'm more a leave loads of time and kill it at the other end person.

I don't so much worry about timings as going by memory as to how things are

Do you ever judge it wrong the other way though?

Not usually. I usually think a journey will take however long it's taken me at it's quickest. I don't realise I'm making this assumption when I make it. It becomes clear to me, however, when I'm waiting on a train that's taking longer than I factored in, and wishing I'd left more time.

Bit meetings after all say you know when you finish so you when surely done all the hard work by then? You know you finish at half five and the stress is more up to finishing work then? Is it really possible for it to go so wrong between work and the bus stop?

I agree that all the things in nakedavengers post were entirely foreseeable. It’s lack of planning, poor decisions and unrealistic expectations that made you late.

Most of the population don't have ADHD though

No, but many chronically late people do, and don't realise it. There are LOTS of undiagnosed adults with ADHD, especially women as it can present differently in women and men - but it was the classic male ADHD including hyperactivity that was seen as the standard so many women have fallen through the net.

Women often realise there's a problem - and feel we need to seek help - only after becoming mothers, as before that point we managed to muddle along just about - but then add in all the extra tasks and responsibilities that come with motherhood, plus the lack of sleep (which makes AHDH symptoms much worse) and suddenly it's a massive issue. Even then it can take a few years to realise the problem isn't that you're crap at motherhood, or that it isn't like this for every new parent, but that there's something deeper going on.

@Gottagetmoving of course. In hindsight I think it's fucking ridiculous that I thought that was acheiveable.

As I said, I'm a people pleaser and I have a job where I have to think of a million things at once. A text in the morning that says 'meet at 6 at x bar' will unfortunately get about 5 seconds of time to think and for me to text back. In that moment I think 'yeah no problems and I know Janet finishes at 5.30 nearby so I must make it work for her'. In the cold light of day it's not going to work and Janet would much prefer me saying '6.30 works best'. Even then as my job is unpredictable and relentless the same shit would happen just another half an hour later!

Also, the interrupters when trying to leave. I've tried being assertive 'sorry I can't stop' and I've had back 'I just need to check...' and I've been there for 5 minutes as some hugely important issue is thrown at me and I feel I have to help.

As someone below says. 10 minutes in a working day is a shit load of time for me. I rarely eat lunch, I often go for hours needing a wee, my standard day is 10-12 hours. 5.20 when in my head I need to leave at 5.30 is 10 minutes of crucial time when an email can be written and another thing is off my list. In that time I've forgotten the time I need to wee, shut down computer, pack away papers, pack bag and get out.

Im regularly late to work meetings for the same reason.

Yesterday in order to please someone I said I would be back from a work appointment at 1.30. The meeting I was at was scheduled until 1.30 and it was a 20 minute walk in between offices. It was inevitable I would be 20 minutes late which I was. They were pissed off.

I don't know why but in both instances the immediate need to make someone 'pleased' trumped that fact that I knew I'd promised something unachievable and they would be cross with me later for lateness.

Fuck. That's an insight into my behaviour I've never realised before

nake

What happens when people point it out to you? I mean of we were friends is assume I'd know what time you finished work and wjere you worked. So id probabky point out when we made the arrangements that it's cutting it fine so suggest an hour later? Do you just "fill" the extra time instead or does it make it easier ?