An insight into the mindset of someone who is persistently late.

[deviantfeline]

There's always loads of posts on AIBU about people who hate those who are persistently late and how there no excuse for it. Also lots of people claiming 'time blindness' or inability to plan that causes it.

I'm often late. I hate it but my brain doesn't seem to be able to calculate periods of time in a way that means I can plan appropriately. Today was one of those even though I thought I totally had this. Reflecting on what went wrong here's a timeline.

I needed to get a train at 12pm to a meeting. They are once an hour and so couldn't miss it. I set an alarm at 11am that told me to go and get ready to leave for the station. It's a 3 minutes drive and a 2 minute walk from the car park. I know that at this time it's hard to get a parking spot so I factor in time to find one. I'll leave at 11.40 ish then. I spent the morning working from home.

11- alarm goes off. I think oh I've got loads of time and carry on working thinking I'll stop at 11.15 and get myself ready.
11.15 - think I'll finish the email I'm writing
11.23 - finish email and pack bag
Realise my make up and hair need a touch up and I've got loads of time so do that
11.32 - result. I'm done and ready to go with time to spare. This is easy! Find coat and shoes, locate car and door keys, put cups in dishwasher, find umbrella as it's now raining and my phone charger, kiss dog goodbye and give her a treat, lock up house.
Get in car. Somehow it's now 11.47?! How the hell did that happen? It was 11.32 wasn't it? Fuck fuck fuck.
11.52 - arrive at car park having had to stop at a zebra for 2 mins for loads of people crossing. Hadn't factored in the high street would busy as it's midday.
No car parks as predicted! Drive back up the street and finally find one. It's 11.58. Grab my stuff and sprint and get on the train as the doors are closing.

Despite my planning i screwed it up again. I've noticed that I have a time blindness for the time it takes between 'I'm ready' and actually going. In my mind that would take 30 seconds yet it somehow took 15 minutes?!

Its almost worse when I leave plenty time as my brain starts telling me I've got time to do other stuff rather then just leaving! Also I can't visualise the time passing since I looked at the time at 11.32 and getting in the car. That time seems to be the black spot for me to time manage with any ability.

Crisis only slightly averted but I'm soo cross with myself. So you 'on timers'. What would you have done differently and what was my biggest error?

@OneTC · Today 15:22

You're completely fine because the 'extremely painful wait' at the station is just made up self serving bullshit attempting to pathologise your basic lack of consideration and self centredness.

@Mumofnarnia · Today 15:32

I agree. If someone is unable to take into account traffic jams, lack of parking, accidents , road works because they simply cannot bear to wait at a train station I’d say they’re completely and utterly selfish, self centred and full of their own self importance. You made a great point about them not wanting to wait at a train station but don’t mind the train journey itself whilst also sitting around doing nothing!

I mean, what happens if they get to the station and have missed the train, they will still have to wait for another but then all of a sudden the wait doesn’t seem too ‘boring’ or ‘painful’ for them! As far as I’m concerned most people do this have a passive aggressive attitude of “I’ll get there when I feel like it, not when other people say I should get there”!

Have to agree with all of this. I do get a bit fed up of people making excuses for their lateness and flakiness. I have a so-called friend who is a bit like this. She isn't late too often, or if she is it's 15-20 minutes, but she just cancels like 1 in 2 of our meetings, because she has a 'crisis.' Her life is soooooo busy and hectic too, and there is always a fucking 'crisis!'

Involving one of her 4 adult DC (who seem to forever need her for something, even though they are 24 to 35 years old, and 2 have left home,) or one of her 2 grandkids need looking after (all of a sudden!,) or her great aunt needs her, or she's got a problem at her workplace at her part time job, or a neighbour needs a lift to hospital, or her husband isn't well, or her sister needs some meds from Boots and she needs to go to the GP to get the prescription...blah blah blah. 50% of the time, there is a bloody excuse for her to not meet me.

ALWAYS the day before too, or the same fucking day. I could have done something else with that day, but I kept it free for her. So THAT pisses me right off! I really need to start doing the same thing. I have even tried giving her a wide berth and not contacting her - in the hope of losing the friendship as I feel I am not getting anything from it anyway. But she keeps contacting me if I don't contact her.

Do your friends and family and employer know of your ND and accommodate you?

“I'm sure it's not hard for you to grasp that for many neurodivergences being overstimulated and overwhelmed can be neurologically painful.

The same can be true of being underestimated and underwhelmed.

It is emotionally dysregulating in the same way that being overstimulated is so often it isn't really a choice to go and do something while you wait but it becomes a need instead.”

But surely missing trains, interview opportunities, flights, concerts, events, losing jobs, friends, goodwill at work, getting to places rushed, flushed, sweaty, unprepared, forking out money for taxis, new flights etc. is a much more painful experience than the “pain” of waiting around on a train platform for an extra 10 or more 15 minutes? That’s the cost contingency most people give themselves to minimise the above incidents happening. Everyone makes a trade-off in life. You choose the pain you prefer. For the vast majority of people, the cost of all the above I just listed happening significantly outweighs the personal cost of waiting around aimlessly for a little bit. It’s a no-brainier. Most people are not going to want to risk being late to their dream job interview, their honeymoon flight, their best friends wedding just so they never have a single second of boredom before reaching their final destination that day! We instinctively make hundreds of mini cost/benefit analysis decisions every single day for events and tasks.

And when you mean “pain” do you mean discomfort or boredom? Because that’s a natural emotion and part of life. Waiting around for things is hardly a novel or uncommon experience. Surely the average NT or ND person has to spend several minutes waiting for lots of things each week? Waiting to be served in shops, queuing at the grocery check-out or post-office, waiting to pick kids up from school, waiting for the microwave to beep, waiting for everyone to join a Teams meeting etc. it’s a normal part of life in order to do tasks and participate in society!

Yup.

And i'm self-aware enough to know that as an introvert with anxiety, I wasn't really wanting to go anyway.

But some team members really want that kind of social event and were really upset by it and by the idea that they couldn't try to arrange another occasion without it potentially being extremely stressful and therefore, not enjoyable.

Trying to understand a late person is like trying to understand a thief or a liar, if you aren't one yourself you're not going to get your head round it.

I'd never go home or cut someone off for being late, I accept that some people are just fucking useless, but they've probably got some other quality that made me want to meet up with them in the first place.

Yes if I had a brain that could start and finish tasks and recognise an order of priority and manage time a little bit of pain or discomfort would make it worth while but the dysregulation of understimulation is just one component to executive dysfunction. And no I don't just mean boredom. I mean painful, like a really bad itch you can't scratch that just gets worse and drives you up the wall and you can't ignore it and it usually takes precedence in your mind. It's full on restlessness.

You are absolutely correct that many ND have to wait for lots of things every day and there's only so much energy someone can give to proactively selecting an order of priority for how daily tasks should go, when NT can take for granted the fact their brain can automate with general ease these thought and decision processes. Eventually something will give. Systems don't always work all of the time, and simply being told you should function does not make you function.

We instinctively make hundreds of mini cost/benefit analysis decisions every single day for events and tasks.

No, we don't all instinctively do this. Being able to instinctively do this is part of good executive functioning.

Yup.

I know I have an anxiety disorder (well, two) and a possible sleep disorder which I could potentially have diagnosed but I don't, because I also acknowledge that I am a mix of genes from my parents and heritage, my personality and my life experiences so i can't just say 'because anxiety'.

When people like that poster say ND 'can be painful' I can relate but also think I need to get over myself just get on and accept that the world around me isn't going to work or think the way that I would prefer and many, many people think and emotionally respond the way that I do but don't attempt to make the rest of the world 'work' like I do or give me grace when my expectations or desires don't allign with the rest of the world.

Misophonia is one, if it's a 'thing' or a diagnosis which it isn't as yet, I feel stressed to fuck with 'people sounds' like breathing, humming, sniffing, coughing etc but literally no-one likes it! no-one. The research around it says that - no-one likes it, it pisses people off - so at what point is it a neurological 'thing' and not just me being an intolerant or overly-sensitive asshole? I know for a fact that i'm more bothered by noises that other people aren't but that could just be me wanting a virtually silent world.

Where's the line between my personal preferences and how much other people should adjust? or I should be given preferential treatment?

Because i'm not currently, but I realise that the way I want things and my ideal world doesn't correlate with reality and even if I could, I shouldn't try to impose my ideal world on the world. Because it would be shit for most members of society.

@TheWildRosePlayer “Where's the line between my personal preferences and how much other people should adjust? or I should be given preferential treatment?”

I now can’t remember if I posted something up thread about this (brain attic). I was diagnosed with depression and anxiety in the days, long long ago, when it was something to be deeply ashamed of and kept hidden. I do have a lot of issues with executive function I suppose. I’d have done better in life without those problems. I have no idea if I’m ND or NT. I have misophonia, insomnia for 30+ years as well.

The feeling of “neurologically painful” as jimmy has described it is something I experience a lot.

At this moment I’m wanting to scream, physically explode etc. it’s not that rare a thing to feel.

But actually, my life has become harder since the world started to accommodate this sort of thing more. Obviously everyone has a different experience but for whatever reason it worked better for me when people mostly just had to crack on with stuff, including me. I have never disclosed any of this in a workplace.

It’s been a useful thread but not for the first time, I have come away from it wondering what I can or should tolerate in future. I am heartened to see how many posters feel the end result is the same with the late thing though. I can respect reasons but still decide to keep away from those situations and if I gave my extreme anxiety as a reason, it would be taken more seriously than if I said I was annoyed.

Excellent post - so very true

I've just got home from a day out. I see that I posted on this thread at 8:57am, which is odd because I could have sworn that I hit "post", jumped up off the sofa to get ready to go out, and checked the time - it was 10 to 9, I'm sure of it , but I have a chronic problem with numbers where I can't do simple calculations, I get numbers muddled up ( 2 and 5, 3 and 8; was it 32 or 23? or maybe 82? 58? something like that) 🤔so already, there was a mismatch between how much time I thought I had and how much time I actually had.

Anyway, in my head I've got 40 minutes until I have to pick up my parents at 9:30. They live 2 minutes away (literally, not in the sense of "it will only take 2 minutes" meaning it won't take long) Great, should take no more than 20 minutes, I will be early! Which would be nice because when I'm on time, they are not usually ready because they expect me to be late, and when I'm late, they say they were ready on time but have now started some little job or other. Just take my mug and plate into the kitchen, wash the couple of dishes, make my squash, fill the dog's water bottles, pack some bits (that are all lined up on the kitchen counter ready to go, because I'm no fool and I did that while I was making breakfast!). Brush teeth, multiple trips to car to put stuff in because I need my hands free to get the disabled dog out. When I get outside with the dog, it's 9:28 when I thought I'd be out of the house around 10 past. The dog takes a leisurely stroll up the road, and it takes until 9:44 for him to decide where to poo, and for us to get back and in the car. 9:46, I'm at my parents' house, and it's another 10 minutes before we leave - as I was late, they had time to go off and do this and that.

So where I am at the ripe old age of 45, is that I am organised enough to think that I'm on track to be early, and therefore manage to be less late than I would be if I was aiming to be just on time 🤷

Too much counterproductive jargon. As I said above:

1. Work backwards.
2. Plan for errors.
3. FOCUS.

Very interesting thread.

I've always wondered how the people who are always "punctual" do it, and... they don't, it is a lie. Noone is punctual as exactly on time, some people are just choosing to come very early.

And people who come very early are part of the problem, as they tend to count the whole waiting time (even the part they did totally voluntary) against people who are aiming for the agreed time and coming within a few minutes from the mark.

I am not even sure there were anything wrong in the OP's case. She planned with enough contingency that everything fit in, even totally unplanned things and she caught the train just fine. If something, it shows that starting insanely early doesn't help.

@PuggyPuggyPuggy ”Anyway, in my head I've got 40 minutes until I have to pick up my parents at 9:30.”

actually at the time of your post you have far more than that. I’m baffled by them being literally 2 minutes away but you think it will take 20. I’m wondering what your work set up is like.

@ZiriForGood I would never count any time I was early as waiting for someone and then hold that against them.

I don't think I would count the 'early' time as part of the waiting time. But obviously it's slightly annoying if someone is always 30 minutes late if one's is always either early or on time.

Work backwards + add 30 minutes

How on earth is getting somewhere early ‘part of the problem’ of someone being late??

For example, if I need to be in London which is a 2 hour journey for me. I will usually catch a much earlier train than I need to - so that I can allow for any train delays, cancellations, disruptions on the underground, walking from the underground station to the venue, getting lost (despite using google maps). If I’m there an hour early that’s great! I go sit in Costa, Starbucks or somewhere similar and simply relax with a coffee, then make my way to the venue and aim to be there around 10 minutes early - I’ve always been told that for my job it’s courteous to arrive slightly early than bang on time so that everyone can get started and get on with what they are supposed to be doing at the the time they were given to be there rather than be just arriving at that time! So I would say that yes I’m always punctual!
If someone else is then a ‘few minutes late’ it has an impact on everyone else. Ok a few minutes isn’t to bad - however if they are 20 - 30 minutes late it starts to become frustrating! I do NOT include their lateness in my 10 minutes early arrival time, I include their lateness from the time they should have been there!! So nice try but no, we don’t get there early and then get pissed because we got there early and are having to wait longer fgs!

I always thought it's impolite to arrive to things early and actually a few minutes late is the correct etiquette.

If I'm arranging meetings, I assume the first 2-5 minutes is for everyone to arrive and settle in, get comfortable, etc..

Depends what industry you work. For my job I’m usually given a time I need to be there for but it usually states somewhere in the email “please aim to arrive ten minutes early if possible so that we can get started on time”.

Im unsure who told you that arriving late is the correct etiquette

Being 10 minutes early for a bus which can easily run early is hardly being 'very early'. Its being on time with logical contingency.

Throwing yourself through the doors of the train as they close after sprinting through a traffic filled car park is NOT on time and is exceptionally dangerous.

These are the type that show up at the airport when the plane is taxing and yell at the poor workers for not letting them through when it 'hasn't left yet' because they are 'on time'.

There is no such thing as perfectly 'on time' because 'on time' is simply the absolute maximum last minute you should arrive, it is NOT the start point you should aim to be there for.

I'm in Germany.

Kids parties are generally held 3-6.

The first time we had one everyone waited outside & at exactly 3 the doorbell rang & all the kids were dropped off!

This and no I am not always punctual but If I am late its not my fault.

Completely untrue. If you're only able to be in the present, the present pain or discomfort is far worse than a distant potentiality.

the 1920's is on the phone, it wonders when you will be returning?

I think it's important to factor in the fact that not everyone has so much free time in their day that they can allow for random but frequent contingencies such as severe traffic delays, bus breakdowns, train cancellations, etc.. In my case, I usually have to rush from one appointment across town to another. No free hours to arrive early and hang out in Costa in!

I think it is a class thing — I'm from an upper-middle class background where this is the norm. The on-the-dot punctuality thing is more a clocking-on workers thing, no?

That is perfectly understandable and generally a valid reason. It’s when people DO have free time but still choose not to use it - as in op’s case, along with those who find it ‘boring’ and ‘painful’ to get to a train station early and wait and so instead decide to stay at home and start doing chores when most people would have been out the door, then seem to think it’s ok to be late, keep others waiting etc