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?

I have ADHD and understand how things can feel painfully boring. I usually feel that in work meetings, boring conversations, situations where I'm finding it difficult to daydream or play on phone etc.

But, for you would playing on your phone, posting on Mumsnet, playing games on phone - would that not help with the boredom while you're waiting? I actually like just waiting somewhere because it gives me time to mess around on my phone without feeling guilty.

This is me all over! X

hilarious

I was always the one who planned well ahead, organised to within an inch of every minute always early ready to hang around so felt calm and ready for any delays to my route. Then I began to struggle and ended up as you describe deviantfeline eventually I couldn’t cope with the panic and things going wrong and longed to be the early organised person so I began to get organised again. It is difficult but I’m just about there now. It has been frightening, being in panic mode, when it was vital to be on time like catching a train or plane. It’s easier now because phones fill in the time so easily when I arrive early now and the opportunity to just have

My husband is like this but not for work… only for other things he doesn’t deem important like getting to friends house for lunch at certain time, getting child to activity on time etc. It really pisses me off as I’m the opposite and I want to scream! If I’m at work and he’s with DS, I leave a list or I’ll tell him before I leave -‘take his drink’, ‘here’s a spare set of clothes’ bla bla bla and he makes out I’m mad.. then rings me at work and says ‘ok so what do I need for DS?!’

I don’t understand and it infuriates me!

So if say, you have a doctors appointment you think it’s ‘curteous’ to arrive a few minutes late rather than either early or on the dot because you feel it’s more of a ‘clocking-on workers thing”? Try telling that to the doctor who you are now making run late and the patients after you because you have now made them late too. And that’s if you’re lucky. Most GPs will either turn you away and make you rebook your appointment if you’re too late or they will simply see other patients who bothered to actually arrive on time and didn’t turn up late simply because…. They see it as a ‘class thing’ and think the on the dot punctuality thing as a ‘clocking on workers thing’!

My take on this is that if he can do it for work he can do it in his home life!

I don’t think people who arrive early to meet a friend at a certain time count the time before the arranged meeting time as the entire waiting time and hold it against the other person do they? Nobody in this thread has said they do this. I can’t see anyone logically thinking this. Do people think this way? If I was to meet a friend for lunch at 1pm and I arrived at 12.45pm and my friend at 1.15pm, I would count her as 15 minutes late - not 30 minutes late! Even though I had been waiting for 30 minutes total, only 15 minutes of that 30 minutes would be waiting for her specifically.

The time people turn up to a single place or event they are supposed to be at a certain time is probably a perfect bell curve/natural distribution curve. The vast majority will arrive on time or a few minutes either side. At the extreme left and right tail ends, you will have people who are significantly early or significantly late. In fact the bell curve is probably skewed to the right (ever so slightly late) if the event is meeting a friend for lunch and skewed to the left (slightly early) if the event is having to catch a train that leaves at X time.

To address what other posters have said, of course if you are going round a friends house for dinner and they asked you to come round at a certain time, being early is quite bad-mannered because you are imposing on their free time and they are not expecting your company yet which can put them out. Apart from some people who are oblivious to this etiquette, I think most people instinctively know not to arrive absurdly early or even bang on time to the second (unless culture-specific) to something like a dinner party. I’d usually wait in the car or have a walk outside or pop to nearby shop until say ten mins after the expected time to be polite. Arriving early to a public cafe to meet someone is very different to arriving early at someone’s house. There’s so much unsaid etiquette and social norms in lots of different situations which you usually learn with time!

Do trains wait if they know you're not working class?

There are things you can't control and things you can. So, a walk to the station is generally under your control, a drive is not (traffic, parking etc). You need to build in a safety cushion of time on the uncontrollable factors so that, if everything goes to plan, will make you a little early. You can then fill up this extra time with the extras that contributed to you being late. Fix your makeup in the car or finish the email at the station.

Exactly. There’s no point making yourself late to leave the house by sitting on your bed to do your 10 minutes of daily Duolingo. Better to arrive 10 minutes early and do it on the platform whilst you’re waiting for your train! Free waiting-around time here and there is literally what scrolling Mumsenet is for!

That was in an episode of "To The Manor Born"

To be fair, if I was a train driver I'd wait for Penelope Keith.

It was Peter Bowles they waited for.

They did sometimes in rural areas in my childhood. 😆

My dh is like this with pretty much everything. I totally ignore it now and leave at the time I said we were going too.
We once spent a holiday waiting for him every morning in the car and I said never again.
I drove off so he's either out of breath and on time or I go regardless.

I think it's rude and assumes his time is more important than others. I do adore him so I'd never leave him over it but equally I don't pander or enable it.
For really important things I do usually add in ten minutes contingency but don't tell him!!

Erm, all doctors, wherever I've lived in Britain, in my 40 years' experience of GP appointments, see patients a minimum of thirty-five minutes after the appointment time.

This is what I don't quite understand. All of us here enjoy posting on Mumsnet. You can post on Mumsnet on a train platform.

I'm diagnosed with ADHD. I get serious panics about missing trains and planes. I don't sleep the night before a flight or train. I have a lot of nightmares about missing flights. I have actually missed flights before because I lose things.

I generally get to the station very early, because I factor in a lot of excess time for losing things.. Often it's still a panic but I have managed to avert several disasters by having excess time to deal with them. If I'm early then great, I have time to play games on my phone. I'm wasting time on my phone right now, I love wasting time on my phone.

Maybe on a train platform people get overwhelmed if it's too busy and noisy? So can't play on phone etc and then get bored?

I'm more likely to be late in social situations but I do still get very anxious about upsetting people. I really hate feeling like I'm holding people up, it makes me panic.

@EmeraldRoulette I've got 33 minutes between 8:57 and 9:30, haven't I? And I didn't get up off the sofa to leave, I got up to get ready to leave, thinking that brushing teeth, going for a wee, getting all the stuff I need packed in the car and the dog and myself out the door will take 20 minutes.

I 'm self employed and work from home, so I 'd have to try very hard to be late 😅 but of course everything I do that doesn't involve other people somehow takes longer than I think.

And I used to work in a doctors for quite a long time up until 5 years ago! More often than not, GPs would simply push late comers back and make them wait while they saw others that had arrived before them. If they were too late, they had to re book their appointment.

You just seem to be trying to justify why you think it’s ok for you to be late and keep everyone else waiting. Claiming it’s ’courteous’ to be a few minutes late is certainly something I’ve never come across or being taught before. Also trying to say people being punctual or late will depend on their ‘class’ is completely absurd! Punctual people are obviously ‘working class’ according to you! But you are allowed to be late because you are from an ‘upper/ middle class’ background!! That way of thinking is narcissism at its finest! I can’t take a word you say seriously anymore, sorry!

I'm often internet-diagnosed with ADHD. I'm unconvinced - it doesn't really matter at my age, anyway - but I definitely have lifelong issues that seem a rough match.

Similarly with dyspraxia. This is from the NHS:

If you have dyspraxia it may affect:

• your co-ordination, balance and movement - yeah, mine's a bit off
• how you learn new skills, think, and remember information at work and home - distinctly weird, my lecturers commented on it
• your daily living skills, such as dressing or preparing meals - awful, my executive dysfunction is legendary
• your ability to write, type, draw and grasp small objects - okay, actually
• how you function in social situations - no worse than most slightly awkward people
• how you deal with your emotions - okay, but needed lengthy therapy
• time management, planning and personal organisation skills - all day, every day, no matter what!

There's something glitchy in the way my brain processes 'spaces' - I'm terrible at judging distances, time spans and at visualising the order in which things happen. It is a disability. I've learned to live with it, but never succeeded in changing it.

On the plus side of this glitchy brain, I'm fantastic at seeing the big picture. I've got a suspicion this is because I visualise things happening all at once.

Social events, yes. Meetings start on time.

As long as they pay me for the earlier arrival, that's fine by me.

@PuggyPuggyPuggy oh I thought you were picking them up at 9.30 tonight after you posted the post I replied to! I was thinking you had a very busy day and night 😂

that post about class - the mind boggles.

I think it's definitely cultural and class is part of that.

The GP thing is, well, obviously we should all turn up on time to those, but I've never come across a GP surgery that doesn't make you wait at least half an hour after the arranged appointment time, so it doesn't really make sense to turn up on time. I do, in the hope that one day I'll be seen on time, but I often check in then wait in the cafe next door, popping round every 10-15 mins to see if they're ready yet.