May 5, 2025 • 47 mins
If you live with ADHD, you know that time management can be a challenge! — what seems like minutes actually turns into hours, and days disappear before you realize it.
In this episode, Renee shares how time blindness affects relationships in every part of life: from friendships and marriage to parenting, work, and school.
Losing track of time can create misunderstandings and frustrations. Time blindness shows up in multiple ways — learn practical strategies to strengthen your connections despite it.
Whether you’ve struggled with being late, missed deadlines, or forgotten plans, this episode will help you better understand yourself and communicate with the people you care about.
🕰️ Hear about:
• What time blindness is and why it’s common with ADHD• How it impacts friendships, romantic partners, coworkers, and family
• Tools and strategies to stay connected and reduce guilt
• Why self-compassion is key in ADHD relationships
💛 Share this episode with 2 friends who may enjoy it! 🔗 Text a link to your friends & family.
☑️ Don’t forget to leave a 5-star review to help more women with ADHD find this podcast and feel supported.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:29):
Hello, welcome to Inspiring Women with adhd.
I am Renee Allen, the host of this podcast, the only person
that puts on this podcast. If it's all coming from
my own brain, no input from anyone, so I guess host, creator,
whatever else, producer, and I'm excited to be here today.
My aim, the idea behind this is to learn
(00:52):
more about how to navigate life with ADHD for
women. Most of us, I think, are diagnosed in
adulthood, but there, I'm sure there are some who aren't but
just figuring out life, because even if you have known that
you've had it for a long time, you might not understand how it
affects your behavior or your tendencies, how your brain works.
(01:15):
And it's really helpful to understand that, to figure
things out and just see how things could maybe be better.
Put my glasses on. Oh, I think I'm wearing my other glasses
that I haven't worn on here yet. I like the color of them,
but I don't like the shape as much. But I need to clean them
off anyway, so today I'm going to talk
(01:36):
about time blindness. And it's interesting because when
I first learned about time blindness, and I hope that microphone
wasn't picking up that rubbing of the glasses so much.
Oh, that's why there. There's a. Okay, there's more of a glare
because these ones are more curved. I grabbed the wrong glasses
anyway. Ha ha ha. Discovery, huh? So time blindness,
(01:56):
it is a part of adhd. And until earlier this
year, I didn't even think I had an issue with time blindness.
I didn't think it was a problem for me.
I mean, maybe a little bit. Maybe. Maybe in
not giving myself enough time. I mean, actually, if I really
(02:16):
think about it, I know I've struggled with time for a long
time, but I thought for different reasons.
I didn't think it was a lack of awareness.
I thought it was more forgetting things or just people pleasing.
An example is if I was going to leave somewhere
to go somewhere, and my kids said, when are you going to be home?
And I'm thinking they want me to come home as soon
(02:40):
as I can. So I say to them, I should be home in
an hour and a half. Or I'd say that to my husband, you know,
I should be home in an hour and a half.
And that would be if everything turns out like I can
imagine in my mind, I'd be home in an hour and a half.
And it rarely, rarely was. And I didn't really notice
this, but my husband would say, you always come back
(03:02):
later. He wasn't upset by it. But he commented on it.
And I thought, I think it's because I know there's a range.
Like it might be an hour and a half or two hours or three hours
or whatever it is. But to make the person happy,
I'm shooting for the quickest amount of time.
And maybe they didn't even care. You know, instead of like three
(03:22):
hours, mom, why are you gonna be gone that long?
You know, I'm saying an hour and a half.
And it doesn't really happen. Things happen.
Traffic, party, wherever you are, goes longer.
Who even knows why? Why, you know, going grocery shopping or
something. And you just spend more time there.
Whatever it was, my time estimate was always off.
(03:43):
And when I thought about it, I thought, I actually do know
it could take a lot longer. And the reality,
it's not like I'm missing the mark so much.
It's more like I was just saying that to please those people.
And that could be one form of time
blindness if you really can't estimate it time or you're just
(04:06):
not figuring it out in your brain. Another way to
have time blindness is to just not recognize,
like, how much time you're spending.
If someone says, we need to be ready in 45 minutes and you
say, okay, and you do something for a couple more minutes
and all of a sudden 35 minutes have passed and you think, wait,
(04:27):
wait, wait, I haven't even put my makeup on yet.
That's where I've been noticing lately.
I have time blindness. Because I think, wait, how did
it just change from 6:30am to 8:15? Like, how,
how. Where did that time go? And it's just like, you
just can't see the time going by so fast.
(04:48):
And it can actually go both ways. So with adhd, it
can impact relationships. And that's what I want to talk about
mostly today is not just explaining all the kinds of time blindness,
but how it can impact relationships, because it can.
Some people could be upset with that, with you not being
able to gauge your time very well or being late or not being
(05:10):
able to commit to a time that you've committed to.
And there are different things, like, you know, just even being
distracted or just getting kind of soaked in into a
moment. But time blindness can either feel like time
is going by too quickly, like it's disappearing too quickly,
(05:30):
or it could be like, it's just like not an accurate
concept of time. It could be. Think of being in a.
In a classroom, you know, like algebra or something.
In high school, I remember one year I had Math.
It's not like I didn't. I actually. Math was my favorite, but.
But because it was the last class, if.
If I watched the clock, it would just seem like the longest class
(05:53):
ever. Like, oh, my goodness, the clock is not even moving.
And that's not true. The clock is moving.
But I didn't have a good, good concept of what
was really happening. Happening. Or just, you know, having
a hard time predicting how long things would take.
Like, you might have an idea in your mind.
(06:13):
I need to shower, get dressed, put makeup on, do
my hair, whatever those things are that you do in the morning.
You have an idea of how long it takes.
And I actually have no idea how long it takes.
I think in my mind, I think that the makeup and hair
part takes about 15 minutes. And I don't think I'm very accurate.
(06:35):
I don't think I'm very accurate at all.
And I really have no idea what the shower.
It's not like I take a long shower, but I've gotten a little
better at taking showers since I made the episode about the things
that we dread. I've tried to find ways that I
enjoy it more. So I don't go too long without showering, but
I really don't know how long it takes.
(06:55):
Probably not that long. But one of the reasons I don't like to
do it is because if my hair's wet, then it takes longer to get
ready because I have to comb out my hair and I
don't like using the blow dryer. I use it sometimes, but I just.
It's just another step. So all those steps, to me, just.
They do take a long time. And it adds to that,
(07:17):
that portion of getting ready in the morning.
So if you are habitually late in the morning, does
it have to do with you? Does it have to do with your children?
Does it have to do with when you wake up?
Does it have to do with not figuring out even the night before?
I remember going to Hawaii, Molokai, which is a
(07:37):
more. If you haven't been there, it's a more rural island than
you know. It doesn't have as many tourists and things.
And I was there because my uncle bought a condo.
My grandparents used to go there every single year for a couple
months. And one year I went to help my grandma after my
grandpa died. So at the end of my time there,
(07:58):
different cousins or my mom, different relatives came and
took a week to spend with grandma so that.
So that she could be okay, because she ended up having some
health problems once she got There. And the doctor said, you
either need to go home, back to California, or you need to have
somebody caring for you. So we all took turns being in Hawaii.
And she kept apologizing for. I'm so sorry that your
(08:22):
trip to Hawaii is, you know, taking care of me.
And I thought I would not be here. I, you know, there's no way
I'd leave my six kids at home if it didn't have a purpose like
this. I wouldn't just be doing it for fun.
It gave it. It gave me a reason to spend the money.
So I was, I was fine with it. I still was able to go out
to the swimming pool. I did kickboxing outside with a little
portable DVD player. I did all kinds of things.
(08:43):
I don't know if it was DVD or VHS back then, but anyway, so,
yeah, so in Hawaii. Oh, at the end of the
trip, the night before I left, I needed to take grandma's
car, which was just an old beat up Ford, something that
they bought. And I guess there's a lot of
(09:05):
cars that people pass down on these islands that it's like, I'm
never coming back. Anybody want this car?
It didn't have a second gear. You had to shift it and it
skipped second gear. So you had to get fast enough in first gearing
and they can go to third. So it was an adventure.
Fun, fun little car. But I had to drive from
whatever part of the island that we were at to the other end
(09:28):
of the island to the airport the next morning and the
night before. Over and over and over, I tried to
figure out we didn't have cell phones, we didn't have computers.
Well, I probably had a computer at home.
I didn't have a laptop or anything. I don't know how I was even
figuring this stuff out, but I was trying to estimate what time
(09:48):
I needed to get up, what time I needed to leave so that
I could get to the airport on time. It was a little
airport, but still I needed to be there on time to get to
my flight. And then the idea was the car stayed there and
my brother flew in a couple hours later.
And I left the key under the mat in the car and he found
(10:08):
the car and drove it back to Grandma.
So that's how it all worked out over and over the night before.
I remember just thinking, okay, so if it takes
this long to get there, I need to get up at this time,
I'll leave at this time, I'll get to the airport.
For some reason, I couldn't compute the Distance, the time
and the distance, the miles and the distance.
(10:30):
I'm usually good with that. But for some reason it wasn't making
sense. It wasn't making sense. It wasn't making sense.
And then finally it did make sense. And then I got up
on time, had my bag ready, ate. I didn't have a problem
getting ready at all. I didn't make myself leave any later than
I planned to the night before. But it wasn't long after
(10:51):
I got on the highway and was driving.
I think it was south. I don't know. I don't, I don't really don't.
It's hard to know in Hawaii because in California the sun sets
at the beach in the wet in the west, except in Santa Cruz because
you're actually on a crescent Monterey Bay.
But anyway. But most of the time the sun sets on the beach
in the west and you go to Hawaii and it can be north, south,
east, west, I'm not sure. But
(11:15):
as I was driving, I would see a sign that
would let me know how far away I was from the airport.
I wasn't anywhere near, near able to get
there on time to make it for that flight.
Like to have plenty of time. I thought, what did I do?
How did I miss the mark on this so much?
(11:36):
And I could tell, and I was trying not to go too fast, that
I could get a ticket but not to go the speed limit so
that I would be late. And I'm driving this car that doesn't
even go in second gear. And I'm driving just thinking, how did
I miss that? How did I miss that? And every time I'd see how
many miles it was to the airport, I'd think, oh no, no, no, no.
I get to the airport, thankfully it's a little parking lot.
(11:56):
I don't have to park far away or anything, grab my suitcase,
run into the airport. I get there to the check in counter.
It was just a little check in counter, but I get these disapproving
looks from the lady there, thinking there's no way.
Like, what do you, what are you thinking getting here?
I don't know what it was 10 minutes before the plane takes off,
(12:18):
15 minutes before, I don't know, something really close like
that. Like she's just like, they're already on the plane.
And I'm like, I know, but I'm here if it's possible.
I'm trying to be optimistic, like, but I'm here.
Is it possible for me, me to get on the plane?
And she's wanting to scold me. And so then I have to
do a real quick security. And it was like in
(12:39):
the movies, like in the Bodyguard or something
where Whitney Houston is like. Gets off the plane and then
she turns and she runs back to the plane because they're out
on the. Is it called the tarmac where they're out on that place
where the plane drives before it flies?
And so I didn't go in a gate. I just, you know,
(13:01):
like, I didn't go through a little tunnel to get on the plane.
I had to go on the tarmac. I think that's what
it's called. And then walk up the stairs to the plane.
And I had to run. It wasn't really close.
I had to run. I had to take my shoes off, my.
Whatever, flip flops or something I had for Hawaii.
And I just ran, ram, ram, ram, ram, ram.
Ran and got on there, you know, like.
(13:22):
Like it's supposed to leave in five minutes.
And I made it. I made it and got in the back
and they were saying, you're fine, you're fine.
They weren't as disapproving as the lady that checked me in,
but it was close. And the thing was, is
I tried to figure it out in my brain over and over the night
before. And I didn't realize because once
(13:45):
I thought I figured it out, I thought I figured it out.
I thought I allowed myself time to get there.
An hour and a half before maybe. I thought maybe an hour before
because I thought this little airport.
No, not even close. Not even close. Oh, yeah.
So do you ever overshoot under. Shoot?
I would think probably more. We have more tendency to
be late to arrive somewhere or to miss an appointment completely.
(14:09):
Like, wrong date, over planning, whatever.
So this obviously could affect us. It could
affect you, it could affect me. But it can also affect
our relationships. And I think that's where we need to.
Sorry, if you're watching my hand still up here, because I gotta
just. I just have to check every once in a while, just make sure
(14:30):
the sound's working. Because as I mentioned last week, it
wasn't recording the sound. It was a little discouraging, but.
Okay, put my arm back down. So how can it
affect our relationships? I feel like our relationships in
some ways teach us where our time blindness is.
(14:51):
Because when I was just on my own in
college, I had roommates and stuff, but I was independent.
I woke myself up, I went to class, I did
different things. It didn't affect anybody else but me.
And the only time I really remember spacing it in college was
arriving to a class plenty early, like 40 minutes
(15:14):
early. I just happened to have more time that day, or so
I thought. And it was a piano class where
it was one on one. I paid extra. I think I had
to pay a fee that semester. I did it a couple times until I couldn't
afford it anymore. But it was important to me that
I had paid for that lesson beyond tuition.
(15:34):
I had paid for that lesson. And I get there and I
hear the person playing the piano. Maybe I just arrived a half
hour early, but I just heard the person playing the piano
and just listened. And I sat on the floor because
I love sitting on the ground on the floor.
Sat on the floor outside that door and listened to the person
playing and the teacher talking to her.
(15:55):
And when that time was over, the person walked
out and I thought time for me to go in.
And the teacher said, you missed your class.
The other person playing got to stay for an extra half
hour because I wasn't there. And for some reason it
just shifted in my mind where my mind thought it was.
I was supposed to be there a different time where I just didn't
(16:19):
know. And I recently did that with booking the flight that I'm
going on tonight. I looked at all the flights.
I'm starting teaching. Actually it's not tonight.
See, there's already a time blindness.
It's hard to remember what day it is sometimes.
Okay, good thing because I'm not packed yet, but I'm partially
packed anyway. Tomorrow night I'm going on a trip.
I'm also starting teaching two new classes tomorrow for
(16:43):
the summer. Back to back classes in the afternoon.
So I'm thinking, okay, first class starts at 3:30.
It's hard for me when I sub classes, especially if they don't
start on the hour, like a 10 o'clock to 11.
I can remember that better. This one is 3:30 to 4
and then 4:15 to 5. So I knew that. But
(17:06):
there's a class I've said probably a dozen times and I still
don't know what time it starts unless I go and look at the
calendar because it's just not my usual thing.
So anyway, so I knew I was starting this class that day.
Thankfully aware of that. And then I wanted to book
my flight so that when I go to Arizona
I'm not missing teaching this class because I'm just starting
(17:29):
it. I want to not have to get subs or anything.
I'm coming in. I want them to get to know me.
I want to get to know Them. And so the idea is leave Thursday
night and get back Wednesday night so you don't miss
teaching those people. Yay. Good idea.
So I choose the evening flight. I choose an airport that's just
a half hour away. And I think this is great.
(17:52):
It is not until maybe two or three weeks later that I'm
looking and just kind of like putting, I think I was putting
some those classes in my calendar, Google Calendar, and
I bought an app that has reminders and things.
And so anyway, I was just setting it up in there and it
hit me that my flight was too early
(18:15):
to be able to teach both of those classes.
And I thought, really, really? And I wasn't sure, but looked
it up, sure enough, sure enough, I had planned my flight that,
that takes off like 57 minutes after my class
ends. So, so I'd have to teach the class,
the second class, say goodbye to people, whatever, and walk
(18:40):
out, drive to the airport. So it might
take me 45 minutes to do all that. And then the flight
would take off in 10 or 15 minutes. I'm just thinking, what did
I do? What did I do? So I talked to my husband and
I thought, well, that, that, that gym is a little bit closer
to the airport. Maybe I could get there more like 15, 20 minutes.
Maybe it's not a half hour like it is here.
(19:02):
You know, I wasn't sure I hadn't mapped it out.
So I told him, if you can pick me up from the
class, I don't have to come home. I can tell him this needs
to be a little bit earlier class. We'll end, you know, It'll
be a 35 minute class instead of a 45 minute.
I'm figuring out all the time in my head because I'm so
good at time. And so I was planning this
(19:24):
and I thought that way I don't miss teaching the class.
And after a couple days of running that by my husband, he's
way more practical and I don't think he's ever, ever late.
He said that's, that's not going to work.
That's just not going to work. And especially that time of day,
5 o'clock, when everyone's driving around and the lights are
all jammed up and you know, it might take you twice as long
(19:46):
to get to the airport. And he was right.
So I had to get us up for that class.
But I thought I had it figured out. And it's frustrating when
you really do try to take the time
to figure it out and you can't. How could that Affect a
friendship. How could that affect a friendship?
If you plan to meet somebody or be a part
(20:08):
of something or help them with an event and then it
doesn't work out, or you're really late, or you're not
able to stop at the store and get what you said you could or
whatever that can make that friend feel not like
they're not important. Like you don't respect their time.
(20:29):
And, and it can be discouraging. And, and, and we should
value everyone's time because they could be at home
getting things done or running another, another errand or whatever
it is they want to do with their time.
They probably don't want to sit and just wait for you.
And even just canceling things last minute, this is probably
(20:50):
something I'm not as good at. And I
don't know if I actually cancel last minute as much as I
want to reevaluate the timing of things.
You know, like, I'll make a plan and say, should we go to
dinner at 6:30? You know, everyone's just like, yeah, 6:30, 6:30,
whatever it is. And then as it gets closer that day,
(21:12):
I think, oh, I don't know if that's gonna work out.
Maybe we should do it. 7:30, maybe we should do this.
You know, is it still work with. So I always do the thing
where it's probably makes it look like I'm checking in with them
to see if it still works with them. Does it still work for you
to meet at this time? Because I want to give them the freedom
if it doesn't. Because it's hard for me to predict.
Even though I can look at my calendar, it's really hard to predict
(21:35):
how that day is going to go. And I hate being locked into
a schedule. But when you involve other people, you have
a schedule. And I found myself doing that a
lot with my family since we moved here.
That way when we plan things, you know, okay, then we'll eat
at 4 and then I'll think, does it work better for
people? Do you want to come? Like, I don't actually mind if they
(21:58):
say I actually can't be there till 4:30.
Does that work? I'm very easy going with changing the time, but
I also kind of want that flexibility for myself.
And for most people that doesn't work out.
And I'm, I'm learning that. And I'm realizing I need
to not try to change things around last minute.
(22:20):
I need to respect their time. If they ask me, if
they say, oh, I'm at this appointment, I'm not done.
Can we do this? 20 minutes later I'll say, sure, because I like
pushing things back, but I'm trying to not do
that to them, not shift things around because then, you know,
it kind of disrupts everyone's schedules.
(22:42):
So. And then this one, I don't think I
have a hard time with this. I keep saying that and then I do
that you might have a hard time with this.
I have friends and relatives who do, who have a hard
time staying in touch regularly, that someone else might
write to them or call them and leave a message.
(23:03):
And a week can pass by without even realizing that the time just
goes by, you know, like, oh, I've been so busy.
And I think as we get older we, we start to realize that
real life does happen and that does happen.
And especially if you have adhd. I'm more understanding, I think
of my friends and relatives with ADHD because I know
(23:23):
that can happen where it's just not on your radar.
You know, you might find out that somebody called when you're
in the middle of something else. You're in the line of the grocery
store, you say, oh, I missed this call, I need to call
him back. But then life picks up. You don't have a little
post it note there for yourself to say, call that person.
You might have an app where you could do that and that must might
be a good thing if it's really important.
(23:44):
But you know, opening an email, a text or something,
you might not see it later. It might get buried.
And I don't know how to take texts and make them so I'd
find them again later. I do know how to do that with emails.
You know, you just open the envelope back up and it'll show up
later. But most of the time when I think of texting
somebody back that I haven't, it's when I've finally turned
(24:07):
out all the lights, I'm laying on my bed, I've got the pillow
there and I'm trying to fall asleep.
And I think, oh my goodness, you didn't text that person back,
okay, I'll do that tomorrow. I don't remember the next day.
And I need a strategy for that. Maybe you have a
strategy for that. But a lot of times we remember the things
when our minds have calmed down, when things have settled down,
(24:28):
there's not as much going on. But that may not always be the
appropriate time for taking care of it.
And that might be hard for someone in your life to
have you not. Not remember. Yeah, we don't
want our friends to feel ignored or family members undervalued.
And it can also make them not believe in you or
(24:52):
trust your word or
even want to get together with you. I did have a friend
say that once. Not about me, but she said, I'm going to stop
inviting this person because they. They never come.
And I think, well, they're busy too.
Eventually they might. If you value their friendship, maybe they
will. But I get that too. You know, if that feels like a
(25:15):
rejection. Yeah. And then the hyper focus can be related to
time blindness, which is interesting because I understood what
hyper focusing was. I do that. You may do that too,
where you get into doing one thing and you just
want to do that one thing. You might be curious about it.
You might love doing it. You might just think, I want
(25:36):
to spend a lot of time with this. Or you just start, you know,
you go in a room to put a book away and you decide to reorganize
all the bookshelves. You know, that might be your hyper focus.
It's on a whim, but you're having so much fun with that.
And you can also do that with an interest that you
have with one friend where you hyper focus on that friendship
or that activity that you like to do with that
(25:58):
friend. We go walking every day. Let's, you know, do this and
maybe drift away from other friendships because you're
spending all your time with that person and it doesn't mean you
can't spend time with people. But just if.
If that is hurting a friendship, just being aware
of that and maybe seeing if you can find balance with that.
(26:19):
Also with romantic relationships, a husband, boyfriend, partner,
this could happen all the same reasons being late
when you say you're going to be somewhere.
My husband and I have been married for 37 years.
I don't really think he cares if I arrive late somewhere where
I agree to meet him. I don't think that bothers him.
(26:41):
It does bother him to be late. So if we're going to
ride somewhere together, drive somewhere together, he overshoots
when he needs to leave, and I undershoot it.
So he will come in sometimes and say, are you ready
to go? And it's like 45 minutes before we have.
We need to be there. And it takes 15 minutes to be there.
(27:03):
And I think, no, because we still have time.
I'm finishing this up, and then I'm gonna go finish my makeup
or something. I think he's doing that because he knows I can
make him late. We usually really. He'll just we'll
take separate cars if that's the case.
But he does overshoot it, and I feel that pressure.
I don't like the pressure, but, yeah, if you have
(27:25):
someone who wants you to leave on time, I.
I used to feel pressure from him, but I.
Well, just like when we were all going somewhere, you know,
all the kids are in the car. We're all going to go somewhere
when our kids were younger. And I would always need
to run around the house and do 10 more things, you know?
(27:46):
Or if you just go out to the car and then you, oh, I have everything,
but where's my phone? I have everything, but where's my.
Did I bring my water bottle? If you really need water all the
time. I do. So sometimes I would go out
to the car and then run back in, run back out, run back in, run
back out. Or sometimes I just spend a lot of
time in the house before we leave. And he'd be out
(28:09):
there with the car running. And it was a lot of pressure, like,
well, one, I don't like to waste money.
So it's like, oh, the gas. He's spending money on gas.
Like, why does he even start the car?
It's not like it was cold where we lived or anything, but he
just did it to get the kids in and get that part done and
told me he knew that I could function better if they were all
gone, if they were all in the car and I could
(28:31):
do what I needed to do, which I thought was so thoughtful.
And that was before I knew I had adhd.
And I thought that's really wonderful that he saw it that way
because it was helpful to me, and it was helpful for me to understand
that, because that pressure came off and maybe with reminding
me it's time to leave a half hour before we need to leave now,
we kind of. Recently it's been more like, what.
(28:53):
What time should we leave? Are we driving together or separately?
And sometimes I want to get there earlier if I need to get, you
know, get something done. But anyway, depending on where we're
going. But okay. Other things. Okay, I don't.
Well, I'm sorry. I lead everything with.
I don't do this. I probably do. So you can also
just forget important dates, like an anniversary, a birthday,
(29:18):
because your time frames
aren't actually there. You know, it's just not evident to you
what day it is, what month it is, what week it is.
You might really be good with holidays.
You might remember someone's birthday.
You might remember Mother's Day. I mean, this Even goes with.
With family relationships and stuff too.
(29:38):
I am a gift giver or a person, you know, like,
sends my mom and dad something on Mother's Day.
Father's Day. Not everybody does that or calls them up or
whatever. And the one time I forgot, I totally spaced.
And it's like, oh, my goodness, it's Mother's Day.
I called my mom and it was hard for her
because she was used to always getting something from me.
(29:58):
I said, you know, something will come in three days or whatever.
She's like, oh, you know. And it, it's making
me think, now what? Mother's Day's coming up.
I need to think about that. But, yeah, forgetting important dates
could be a part of time blindness or even just if you
(30:19):
divide what you do in the house. My husband and I don't really
do this. I mean, we've kind of both.
What do you call it? Gravitated. What's that word where you go
towards something and the things that he likes
to do and clean. The things that I like to do and clean.
And sometimes there's a crossover. But if you are dividing things
up and deciding, I'll take care of this, you take care
(30:40):
of that. And you're underestimating what a great
responsibility it is for them to do something compared to what
you are or whatever, I don't know if that could be a
problem. Or even with your children saying, okay, I want you
to clean the kitchen each night. I want you to clean the bathroom.
And with age, sometimes I would give the
(31:02):
older kids the responsibilities, like the kitchen and vacuuming,
or things that might take a little more attention to detail.
Where a younger child would get a spray bottle and a rag and
they can just wipe things off in the bathroom.
But we used to do that when our kids were younger, that every
night we would have family prayer, and after prayer, everyone
(31:23):
would go and do their cleanup thing.
And it was so nice because that was the last thing of the day.
And I'd always wake up to a clean house.
I'd always wake up to clean whatever room it was.
I had six kids, so it was helpful. Even the littlest child
can take a rag and wipe the floor or something.
So it was helpful. But. But this one is.
(31:44):
Is interesting because if you are hyper focusing on
something, you really are diving into a project.
You really do want to get this done.
You could be neglecting your relations.
You could be staying up so late doing something
where you're not getting any quality time together or any time
together. You know, you hardly see each Other because of that.
(32:07):
So just noticing, sometimes I need to
stop. Sometimes I need to just tell myself, I know
I finally got started on this. It's hard.
If you're not exhausted in the evening and you're just getting
that momentum and you need to spend that time
(32:27):
with that person, then you need to, you need to make
some choices. You need to, to recognize that, that you need
to manage your time, to value the relationship too.
And that's all individual for sure. But.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And then if you have
a job or whether you're working in an office,
(32:50):
a school, wherever, on the road, whatever
it is, any of those work responsibilities, you could
miss deadlines. You could underestimate how long something will
take. Sure, I'll get this done. You know, over committing, I
can get all this done and then you don't or you forget or whatever.
(33:13):
But over committing any of that stuff is
hard in a job because you need
to complete things in a timely manner.
You need to have, you may have deadlines, maybe not every job
does, but if you have deadlines or if you need to know what
day something happens and then you're not aware of it, that can
(33:34):
be a problem. And even for me, teaching yoga, I.
I missed a few classes a few times and had to develop my
post IT note system. And that was before I knew I had adhd
and just get out a post it note and write on it with a
Sharpie and just put it in probably two places where I
could see it when I walked through the house.
(33:55):
Because sometimes I could wake up in the morning and I don't
know if you do this, but you wake up in the morning and you know
what day it is, you know what you need to do and something shifts
in your brain. And it's not even. I didn't
realize it was 4 o'clock. It's more like I didn't even
realize that today I needed to do this.
And so you just completely flake on something.
(34:19):
So. Yeah, yeah. And if you, if you're
your supervisor, your boss, your team that you
work with, if that causes problems for them, then that can
be a problem for me. The one time that I completely forgot
about this one class at a yoga studio.
Thankfully, the woman who taught right before me saw that I wasn't
(34:41):
arriving, had time, and she just rolled with it.
She just pretended like she was planning to teach the class,
like, oh, everyone's here, let's go ahead and teach.
And she taught it. And she may have thought, oh, what if Renee's
coming Late. But the owner of the studio was
not very happy with me at all. The fact that somebody stepped
(35:02):
in and took care of it wasn't appeasing for her.
It didn't make her any happier. But it really taught me a
lesson, like you've got to be careful.
You can't rely on your own brain. You can't at all.
So yeah, you don't want your reputation to be that you're somebody
who's not going to remember. Or it can be I'm
somebody who's not going to be remembered, but I need a lot of
(35:23):
tools to help me remember. It could be that.
So yeah. Oh yeah. Being, being
a mom too, with children, school, everything.
Losing track of time. Waiting too late to eat
dinner, but it's not too late. But then kids are going to get
to bed later and then they're cranky or just having a harder
(35:47):
time falling asleep, and then they have a harder time the next
day. Things that you do can affect them.
Or even just forgetting to turn in a permission slip.
I don't even know if they do paper permission slips anymore,
if it's all through email or whatever.
But I, I missed a lot of those things.
And it could be hard for kids or forgetting to bring their lunch,
(36:09):
or forgetting to pack a lunch, any of those things.
You know, if you, if you lose track of time, you make them late.
It's hard. In fact, I always think it's probably pretty rare
for a child who's late to school, especially if they're little,
to have it be their fault. If they're in high school, I can totally
see it. But when a teacher recognizes a
(36:33):
child is tardy, it's probably the parent's fault, it's probably
whoever brought them's fault. But maybe not, maybe not.
I'm sure there are instances where it could be the kids too.
But yeah, it can mess up a lot of things with
school if, if you're in school as a student, if
you're younger, in middle school, high school, or in
(36:54):
college, not as young in college if you don't
have a good idea of how long it'll take to get something done,
or you're late to class or late to a group
study session or something like that, cramming last minute, all
those things can affect you physically.
They could affect your grade. For getting due dates, knowing
(37:17):
the due date, and going to class and forgetting to turn it in.
My son did that a lot. It can be really hard.
So what can you do? What can you do?
I think anytime that you can see. I have
time blindness in this. Anytime you can have an awareness and
see it, you might already recognize one or two things
(37:38):
you do. Now you might be raising your hand like, yeah, I do that
too, to a lot of these. But as you start to
recognize more of how this applies to other
people in your life, it can help you be aware
of it and maybe prevent it. Like, if you have a tendency to
cancel something last minute or to do five more things before
(38:00):
you leave because it's too early to leave, tell yourself it's
not too early to leave. Go ahead and get in the car
and get there a little early. Or, you know, you just get
there on time. Don't do five more things.
That is, I think, the very, very typical thing of I don't need
to leave yet, so I'm gonna go do something else.
I'm gonna go switch the laundry. And then you get in there.
(38:22):
Oh, there's some things I need to hang up from the dryer, from
the washer that I don't want to go in the dryer.
All those little things. Oh, and there's the trash.
I need to take the trash out. All those things that you might
need to do the last minute. And if you have kids, 100%, you can
have a diaper that's last minute. They need a diaper.
Or their face, you know, they ate something in their face.
Is messy. A lot of times when we are are estimating
(38:45):
what time we have to leave, we're estimating that on optimal
conditions. Optimal what? What time do I need to
leave to get there at that time that's with no traffic or
if there is traffic, estimating that.
But what about the optimal conditions in the parking lot or
when it's time to leave, if you have children, if you might
(39:07):
need a little more time because one's having a meltdown or they
can't find their socks or something.
So trying to gauge time not on optimal conditions,
but on realistic possibilities and maybe bringing
something. I mean, now we have cell phones, so it's not like
we can't be entertained. You can download an episode of the podcast,
you know, if you don't have cell coverage, you can always download
(39:29):
things to your phone. Even music that you can listen to if
you don't have Internet, or you can just sit, close your eyes
and breathe for a few seconds. But you don't want to be late.
But if you arrive early, it's not like we get as bored as we
might be. Otherwise you might get up and around or something
out of Your car before the person comes or use the bathroom or
something. It's not always a scary thing being early.
(39:50):
Speaking of time, I need to teach a class in 40 minutes, so
I'm aware. Yay. Well, for half a second, I
wasn't. I was thinking I was flying away tonight, but anyway.
Yeah. So it can have an emotional impact
if. If you feel bad that you're the one
that's. Like, if you feel like you're letting other people down,
(40:12):
if you feel bad that you're not keeping your commitments or you
don't like being seen as selfish or lazy or careless
or whatever it is. It's not like you're trying to do
this to other people and. And that. That can
be hard to think that you are. But I think conversations are
(40:33):
really important if you have communication with people.
And part of me thinks everyone doesn't want to hear me say, oh,
that's because of my adhd. Oh, yeah, I'm really sorry I did
that. But that's because of my adhd.
But I think it is helpful because everyone has their things,
right, Whether they have a mental health condition
(40:56):
or. I mean, not everyone has a mental health condition for
sure, but a lot of people do. Like, they might have anxiety,
but they don't have adhd, or they might just be more
introverted and not understand why is everybody else so happy
to be with people? But I'm not. Everyone has their things of
the way they are. And if there's a way to
(41:17):
have a conversation where it doesn't just sound like you're giving
a lot of excuses because that's what people think.
Not everyone, but some people do. But there might be
more compassion there, and it might help you be
aware of their. Their reaction to it, and it just
(41:37):
might help your relationship more. As I say, my.
My son just came home for call from.
From college. My mouth's getting dry.
But I noticed him doing this when
he was there. But I thought, I get it.
It's my tendency too, you know, where he'd plan something
(41:57):
and he'd have kind of a hard time. Like, what.
What time? If we want to do this tomorrow?
And then we want to go. Want to go kayaking, then we want
to swim in the pool, and then I have to fly out,
so we have to drive to Orlando. I had to take him to Orlando
to go to the airport. It was a farther airport, so we were figuring
that out together. And we were trying to give the
(42:19):
optimal time of getting as much sleep as he
could without getting up too early. But Also having enough time
to do things, and he didn't wake up in
time to do that or. Or at least to give himself enough time to
do things because he's not always aware of time once he is
up. So anyway, so yeah, I just
(42:42):
saw him do that kind of thing a few times.
Like, you know, I gotta eat some breakfast first or whatever.
And I thought I'd want to do that too.
I'd want to shift the time parameters around if I could.
Because I think sometimes I like to live life where I can
do things when it feels right and when I feel like
I'm ready to do it. And that feels better for me,
(43:05):
but that doesn't work for everybody else.
And just seeing him do it, I thought, I
can identify with that. I know why he's doing it, and
I know that I do it in my own way too.
So I had more compassion for him, but I saw that it didn't
(43:25):
work for everybody else. And, yeah, I think just
observing, even observing other people in your life, other people
who don't estimate time well, or value your time
in your life, that it affects you. And sometimes seeing that
is really helpful because then you start to see, do I do
(43:47):
that yet? And how do I do that? Because I really didn't know
my. I knew my son did this, but I didn't know why.
I didn't know he had ADHD when he was still in high school.
And, you know, like, we need to leave at this time.
You need to come in and eat breakfast.
You know, it's time to go. It's time to go.
Okay, I will, I will. And then. And in my
(44:09):
idea, like, if you don't give yourself time enough for breakfast,
you either go without. I mean, not that I want him to go
without in high school, but, like, for myself, I would either
just go without or grab something and eat it on the
way. But he wanted to sit down and eat it, and then
he wanted to brush his teeth afterwards.
And I'm like, you can't. You have to skip steps.
You have to skip steps. If you haven't.
(44:30):
If you haven't given yourself enough time, you have to streamline
the steps and, you know, do the. Pull the hair
back or whatever it is, the steps that women might have, maybe
men do too. Pull the hair back. But anyway, I think that'll
be it for today. Thank you for being here.
Thank you for being here.
(44:51):
And if you need any other tips, I mean,
I think I mentioned them throughout.
It's just, you know, a timer, a reminder,
a calendar, something you can look at.
I like the written things and I like the.
The digital things. I like a combination where I can see it
(45:12):
on the wall. I can see. Oh, that's where I have to go.
That's what I have to do. So, anyway, thank you, thank you,
thank you. I will be back in a couple
days. I'm not really, but I'm recording this early,
so. Yeah. Time blindness. Do you have it?
(45:32):
If you do, is there anything you can do about it?
Even if they're just tiny little improvements, it's good, it's
good, good, good to make improvements in life because it'll make
your life a little bit less stressful and be nicer for other
people. So thank you so much and feel
free to contact me if you want, whether through email or through
(45:55):
my website. I do have an Instagram account inspiring women with
adhd. I think it has the with in there if you want to
DM me, if you ever want to send a message or something.
I. I love getting emails from people and hearing how either
my podcast or my newsletter resonates with people.
I try to give tips in there if I can, and just let
(46:16):
us know we're all in this together. So thank you so much.
Bye.
Open windows Broken shadow
Frozen dreams are left for tomorrow
(46:55):
Rewind like run out of time to sing
melodies and harmonies I'm cut short
the silence of sound has yet been found but
not by me.
Hello, welcome to Inspiring Women with adhd.
I am Renee Allen, the host of this podcast, the only person
that puts on this podcast. If it's all coming from
my own brain, no input from anyone, so I guess host, creator,
whatever else, producer, and I'm excited to be here today.
My aim, the idea behind this is to learn
(00:52):
more about how to navigate life with ADHD for
women. Most of us, I think, are diagnosed in
adulthood, but there, I'm sure there are some who aren't but
just figuring out life, because even if you have known that
you've had it for a long time, you might not understand how it
affects your behavior or your tendencies, how your brain works.
(01:15):
And it's really helpful to understand that, to figure
things out and just see how things could maybe be better.
Put my glasses on. Oh, I think I'm wearing my other glasses
that I haven't worn on here yet. I like the color of them,
but I don't like the shape as much. But I need to clean them
off anyway, so today I'm going to talk
(01:36):
about time blindness. And it's interesting because when
I first learned about time blindness, and I hope that microphone
wasn't picking up that rubbing of the glasses so much.
Oh, that's why there. There's a. Okay, there's more of a glare
because these ones are more curved. I grabbed the wrong glasses
anyway. Ha ha ha. Discovery, huh? So time blindness,
(01:56):
it is a part of adhd. And until earlier this
year, I didn't even think I had an issue with time blindness.
I didn't think it was a problem for me.
I mean, maybe a little bit. Maybe. Maybe in
not giving myself enough time. I mean, actually, if I really
(02:16):
think about it, I know I've struggled with time for a long
time, but I thought for different reasons.
I didn't think it was a lack of awareness.
I thought it was more forgetting things or just people pleasing.
An example is if I was going to leave somewhere
to go somewhere, and my kids said, when are you going to be home?
And I'm thinking they want me to come home as soon
(02:40):
as I can. So I say to them, I should be home in
an hour and a half. Or I'd say that to my husband, you know,
I should be home in an hour and a half.
And that would be if everything turns out like I can
imagine in my mind, I'd be home in an hour and a half.
And it rarely, rarely was. And I didn't really notice
this, but my husband would say, you always come back
(03:02):
later. He wasn't upset by it. But he commented on it.
And I thought, I think it's because I know there's a range.
Like it might be an hour and a half or two hours or three hours
or whatever it is. But to make the person happy,
I'm shooting for the quickest amount of time.
And maybe they didn't even care. You know, instead of like three
(03:22):
hours, mom, why are you gonna be gone that long?
You know, I'm saying an hour and a half.
And it doesn't really happen. Things happen.
Traffic, party, wherever you are, goes longer.
Who even knows why? Why, you know, going grocery shopping or
something. And you just spend more time there.
Whatever it was, my time estimate was always off.
(03:43):
And when I thought about it, I thought, I actually do know
it could take a lot longer. And the reality,
it's not like I'm missing the mark so much.
It's more like I was just saying that to please those people.
And that could be one form of time
blindness if you really can't estimate it time or you're just
(04:06):
not figuring it out in your brain. Another way to
have time blindness is to just not recognize,
like, how much time you're spending.
If someone says, we need to be ready in 45 minutes and you
say, okay, and you do something for a couple more minutes
and all of a sudden 35 minutes have passed and you think, wait,
(04:27):
wait, wait, I haven't even put my makeup on yet.
That's where I've been noticing lately.
I have time blindness. Because I think, wait, how did
it just change from 6:30am to 8:15? Like, how,
how. Where did that time go? And it's just like, you
just can't see the time going by so fast.
(04:48):
And it can actually go both ways. So with adhd, it
can impact relationships. And that's what I want to talk about
mostly today is not just explaining all the kinds of time blindness,
but how it can impact relationships, because it can.
Some people could be upset with that, with you not being
able to gauge your time very well or being late or not being
(05:10):
able to commit to a time that you've committed to.
And there are different things, like, you know, just even being
distracted or just getting kind of soaked in into a
moment. But time blindness can either feel like time
is going by too quickly, like it's disappearing too quickly,
(05:30):
or it could be like, it's just like not an accurate
concept of time. It could be. Think of being in a.
In a classroom, you know, like algebra or something.
In high school, I remember one year I had Math.
It's not like I didn't. I actually. Math was my favorite, but.
But because it was the last class, if.
If I watched the clock, it would just seem like the longest class
(05:53):
ever. Like, oh, my goodness, the clock is not even moving.
And that's not true. The clock is moving.
But I didn't have a good, good concept of what
was really happening. Happening. Or just, you know, having
a hard time predicting how long things would take.
Like, you might have an idea in your mind.
(06:13):
I need to shower, get dressed, put makeup on, do
my hair, whatever those things are that you do in the morning.
You have an idea of how long it takes.
And I actually have no idea how long it takes.
I think in my mind, I think that the makeup and hair
part takes about 15 minutes. And I don't think I'm very accurate.
(06:35):
I don't think I'm very accurate at all.
And I really have no idea what the shower.
It's not like I take a long shower, but I've gotten a little
better at taking showers since I made the episode about the things
that we dread. I've tried to find ways that I
enjoy it more. So I don't go too long without showering, but
I really don't know how long it takes.
(06:55):
Probably not that long. But one of the reasons I don't like to
do it is because if my hair's wet, then it takes longer to get
ready because I have to comb out my hair and I
don't like using the blow dryer. I use it sometimes, but I just.
It's just another step. So all those steps, to me, just.
They do take a long time. And it adds to that,
(07:17):
that portion of getting ready in the morning.
So if you are habitually late in the morning, does
it have to do with you? Does it have to do with your children?
Does it have to do with when you wake up?
Does it have to do with not figuring out even the night before?
I remember going to Hawaii, Molokai, which is a
(07:37):
more. If you haven't been there, it's a more rural island than
you know. It doesn't have as many tourists and things.
And I was there because my uncle bought a condo.
My grandparents used to go there every single year for a couple
months. And one year I went to help my grandma after my
grandpa died. So at the end of my time there,
(07:58):
different cousins or my mom, different relatives came and
took a week to spend with grandma so that.
So that she could be okay, because she ended up having some
health problems once she got There. And the doctor said, you
either need to go home, back to California, or you need to have
somebody caring for you. So we all took turns being in Hawaii.
And she kept apologizing for. I'm so sorry that your
(08:22):
trip to Hawaii is, you know, taking care of me.
And I thought I would not be here. I, you know, there's no way
I'd leave my six kids at home if it didn't have a purpose like
this. I wouldn't just be doing it for fun.
It gave it. It gave me a reason to spend the money.
So I was, I was fine with it. I still was able to go out
to the swimming pool. I did kickboxing outside with a little
portable DVD player. I did all kinds of things.
(08:43):
I don't know if it was DVD or VHS back then, but anyway, so,
yeah, so in Hawaii. Oh, at the end of the
trip, the night before I left, I needed to take grandma's
car, which was just an old beat up Ford, something that
they bought. And I guess there's a lot of
(09:05):
cars that people pass down on these islands that it's like, I'm
never coming back. Anybody want this car?
It didn't have a second gear. You had to shift it and it
skipped second gear. So you had to get fast enough in first gearing
and they can go to third. So it was an adventure.
Fun, fun little car. But I had to drive from
whatever part of the island that we were at to the other end
(09:28):
of the island to the airport the next morning and the
night before. Over and over and over, I tried to
figure out we didn't have cell phones, we didn't have computers.
Well, I probably had a computer at home.
I didn't have a laptop or anything. I don't know how I was even
figuring this stuff out, but I was trying to estimate what time
(09:48):
I needed to get up, what time I needed to leave so that
I could get to the airport on time. It was a little
airport, but still I needed to be there on time to get to
my flight. And then the idea was the car stayed there and
my brother flew in a couple hours later.
And I left the key under the mat in the car and he found
(10:08):
the car and drove it back to Grandma.
So that's how it all worked out over and over the night before.
I remember just thinking, okay, so if it takes
this long to get there, I need to get up at this time,
I'll leave at this time, I'll get to the airport.
For some reason, I couldn't compute the Distance, the time
and the distance, the miles and the distance.
(10:30):
I'm usually good with that. But for some reason it wasn't making
sense. It wasn't making sense. It wasn't making sense.
And then finally it did make sense. And then I got up
on time, had my bag ready, ate. I didn't have a problem
getting ready at all. I didn't make myself leave any later than
I planned to the night before. But it wasn't long after
(10:51):
I got on the highway and was driving.
I think it was south. I don't know. I don't, I don't really don't.
It's hard to know in Hawaii because in California the sun sets
at the beach in the wet in the west, except in Santa Cruz because
you're actually on a crescent Monterey Bay.
But anyway. But most of the time the sun sets on the beach
in the west and you go to Hawaii and it can be north, south,
east, west, I'm not sure. But
(11:15):
as I was driving, I would see a sign that
would let me know how far away I was from the airport.
I wasn't anywhere near, near able to get
there on time to make it for that flight.
Like to have plenty of time. I thought, what did I do?
How did I miss the mark on this so much?
(11:36):
And I could tell, and I was trying not to go too fast, that
I could get a ticket but not to go the speed limit so
that I would be late. And I'm driving this car that doesn't
even go in second gear. And I'm driving just thinking, how did
I miss that? How did I miss that? And every time I'd see how
many miles it was to the airport, I'd think, oh no, no, no, no.
I get to the airport, thankfully it's a little parking lot.
(11:56):
I don't have to park far away or anything, grab my suitcase,
run into the airport. I get there to the check in counter.
It was just a little check in counter, but I get these disapproving
looks from the lady there, thinking there's no way.
Like, what do you, what are you thinking getting here?
I don't know what it was 10 minutes before the plane takes off,
(12:18):
15 minutes before, I don't know, something really close like
that. Like she's just like, they're already on the plane.
And I'm like, I know, but I'm here if it's possible.
I'm trying to be optimistic, like, but I'm here.
Is it possible for me, me to get on the plane?
And she's wanting to scold me. And so then I have to
do a real quick security. And it was like in
(12:39):
the movies, like in the Bodyguard or something
where Whitney Houston is like. Gets off the plane and then
she turns and she runs back to the plane because they're out
on the. Is it called the tarmac where they're out on that place
where the plane drives before it flies?
And so I didn't go in a gate. I just, you know,
(13:01):
like, I didn't go through a little tunnel to get on the plane.
I had to go on the tarmac. I think that's what
it's called. And then walk up the stairs to the plane.
And I had to run. It wasn't really close.
I had to run. I had to take my shoes off, my.
Whatever, flip flops or something I had for Hawaii.
And I just ran, ram, ram, ram, ram, ram.
Ran and got on there, you know, like.
(13:22):
Like it's supposed to leave in five minutes.
And I made it. I made it and got in the back
and they were saying, you're fine, you're fine.
They weren't as disapproving as the lady that checked me in,
but it was close. And the thing was, is
I tried to figure it out in my brain over and over the night
before. And I didn't realize because once
(13:45):
I thought I figured it out, I thought I figured it out.
I thought I allowed myself time to get there.
An hour and a half before maybe. I thought maybe an hour before
because I thought this little airport.
No, not even close. Not even close. Oh, yeah.
So do you ever overshoot under. Shoot?
I would think probably more. We have more tendency to
be late to arrive somewhere or to miss an appointment completely.
(14:09):
Like, wrong date, over planning, whatever.
So this obviously could affect us. It could
affect you, it could affect me. But it can also affect
our relationships. And I think that's where we need to.
Sorry, if you're watching my hand still up here, because I gotta
just. I just have to check every once in a while, just make sure
(14:30):
the sound's working. Because as I mentioned last week, it
wasn't recording the sound. It was a little discouraging, but.
Okay, put my arm back down. So how can it
affect our relationships? I feel like our relationships in
some ways teach us where our time blindness is.
(14:51):
Because when I was just on my own in
college, I had roommates and stuff, but I was independent.
I woke myself up, I went to class, I did
different things. It didn't affect anybody else but me.
And the only time I really remember spacing it in college was
arriving to a class plenty early, like 40 minutes
(15:14):
early. I just happened to have more time that day, or so
I thought. And it was a piano class where
it was one on one. I paid extra. I think I had
to pay a fee that semester. I did it a couple times until I couldn't
afford it anymore. But it was important to me that
I had paid for that lesson beyond tuition.
(15:34):
I had paid for that lesson. And I get there and I
hear the person playing the piano. Maybe I just arrived a half
hour early, but I just heard the person playing the piano
and just listened. And I sat on the floor because
I love sitting on the ground on the floor.
Sat on the floor outside that door and listened to the person
playing and the teacher talking to her.
(15:55):
And when that time was over, the person walked
out and I thought time for me to go in.
And the teacher said, you missed your class.
The other person playing got to stay for an extra half
hour because I wasn't there. And for some reason it
just shifted in my mind where my mind thought it was.
I was supposed to be there a different time where I just didn't
(16:19):
know. And I recently did that with booking the flight that I'm
going on tonight. I looked at all the flights.
I'm starting teaching. Actually it's not tonight.
See, there's already a time blindness.
It's hard to remember what day it is sometimes.
Okay, good thing because I'm not packed yet, but I'm partially
packed anyway. Tomorrow night I'm going on a trip.
I'm also starting teaching two new classes tomorrow for
(16:43):
the summer. Back to back classes in the afternoon.
So I'm thinking, okay, first class starts at 3:30.
It's hard for me when I sub classes, especially if they don't
start on the hour, like a 10 o'clock to 11.
I can remember that better. This one is 3:30 to 4
and then 4:15 to 5. So I knew that. But
(17:06):
there's a class I've said probably a dozen times and I still
don't know what time it starts unless I go and look at the
calendar because it's just not my usual thing.
So anyway, so I knew I was starting this class that day.
Thankfully aware of that. And then I wanted to book
my flight so that when I go to Arizona
I'm not missing teaching this class because I'm just starting
(17:29):
it. I want to not have to get subs or anything.
I'm coming in. I want them to get to know me.
I want to get to know Them. And so the idea is leave Thursday
night and get back Wednesday night so you don't miss
teaching those people. Yay. Good idea.
So I choose the evening flight. I choose an airport that's just
a half hour away. And I think this is great.
(17:52):
It is not until maybe two or three weeks later that I'm
looking and just kind of like putting, I think I was putting
some those classes in my calendar, Google Calendar, and
I bought an app that has reminders and things.
And so anyway, I was just setting it up in there and it
hit me that my flight was too early
(18:15):
to be able to teach both of those classes.
And I thought, really, really? And I wasn't sure, but looked
it up, sure enough, sure enough, I had planned my flight that,
that takes off like 57 minutes after my class
ends. So, so I'd have to teach the class,
the second class, say goodbye to people, whatever, and walk
(18:40):
out, drive to the airport. So it might
take me 45 minutes to do all that. And then the flight
would take off in 10 or 15 minutes. I'm just thinking, what did
I do? What did I do? So I talked to my husband and
I thought, well, that, that, that gym is a little bit closer
to the airport. Maybe I could get there more like 15, 20 minutes.
Maybe it's not a half hour like it is here.
(19:02):
You know, I wasn't sure I hadn't mapped it out.
So I told him, if you can pick me up from the
class, I don't have to come home. I can tell him this needs
to be a little bit earlier class. We'll end, you know, It'll
be a 35 minute class instead of a 45 minute.
I'm figuring out all the time in my head because I'm so
good at time. And so I was planning this
(19:24):
and I thought that way I don't miss teaching the class.
And after a couple days of running that by my husband, he's
way more practical and I don't think he's ever, ever late.
He said that's, that's not going to work.
That's just not going to work. And especially that time of day,
5 o'clock, when everyone's driving around and the lights are
all jammed up and you know, it might take you twice as long
(19:46):
to get to the airport. And he was right.
So I had to get us up for that class.
But I thought I had it figured out. And it's frustrating when
you really do try to take the time
to figure it out and you can't. How could that Affect a
friendship. How could that affect a friendship?
If you plan to meet somebody or be a part
(20:08):
of something or help them with an event and then it
doesn't work out, or you're really late, or you're not
able to stop at the store and get what you said you could or
whatever that can make that friend feel not like
they're not important. Like you don't respect their time.
(20:29):
And, and it can be discouraging. And, and, and we should
value everyone's time because they could be at home
getting things done or running another, another errand or whatever
it is they want to do with their time.
They probably don't want to sit and just wait for you.
And even just canceling things last minute, this is probably
(20:50):
something I'm not as good at. And I
don't know if I actually cancel last minute as much as I
want to reevaluate the timing of things.
You know, like, I'll make a plan and say, should we go to
dinner at 6:30? You know, everyone's just like, yeah, 6:30, 6:30,
whatever it is. And then as it gets closer that day,
(21:12):
I think, oh, I don't know if that's gonna work out.
Maybe we should do it. 7:30, maybe we should do this.
You know, is it still work with. So I always do the thing
where it's probably makes it look like I'm checking in with them
to see if it still works with them. Does it still work for you
to meet at this time? Because I want to give them the freedom
if it doesn't. Because it's hard for me to predict.
Even though I can look at my calendar, it's really hard to predict
(21:35):
how that day is going to go. And I hate being locked into
a schedule. But when you involve other people, you have
a schedule. And I found myself doing that a
lot with my family since we moved here.
That way when we plan things, you know, okay, then we'll eat
at 4 and then I'll think, does it work better for
people? Do you want to come? Like, I don't actually mind if they
(21:58):
say I actually can't be there till 4:30.
Does that work? I'm very easy going with changing the time, but
I also kind of want that flexibility for myself.
And for most people that doesn't work out.
And I'm, I'm learning that. And I'm realizing I need
to not try to change things around last minute.
(22:20):
I need to respect their time. If they ask me, if
they say, oh, I'm at this appointment, I'm not done.
Can we do this? 20 minutes later I'll say, sure, because I like
pushing things back, but I'm trying to not do
that to them, not shift things around because then, you know,
it kind of disrupts everyone's schedules.
(22:42):
So. And then this one, I don't think I
have a hard time with this. I keep saying that and then I do
that you might have a hard time with this.
I have friends and relatives who do, who have a hard
time staying in touch regularly, that someone else might
write to them or call them and leave a message.
(23:03):
And a week can pass by without even realizing that the time just
goes by, you know, like, oh, I've been so busy.
And I think as we get older we, we start to realize that
real life does happen and that does happen.
And especially if you have adhd. I'm more understanding, I think
of my friends and relatives with ADHD because I know
(23:23):
that can happen where it's just not on your radar.
You know, you might find out that somebody called when you're
in the middle of something else. You're in the line of the grocery
store, you say, oh, I missed this call, I need to call
him back. But then life picks up. You don't have a little
post it note there for yourself to say, call that person.
You might have an app where you could do that and that must might
be a good thing if it's really important.
(23:44):
But you know, opening an email, a text or something,
you might not see it later. It might get buried.
And I don't know how to take texts and make them so I'd
find them again later. I do know how to do that with emails.
You know, you just open the envelope back up and it'll show up
later. But most of the time when I think of texting
somebody back that I haven't, it's when I've finally turned
(24:07):
out all the lights, I'm laying on my bed, I've got the pillow
there and I'm trying to fall asleep.
And I think, oh my goodness, you didn't text that person back,
okay, I'll do that tomorrow. I don't remember the next day.
And I need a strategy for that. Maybe you have a
strategy for that. But a lot of times we remember the things
when our minds have calmed down, when things have settled down,
(24:28):
there's not as much going on. But that may not always be the
appropriate time for taking care of it.
And that might be hard for someone in your life to
have you not. Not remember. Yeah, we don't
want our friends to feel ignored or family members undervalued.
And it can also make them not believe in you or
(24:52):
trust your word or
even want to get together with you. I did have a friend
say that once. Not about me, but she said, I'm going to stop
inviting this person because they. They never come.
And I think, well, they're busy too.
Eventually they might. If you value their friendship, maybe they
will. But I get that too. You know, if that feels like a
(25:15):
rejection. Yeah. And then the hyper focus can be related to
time blindness, which is interesting because I understood what
hyper focusing was. I do that. You may do that too,
where you get into doing one thing and you just
want to do that one thing. You might be curious about it.
You might love doing it. You might just think, I want
(25:36):
to spend a lot of time with this. Or you just start, you know,
you go in a room to put a book away and you decide to reorganize
all the bookshelves. You know, that might be your hyper focus.
It's on a whim, but you're having so much fun with that.
And you can also do that with an interest that you
have with one friend where you hyper focus on that friendship
or that activity that you like to do with that
(25:58):
friend. We go walking every day. Let's, you know, do this and
maybe drift away from other friendships because you're
spending all your time with that person and it doesn't mean you
can't spend time with people. But just if.
If that is hurting a friendship, just being aware
of that and maybe seeing if you can find balance with that.
(26:19):
Also with romantic relationships, a husband, boyfriend, partner,
this could happen all the same reasons being late
when you say you're going to be somewhere.
My husband and I have been married for 37 years.
I don't really think he cares if I arrive late somewhere where
I agree to meet him. I don't think that bothers him.
(26:41):
It does bother him to be late. So if we're going to
ride somewhere together, drive somewhere together, he overshoots
when he needs to leave, and I undershoot it.
So he will come in sometimes and say, are you ready
to go? And it's like 45 minutes before we have.
We need to be there. And it takes 15 minutes to be there.
(27:03):
And I think, no, because we still have time.
I'm finishing this up, and then I'm gonna go finish my makeup
or something. I think he's doing that because he knows I can
make him late. We usually really. He'll just we'll
take separate cars if that's the case.
But he does overshoot it, and I feel that pressure.
I don't like the pressure, but, yeah, if you have
(27:25):
someone who wants you to leave on time, I.
I used to feel pressure from him, but I.
Well, just like when we were all going somewhere, you know,
all the kids are in the car. We're all going to go somewhere
when our kids were younger. And I would always need
to run around the house and do 10 more things, you know?
(27:46):
Or if you just go out to the car and then you, oh, I have everything,
but where's my phone? I have everything, but where's my.
Did I bring my water bottle? If you really need water all the
time. I do. So sometimes I would go out
to the car and then run back in, run back out, run back in, run
back out. Or sometimes I just spend a lot of
time in the house before we leave. And he'd be out
(28:09):
there with the car running. And it was a lot of pressure, like,
well, one, I don't like to waste money.
So it's like, oh, the gas. He's spending money on gas.
Like, why does he even start the car?
It's not like it was cold where we lived or anything, but he
just did it to get the kids in and get that part done and
told me he knew that I could function better if they were all
gone, if they were all in the car and I could
(28:31):
do what I needed to do, which I thought was so thoughtful.
And that was before I knew I had adhd.
And I thought that's really wonderful that he saw it that way
because it was helpful to me, and it was helpful for me to understand
that, because that pressure came off and maybe with reminding
me it's time to leave a half hour before we need to leave now,
we kind of. Recently it's been more like, what.
(28:53):
What time should we leave? Are we driving together or separately?
And sometimes I want to get there earlier if I need to get, you
know, get something done. But anyway, depending on where we're
going. But okay. Other things. Okay, I don't.
Well, I'm sorry. I lead everything with.
I don't do this. I probably do. So you can also
just forget important dates, like an anniversary, a birthday,
(29:18):
because your time frames
aren't actually there. You know, it's just not evident to you
what day it is, what month it is, what week it is.
You might really be good with holidays.
You might remember someone's birthday.
You might remember Mother's Day. I mean, this Even goes with.
With family relationships and stuff too.
(29:38):
I am a gift giver or a person, you know, like,
sends my mom and dad something on Mother's Day.
Father's Day. Not everybody does that or calls them up or
whatever. And the one time I forgot, I totally spaced.
And it's like, oh, my goodness, it's Mother's Day.
I called my mom and it was hard for her
because she was used to always getting something from me.
(29:58):
I said, you know, something will come in three days or whatever.
She's like, oh, you know. And it, it's making
me think, now what? Mother's Day's coming up.
I need to think about that. But, yeah, forgetting important dates
could be a part of time blindness or even just if you
(30:19):
divide what you do in the house. My husband and I don't really
do this. I mean, we've kind of both.
What do you call it? Gravitated. What's that word where you go
towards something and the things that he likes
to do and clean. The things that I like to do and clean.
And sometimes there's a crossover. But if you are dividing things
up and deciding, I'll take care of this, you take care
(30:40):
of that. And you're underestimating what a great
responsibility it is for them to do something compared to what
you are or whatever, I don't know if that could be a
problem. Or even with your children saying, okay, I want you
to clean the kitchen each night. I want you to clean the bathroom.
And with age, sometimes I would give the
(31:02):
older kids the responsibilities, like the kitchen and vacuuming,
or things that might take a little more attention to detail.
Where a younger child would get a spray bottle and a rag and
they can just wipe things off in the bathroom.
But we used to do that when our kids were younger, that every
night we would have family prayer, and after prayer, everyone
(31:23):
would go and do their cleanup thing.
And it was so nice because that was the last thing of the day.
And I'd always wake up to a clean house.
I'd always wake up to clean whatever room it was.
I had six kids, so it was helpful. Even the littlest child
can take a rag and wipe the floor or something.
So it was helpful. But. But this one is.
(31:44):
Is interesting because if you are hyper focusing on
something, you really are diving into a project.
You really do want to get this done.
You could be neglecting your relations.
You could be staying up so late doing something
where you're not getting any quality time together or any time
together. You know, you hardly see each Other because of that.
(32:07):
So just noticing, sometimes I need to
stop. Sometimes I need to just tell myself, I know
I finally got started on this. It's hard.
If you're not exhausted in the evening and you're just getting
that momentum and you need to spend that time
(32:27):
with that person, then you need to, you need to make
some choices. You need to, to recognize that, that you need
to manage your time, to value the relationship too.
And that's all individual for sure. But.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And then if you have
a job or whether you're working in an office,
(32:50):
a school, wherever, on the road, whatever
it is, any of those work responsibilities, you could
miss deadlines. You could underestimate how long something will
take. Sure, I'll get this done. You know, over committing, I
can get all this done and then you don't or you forget or whatever.
(33:13):
But over committing any of that stuff is
hard in a job because you need
to complete things in a timely manner.
You need to have, you may have deadlines, maybe not every job
does, but if you have deadlines or if you need to know what
day something happens and then you're not aware of it, that can
(33:34):
be a problem. And even for me, teaching yoga, I.
I missed a few classes a few times and had to develop my
post IT note system. And that was before I knew I had adhd
and just get out a post it note and write on it with a
Sharpie and just put it in probably two places where I
could see it when I walked through the house.
(33:55):
Because sometimes I could wake up in the morning and I don't
know if you do this, but you wake up in the morning and you know
what day it is, you know what you need to do and something shifts
in your brain. And it's not even. I didn't
realize it was 4 o'clock. It's more like I didn't even
realize that today I needed to do this.
And so you just completely flake on something.
(34:19):
So. Yeah, yeah. And if you, if you're
your supervisor, your boss, your team that you
work with, if that causes problems for them, then that can
be a problem for me. The one time that I completely forgot
about this one class at a yoga studio.
Thankfully, the woman who taught right before me saw that I wasn't
(34:41):
arriving, had time, and she just rolled with it.
She just pretended like she was planning to teach the class,
like, oh, everyone's here, let's go ahead and teach.
And she taught it. And she may have thought, oh, what if Renee's
coming Late. But the owner of the studio was
not very happy with me at all. The fact that somebody stepped
(35:02):
in and took care of it wasn't appeasing for her.
It didn't make her any happier. But it really taught me a
lesson, like you've got to be careful.
You can't rely on your own brain. You can't at all.
So yeah, you don't want your reputation to be that you're somebody
who's not going to remember. Or it can be I'm
somebody who's not going to be remembered, but I need a lot of
(35:23):
tools to help me remember. It could be that.
So yeah. Oh yeah. Being, being
a mom too, with children, school, everything.
Losing track of time. Waiting too late to eat
dinner, but it's not too late. But then kids are going to get
to bed later and then they're cranky or just having a harder
(35:47):
time falling asleep, and then they have a harder time the next
day. Things that you do can affect them.
Or even just forgetting to turn in a permission slip.
I don't even know if they do paper permission slips anymore,
if it's all through email or whatever.
But I, I missed a lot of those things.
And it could be hard for kids or forgetting to bring their lunch,
(36:09):
or forgetting to pack a lunch, any of those things.
You know, if you, if you lose track of time, you make them late.
It's hard. In fact, I always think it's probably pretty rare
for a child who's late to school, especially if they're little,
to have it be their fault. If they're in high school, I can totally
see it. But when a teacher recognizes a
(36:33):
child is tardy, it's probably the parent's fault, it's probably
whoever brought them's fault. But maybe not, maybe not.
I'm sure there are instances where it could be the kids too.
But yeah, it can mess up a lot of things with
school if, if you're in school as a student, if
you're younger, in middle school, high school, or in
(36:54):
college, not as young in college if you don't
have a good idea of how long it'll take to get something done,
or you're late to class or late to a group
study session or something like that, cramming last minute, all
those things can affect you physically.
They could affect your grade. For getting due dates, knowing
(37:17):
the due date, and going to class and forgetting to turn it in.
My son did that a lot. It can be really hard.
So what can you do? What can you do?
I think anytime that you can see. I have
time blindness in this. Anytime you can have an awareness and
see it, you might already recognize one or two things
(37:38):
you do. Now you might be raising your hand like, yeah, I do that
too, to a lot of these. But as you start to
recognize more of how this applies to other
people in your life, it can help you be aware
of it and maybe prevent it. Like, if you have a tendency to
cancel something last minute or to do five more things before
(38:00):
you leave because it's too early to leave, tell yourself it's
not too early to leave. Go ahead and get in the car
and get there a little early. Or, you know, you just get
there on time. Don't do five more things.
That is, I think, the very, very typical thing of I don't need
to leave yet, so I'm gonna go do something else.
I'm gonna go switch the laundry. And then you get in there.
(38:22):
Oh, there's some things I need to hang up from the dryer, from
the washer that I don't want to go in the dryer.
All those little things. Oh, and there's the trash.
I need to take the trash out. All those things that you might
need to do the last minute. And if you have kids, 100%, you can
have a diaper that's last minute. They need a diaper.
Or their face, you know, they ate something in their face.
Is messy. A lot of times when we are are estimating
(38:45):
what time we have to leave, we're estimating that on optimal
conditions. Optimal what? What time do I need to
leave to get there at that time that's with no traffic or
if there is traffic, estimating that.
But what about the optimal conditions in the parking lot or
when it's time to leave, if you have children, if you might
(39:07):
need a little more time because one's having a meltdown or they
can't find their socks or something.
So trying to gauge time not on optimal conditions,
but on realistic possibilities and maybe bringing
something. I mean, now we have cell phones, so it's not like
we can't be entertained. You can download an episode of the podcast,
you know, if you don't have cell coverage, you can always download
(39:29):
things to your phone. Even music that you can listen to if
you don't have Internet, or you can just sit, close your eyes
and breathe for a few seconds. But you don't want to be late.
But if you arrive early, it's not like we get as bored as we
might be. Otherwise you might get up and around or something
out of Your car before the person comes or use the bathroom or
something. It's not always a scary thing being early.
(39:50):
Speaking of time, I need to teach a class in 40 minutes, so
I'm aware. Yay. Well, for half a second, I
wasn't. I was thinking I was flying away tonight, but anyway.
Yeah. So it can have an emotional impact
if. If you feel bad that you're the one
that's. Like, if you feel like you're letting other people down,
(40:12):
if you feel bad that you're not keeping your commitments or you
don't like being seen as selfish or lazy or careless
or whatever it is. It's not like you're trying to do
this to other people and. And that. That can
be hard to think that you are. But I think conversations are
(40:33):
really important if you have communication with people.
And part of me thinks everyone doesn't want to hear me say, oh,
that's because of my adhd. Oh, yeah, I'm really sorry I did
that. But that's because of my adhd.
But I think it is helpful because everyone has their things,
right, Whether they have a mental health condition
(40:56):
or. I mean, not everyone has a mental health condition for
sure, but a lot of people do. Like, they might have anxiety,
but they don't have adhd, or they might just be more
introverted and not understand why is everybody else so happy
to be with people? But I'm not. Everyone has their things of
the way they are. And if there's a way to
(41:17):
have a conversation where it doesn't just sound like you're giving
a lot of excuses because that's what people think.
Not everyone, but some people do. But there might be
more compassion there, and it might help you be
aware of their. Their reaction to it, and it just
(41:37):
might help your relationship more. As I say, my.
My son just came home for call from.
From college. My mouth's getting dry.
But I noticed him doing this when
he was there. But I thought, I get it.
It's my tendency too, you know, where he'd plan something
(41:57):
and he'd have kind of a hard time. Like, what.
What time? If we want to do this tomorrow?
And then we want to go. Want to go kayaking, then we want
to swim in the pool, and then I have to fly out,
so we have to drive to Orlando. I had to take him to Orlando
to go to the airport. It was a farther airport, so we were figuring
that out together. And we were trying to give the
(42:19):
optimal time of getting as much sleep as he
could without getting up too early. But Also having enough time
to do things, and he didn't wake up in
time to do that or. Or at least to give himself enough time to
do things because he's not always aware of time once he is
up. So anyway, so yeah, I just
(42:42):
saw him do that kind of thing a few times.
Like, you know, I gotta eat some breakfast first or whatever.
And I thought I'd want to do that too.
I'd want to shift the time parameters around if I could.
Because I think sometimes I like to live life where I can
do things when it feels right and when I feel like
I'm ready to do it. And that feels better for me,
(43:05):
but that doesn't work for everybody else.
And just seeing him do it, I thought, I
can identify with that. I know why he's doing it, and
I know that I do it in my own way too.
So I had more compassion for him, but I saw that it didn't
(43:25):
work for everybody else. And, yeah, I think just
observing, even observing other people in your life, other people
who don't estimate time well, or value your time
in your life, that it affects you. And sometimes seeing that
is really helpful because then you start to see, do I do
(43:47):
that yet? And how do I do that? Because I really didn't know
my. I knew my son did this, but I didn't know why.
I didn't know he had ADHD when he was still in high school.
And, you know, like, we need to leave at this time.
You need to come in and eat breakfast.
You know, it's time to go. It's time to go.
Okay, I will, I will. And then. And in my
(44:09):
idea, like, if you don't give yourself time enough for breakfast,
you either go without. I mean, not that I want him to go
without in high school, but, like, for myself, I would either
just go without or grab something and eat it on the
way. But he wanted to sit down and eat it, and then
he wanted to brush his teeth afterwards.
And I'm like, you can't. You have to skip steps.
You have to skip steps. If you haven't.
(44:30):
If you haven't given yourself enough time, you have to streamline
the steps and, you know, do the. Pull the hair
back or whatever it is, the steps that women might have, maybe
men do too. Pull the hair back. But anyway, I think that'll
be it for today. Thank you for being here.
Thank you for being here.
(44:51):
And if you need any other tips, I mean,
I think I mentioned them throughout.
It's just, you know, a timer, a reminder,
a calendar, something you can look at.
I like the written things and I like the.
The digital things. I like a combination where I can see it
(45:12):
on the wall. I can see. Oh, that's where I have to go.
That's what I have to do. So, anyway, thank you, thank you,
thank you. I will be back in a couple
days. I'm not really, but I'm recording this early,
so. Yeah. Time blindness. Do you have it?
(45:32):
If you do, is there anything you can do about it?
Even if they're just tiny little improvements, it's good, it's
good, good, good to make improvements in life because it'll make
your life a little bit less stressful and be nicer for other
people. So thank you so much and feel
free to contact me if you want, whether through email or through
(45:55):
my website. I do have an Instagram account inspiring women with
adhd. I think it has the with in there if you want to
DM me, if you ever want to send a message or something.
I. I love getting emails from people and hearing how either
my podcast or my newsletter resonates with people.
I try to give tips in there if I can, and just let
(46:16):
us know we're all in this together. So thank you so much.
Bye.
Open windows Broken shadow
Frozen dreams are left for tomorrow
(46:55):
Rewind like run out of time to sing
melodies and harmonies I'm cut short
the silence of sound has yet been found but
not by me.
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