Yes. Lots and lots of timers. I have mechanical timers, electronic timers on my appliance, and now my phone does timers. I sometimes use all three types.
I set timers for things like that, too. And if i don’t, i fuck up. Being able to set a gazillion timers and alerts on my phone has been life-changing.
On one of the Airline shows, the guy would have been on time if he could have used the airport’s valet service. And if they didn’t close the door 20 minutes before flight. Everything was everyone else’s fault. In the end, he admitted that the problem was that he knew he should have gotten up 30 minutes earlier … but he didn’t want to so he didn’t.
Hawaiian airlines once delayed a plane a few minutes at my request because my husband, who didn’t have TSA pre, was stuck in the security line. But I’ve never missed a flight. I have cut it pretty close.
I’m starting to thing the laters don’t know how clocks work.
We planned to leave at 6:30 because she (Mrs Cad) had to be at a meeting at 8:00 and it is a 90 minute drive. BUT not leaving any slack time was not the issue, the drive did take only 90 minutes. The issue was she was ready at 6:45. Not lying here: she did not understand why she was 15 minutes late when the drive took the exact time as expected.
She is probably used to everyone padding times to offset her habitual lateness. Being only 15 minutes after the scheduled time may have felt like she did well getting out quickly.
And sometimes I still burn the rice.
I’m not really habitually late but I emphathiize with those who are.
I bought a fancy Pixel watch so I could remember everything and set timers for everything and the damned thing barely vibrates when it’s supposed to go off. I managed to find a backdoor to make it chime for certain things but at least half the time the alert fails to register.
I’m usually on time, or early, because I have anxiety about being late. But if I have no hard and fast time I need to be somewhere I usually arrive later than I wanted to.
I think what people don’t understand about executive function is that you don’t get to decide what your brain cares about. Your brain, not you, decides what’s important. I have this problem especially with prioritization; something relatively unimportant can be experienced as urgent. It happens all the time for me posting here. I’m so bad at prioritization that I eventually just stopped prioritizing tasks altogether. I just write a list and do the first thing on it, then the second, etc.
I’m not talking about this in theoretical terms, I’m talking about it neuroscientifically. ADHD is in part the inability to control what you pay attention to and when you pay attention to it. I first encountered this explanation in Smart But Stuck: Emotions in Teens and Adults with ADHD and it’s supported by classic neuroscience works like Descartes’ Error that demonstrate how critical emotion is to reasoning and executive function. In someone with ADHD, the emotional prioritization system is all out of whack. Things that should feel more important don’t. And for me, I can spend what feels like five minutes, look up and see an hour has passed. Time blindness is a common and known issue. Now that’s not sufficient? Enter hyperfixation, a trance-like state of extreme focus that makes it difficult to process sound or in my case even vibration half the time.
Most people enjoy a reasonable degree of control over what their brain does. Neurotypical people are in the driver’s seat of their own executive function. They get to decide what they care about and their brain magically acts based on that.
Others are not that lucky.
I got my ass beat countless times for not processing audio prompts - trust me, if I could control it, I would have!
Most people I know are embarrassed to be late. They shouldn’t be shamed on top of it. But there are always assholes that just don’t care. The problem is you really can’t tell which is the case unless you know someone really well. Maybe what appears to be nonchalance is shame so deep they can’t even acknowledge it.
And if someone who was always late were apologetic and at least acknowledge their lateness affects others that would be one thing. But in my experience people who are habitually late do not have a disability; they have a Fuck You attitude because the world needs to revolve around their convenience. AND they do absolutely nothing to change their behavior because why should they? You need to work your schedule around them.
I don’t think it’s so much that people don’t understand that. I think it’s much more a matter of people disagreeing that executive function is the only possible reason for habitual lateness and that sometimes late people “want everything.” Let me explain - I have no idea why anybody in this thread is late beyond what they say is the reason, and I am perfectly willing to accept whatever they say. But there’s a hint of “everyone who is habitually late has a problem with executive function” and also some of “people with problems with executive function can’t help anything about themselves”. It may be that neither you nor anyone else in this thread gets upset when you are told to be somewhere at 7:15 and when you arrive at 7:25 you have to wait because the real meeting time is 7:30 - but those people exist. It might be that no one in this thread has ever said " You nagged me to hurry up and get ready but I’m standing here like an asshole waiting for you to put your shoes on" - but those people exist. I understand the concept of executive function just fine - but I don’t understand why people with those problems with make time-dependent plans with other people. By “want everything” I’m referring to people in my life who would get upset when people wouldn’t make time dependent plans with them - sure , I’ll meet them at the bar Friday night or invite them to my BBQ Saturday because it doesn’t really matter when they show. But I won’t give them a ride on a weekend trip because I want to leave at 9 am, and they won’t be ready until 10 or 11, even if they agree to 9. I’ve seen people get mad when they are essentially told “Find your own way there”.
Let’s say I agree with that - it doesn’t follow from that that neurotypical people are never or rarely late. You even say yourself
I don’t entirely disagree with that - but it also works in both directions. When “Fergus” complains that in their experience habitually late people don’t give a damn how long other people wait for them , someone else can’t really say that’s not true about the people in Fergus’s life.
I certainly understand the frustration of waiting on someone, because I’m surrounded by people that struggle with being on time. I guess I’ve just gotten to a point of acceptance that I can’t control it. If someone doesn’t want to make time dependent plans with someone who’s late, I can understand that. Heck, neurodiversity works both ways. My kid freaks out when anyone is late because that’s part of his mental rigidity.
What I took exception to was the idea that, if someone can be on time for “important” things then clearly they don’t think you’re important. I’d be looking for more signals than one’s punctuality to determine how someone feels about me. Because I have direct experience of caring more about one thing but my brain insists this other thing is more important. It’s frustrating.
I actually have a friend who is not only chronically late but sometimes she doesn’t show up to things at all, with no advance warning, and I don’t hear from her for days. She has personal issues, it’s not about how she feels about me. It’s frustrating but we’ve just learned to develop a back up plan whenever we make plans with her.
My brother is always late. Sometimes hours late. We tease him about it. And i don’t plan anything really time-sensitive with him. But we also know that he cares a great deal about us.
Have you ever asked him why?
I’ve started telling my wife “in the car at 8:15.” If I just say “we’re leaving at 8:15,” then at 8:15 she starts looking for her phone, purse, checking the doors, and god knows what else, as she works her way out the door. A few minutes usually doesn’t matter, but we’re often trying to get on a ferry, and then it does matter.
No. I am also late. Not nearly as late as my brother, but i am also closer to neurotypical than he is. I get it. And my brother loves me and has helped me in important ways when i need it. 
I’m not usually late … these days. I was often late when I was younger. I felt a lot of shame about it. I dropped out of classes because of it.
Turns out I got an ADHD diagnosis in my 30’s that helped me understand my brain better, and once I did, I was able to figure out ways of not being late (most of which involve setting my life up so I’m not expected to show up every day on time somewhere, and stepping up my communication game so I don’t leave people hanging if I do run late).
So now I have solved the problem, mostly, but some of the shame and self-loathing remain. As annoying as it can be when someone is late (especially given how hard I personally have to work to be on time), I never want to make someone else feel the way people made me feel when I was a teenager who didn’t know what was wrong with my brain. So I set boundaries as needed, but try not to take it personally. If they’re late because they are disrespectful jerks, it will surely show in more ways than just that.
I know, I know, not everyone has ADHD. But not everyone who has ADHD knows it, either. I used to have incredible panic attacks over running late. I’m happy to say those are rare, but they aren’t gone.
My sister’s (diagnosed) ADHD runs in the opposite direction. She is pathological about being on time. She’s also very judgy. But she’s always been very judgy about nearly everything!
Weirdly enough, I get that! She’s probably had to put a lot of effort into being a punctual person, and it can feel pretty frustrating to have that disrespected (either on purpose or not).