Table of Contents:
- What is time blindness?
- What time blindness can look like for SAHMs
- How emotions impact ADHD time blindness
- 3 Strategie to decrease the impact of time blindness in your daily life as a stay-at-home-mom
Question for the ADHD SAHMs out there… Have you ever found yourself speeding to an appointment, knowing that you’ll be over 15 minutes late? maybe even 30-45 minutes late? After having that experience one too many times, maybe you now get to appointments with plenty of time to spare. Forcing your kids to sit in the car for an additional 10 to 15 minutes to kill time before appointments.
What is Time Blindness?
Time blindness is a weak perception of time. You have a very hard time guesstimating how much time something will take.
What time blindness can look like:
- underestimating how long it will take to fold a load of clean laundry (either avoiding it because you think it will take a long time or starting it and being interrupted in the middle because you underestimated how long it would take)
- Not realizing how much time you have left prior to an event on your schedule (sometimes if I have an activity in my schedule at noon, I feel like I can’t do anything at all in the morning because I’m not sure I’ll make it to the event on time).
- Frequently missing deadlines (like your kid’s school fundraiser) or showing up late to things (even if you really really are excited to go to them).
- Challenges creating your schedule and then sticking to it (how many planners have you bought in the past five years… you know they’re supposed to last the whole year, right?)
- Feeling like you’ve lost track of time and wondering where the whole day went (this happens for me when I get sucked into social media at the end of the night, or honestly when I’m writing for a podcast midday. Where did all that quiet time go? Now it’s time to get back into mom mode? seriously?)
Processing speed may impact time blindness
it’s pretty common for folks with ADHD to have slower processing rates. Things may take us a little longer and then ultimately we’ll have a hard time guessing how much something will take or even how much time has passed.
Time blindness can feel like being stuck in the present
which can lead to addictions to gaming and social media. It’s super important to build your awareness of your time blindness, to help catch yourself in the act.
Time blindness and ADHD
A quick story. Have you ever felt like you do better under pressure? Maybe you’re the type of person who struggles to meet a deadline, but then when the pressure is on (you have to finish ___ before Sally from HR comes over here with your brown box to put all of your belongings in and walks you out…)
This is me. I’m fully the person who needs a little *drama* to get my work done. Not exactly the best strategy for a professional.
Well, you and I can feel vindicated because as it turns out, folks with ADHD actually have better time awareness when we are in emotional distress. I mean, boo that sucks that we have to feel negative emotions in order to feel time, but doesn’t that just make so much sense?
For neurotypical folks, it’s actually the opposite. When things get hairy and emotional, their awareness of time dips down and they struggle to have that awareness of time.
Isn’t it funny how our brains can function differently? Does this ring true for your brain? (more info on that here),
Strategies for Moms
Getting to appointments on time:
- Take the time when you enter an event into your calendar. Look up how long it will take you to get somewhere, add a buffer (10-15 minutes works for my location), and add the event at the time you have to LEAVE your home.
- Begin timing yourself as you and your children get out of the house. Use a stopwatch to see exactly how long it takes you to get your kid(s) out the door, into the car, and on the road. After a while, you’ll have an average and will begin to be able to anticipate more accurately how long that takes (beware: changes in your child’s temperament and abilities will alter your time, so be cognizant that this task will change over time)
- Set timers to remind yourself about an upcoming transition and to keep yourself on-task. If you have an event that occurs at the same time daily, set a timer to remind yourself that it’s time to start thinking about leaving (and one for when it’s really really time and one for when you should have your foot on the gas pedal backing out of your garage)
Managing Your Schedule as a SAHM
Time blindness can make an open schedule extremely challenging for a new mom. It may feel like with a whole day of mothering, you don’t get anything done! Here are some tips that helped me to create touchstones in my schedule, which helped me to build time awareness in the early, hazy days of motherhood.
- Start with consistent meal times. When you have a baby-baby (my phrase for a newborn), you’re going to feel like the days and nights blend together into three-hour increments of feeding the baby, changing the baby, enjoying brief baby engagement, and then putting baby down to sleep. This phase, while short-lived, can be extremely disorienting. Creating a consistent time that you eat breakfast, lunch, and dinner (and 1-2 snacks if that’s your jam) will really work towards creating structure in your day. If your baby or child is a little bit older, having those consistent meal times becomes important for them as well and they can become your little alarm clock to remind you that it’s time to eat (and trust me, they will!)
- Create rhythms and routines to help keep things flowing and to build in variety. I recently heard a recommendation to follow the sunlight in your home (if you’re spending time inside). That way you spend time moving throughout your home and build in various activities with your children throughout the day.
- Create playlists for different times of day: Music can help you to better feel time passing by (and to focus when you need to). Consider creating a playlist for the morning, afternoon, and evening. I’ve personally had a tea-time playlist since my oldest son was very young and it’s been such a balm on those rough afternoons just before my husband comes home from work.