Always Late

Wednesday, October 13, 2010

Hey Ellen:
Lately I’ve been having issues with my boyfriend.  He is always late!  Dinners, visits to my parents house when I meet him there because he’s coming straight from work, appointments we have to look at apartments.  It’s a problem of his he’s always had, with time management.  How the heck can we make it easier for him to be there on time? I guess my continued nagging isn’t helping.  He says sometimes he just loses track of time.  I do believe him but I really have no clue how I’m supposed to handle this.  He is a really great guy who is totally open to any help I would ever give him so I don’t need to worry about upsetting him. 
Thanks,
Jill
Hi Jill,
Well, one thing you can do is, say that you have an appointment to look at a house at 2pm, and he is supposed to leave his office by 1:30. Have him set an alarm on his phone or watch for 1:00, instead of 1:30.  That way he will start to wrap everything up and be able to leave by 1:30.  Some people just have problems getting their mind out of what they are currently doing in time to go to the next task.  I have had this problem with people before and when I gave them that suggestion, it worked perfectly!
Good luck,
Ellen

3 comments:

  1. My brother was ALWAYS LATE for everything. So we started to tell him at least and hour earlier, sometimes more depending what he was coming for. It worked !

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  2. I agree with the above commenter. You can't depend on the "late" person to monitor themselves.
    My brother was always at least an hour late.
    When we invited him to a holiday dinner, for example, I would tell him it started at 1 p.m., thereby ensuring he would actually be there for the 2:30 start.

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  3. Another option is to not wait for him. Go ahead and serve the dinner, leave for the movie, etc, at the appointed time. That way you're not taking responsibility for him or enabling his tardiness. After missing a couple of fun events he'll become amazingly adept at remembering to be there on time.

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