ADHD is a hell of an impulsivity multiplier. Everything sounds amazing at the time…when it comes to doing the actual thing, it can seem like climbing Mt. Everest. Time also works differently for some of us (Time Blindness fucks up much more than just this one area of our lives). As a result, when we make plans, those plans are “out there” or “some other time in the future” or “not now”. So when it comes time to do the thing, you forgot it was ever going to happen. Dates and days are hard to keep track of, too. Things have either already happened, are happening now, or are some nebulous blob of “will happen at some point”…which doesn’t quantify anything at all.

As a result, when things go from “future” to “now”, we’re often caught by surprise and haven’t been anticipating it, so we don’t prepare. Maybe we planned to sleep in that day, etc, and when you get a reminder the night before, it can be very jarring.

I hope I’m not making this sound stupid, it’s hard to explain but it is a real thing. And no amount of reminders or calendars or alerts will “cure” it…they help, but you can’t plan for every occurrence and some apps won’t let you set multiple alarms a week out, a few days out, 1 day, hours, etc. It’s limited to 1 or 2 that are pre-programmed, and if you want more you have to manually input them all them every time. Not easy to do when you’re in the middle of paying your bill after a doctor’s visit with other people waiting behind you.

It sucks.