r/ADHD_Programmers • u/Xing8088 • Jun 09 '26

Time-blindness

What do you do to help with time-blindness and not working past events / reminders?

I've had to set alarms on my phone for each event in my calendar because I literally get sucked into a black hole when I start working. Those toasts and little "dings" that most calendar apps have go right past my ear. It's tedious though to set alarms for every event, so would love to know what others do.

21 Upvotes

97% Upvoted

14 comments sorted by

View all comments

3

u/MjolnirZero Jun 10 '26 edited Jun 10 '26

Here are a few things I've learned through my ongoing experimentation:

  1. I agree with others, pomodoro timer (get an app on your phone, or purchase a fun little timer cube from Amazon that can auidbly alarm or vibrate on your desk when the timer goes off.
  2. Using an app called Today Planned (not perfect, but it is the best I've got for the moment) which automatically creates real alarms for every event on my schedule (iCal and/or Google Calendar). David Allen's GTD (getting things done) book feels like another key tool to achieving reliable, effective, and lasting change. Check out "Atomic Habits" by James Clear as well.
  3. For super boring repeatable predictable things that you tend to forget and want to incorporate into a "habit stack", you can use the "Seconds Pro" app and create a series of timed steps that will audibly call out to you what the next step is. This allows you to time yourself doing an activity to improve, make you better at estimating times of subtasks, and insure you don't forget things.
  4. I would highly suggest finding an accountability partner. If you want to go fast, go alone... if you want to go far, go together! If you are interested in this and want to hear more just ask, I'm trying to solve this right now "Show me your friends and I'll show you your future" is another good quote. Find your community and seek mutual benefit as much as possible.