My daughter is always late...

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I am new to this site, so I am very excited about all of the insight that is available.

We are struggling with being late all of the time because my 12 year old daughter moves at a snail's pace. It is infuriating... we try desperately to be patient but it affects all aspects of our lives. We recently found one tiny piece of the puzzle. She was taking so long in the shower because she honestly didn't know how to rinse her hair. She was just standing under the shower hoping all of the conditioner would rinse away. She really didn't understand that there was more she needed to do. This realization makes me want to cry because I can not begin to fathom how many other things she is struggling with that seem so natural to me. She is gifted academically. Sometimes she is so smart I am awed. It does however cause me to struggle when she doesn't know to rinse her hair!

She takes forever with everything. We get her up TWO HOURS before her bus comes and it is still a CONSTANT struggle to get her there on time.

She feels that she is moving as quickly as she can and we are being unfair. She is also very difficult to wake up. We are considering the "screaming meanie" a VERY loud alarm clock... but we're not sure how that will pan out either.

I wish I always knew what she was actually struggling with, so I could help. Instead we are both frustrated. A lot.

Does anyone else struggle with this? If so, what has helped?

Thank you so much for any advice.

Watch what she is doing the entire time she is getting ready. Is she adding extra activities, are there certain activities that take longer, are there activities that have long pauses? Theses are things you might want to look for.

I am not a parent. but I have problems with executive function (common with AS). This means sometimes I have trouble knowing what steps a task needs, and I have trouble putting together the steps, so things can take me much longer to do. Many of the tasks I struggle with are common things most people do not have trouble with. I have trouble with making decisions so it takes me really long to figure out what I should wear based on the weather, and expected activities/situations of the day.

I have trouble getting dressed, but I am getting a graduate degree in engineering. Struggling with day to day activities does not always correlate with academics.

Following her around for her morning routine will be hard, but she probably does not know what areas she is struggling with or could be done easier and quicker, so you will have to watch and observe her to see what areas she could use your help.

Hi. Me too. My son, almost 12, ugh... So, what has helped - no showers in the morning. He's homeschooled now, but when he was in school, he went to bed in what he'd wear the next morning. Showers were at night when we had more time. If his hair was too messy in the morning from being in bed overnight, we'd spray it with water from a spray bottle (sometimes water and a bit of leave in conditioner or detangler) and then he'd brush it, making it look like he'd just showered.)

For showering, I taught him the steps as best I could back when he was still wanting my help. Now that he's got privacy concerns, I've had him shower with a bathing suit on when he needed a refresher on how to do various shower tasks.

I saw on wife swap the other day the idea to play a certain number of favorite songs (they did 2 - what's that, 6 minutes? That would not work around here - I'd do maybe 4 songs) to time the shower, so the kid can get in a routine where certain tasks are done during certain songs. Get wet all over, song 1. Shampoo hair and soap up body, song 2. Rinse, half of song 3. Conditioner, the rest of song 3. Final rinse, song 4. Or however. I guess it should be the same songs each time so they can get in a habit.

As for sleep, my son has severe sleeping issues that were mostly solved with melatonin. I guess it's not a totally harmless substance, but if she's tired from not getting enough sleep, you might want to look into it to try to get her to sleep earlier. As for the amount of sleep, my son needs 12 hours. It's rough to fit that in with school.

We homeschool now and I have to say that's the best recommendation I have, but I know not everybody can swing it. It changed our lives. We were SO STRESSED. Hurry hurry hurry, quick quick quick, it was awful. And not just in the morning but the evenings too as there were only so many minutes to get everything done and get to bed on time so that the next day wouldn't be even worse. Now we have some leeway for the time that meltdowns take, or when he's interested in something I want to give him extra time for, or for shower or other bathroom events that take a loooooong time.

Sometimes he's in a class that requires getting up earlier and on time. This week he has soccer camp. What works for us, and come to think of it I'm not sure why it works so well because usually he gets super mad at stuff that's similar to this, but I tell him if he doesn't get up by the fourth warning I'm going to pour water on him. I did actually do it once, years ago, and I haven't had to do it again as just bringing it up really speeds things up. I explained that there are certain things we can't be late for, and that the water is refreshing... Also I open his curtains so the sun shines in. I used to rip off his blankets but lately he's gotten really upset about that so it's been counter-productive.

And of course just like for anything else where you need compliance, you could try a reward system. Sometimes a visual thing like a chart, or earning marbles that fill a jar, or earning a quarter for some pre-defined thing, in this example say for being ready by a certain time, or taking a certain time or less to get ready. My son earns computer and video game time, not for getting ready in the mornings, but for other things that he finds it hard to do.

Good luck!

My son is a dawdler, and the only way we keep him on track is to constantly drive the action. This may not fly with a pre-teen girl who is used to autonomy. My son is seven, and has had adaptive issues, always. So, in a way it is easier b/c we know what parts he can do himself, and what he cannot. Whenever we are in a rush, we have to do all the steps to dress him, especially if we are going somewhere he does not want to go.

If she lets you (at her age, I don't think I would have been Ok with this.) as others have said, observe her to see what she can do and cannot do efficiently. My son still does an evening bath, so we do not have that worry in the morning. If that won't fly for you (hot summer, post-puberty) then maybe let her bathe at night, and add just a quick one in the A.M. where she doesn't have to worry about her hair and stuff.

You may have to do constant prompting to tell her to move from one stage to another, use visual prompts, and then gradually reduce them. I don't know about introducing this paradigm when she is not used to it, but it is worth a try.

I agree with the music thing. Time sometimes seems simply to disappear for me. What seems to be 10 minutes are suddenly 30 and I cant tell you, where they have gone, so I didnt look out of the window or whatever. What takes 15 minutes one day, needs whyever 25 minutes the next day.

Things that helped me reduce all that. In my bath I have now everything in a row, according to the order I need. From the Left: Toothbrush-Toothgel, Natural Medication preventing bladder infection and Fol Acid/Iron because of having to less, Mouthwater, Olive Oilspray for easying hairbrushing and hairbrush, ...

Because of that I reduce the time I spent with thinking, and can focus on "action" without thinking. I simply know, as long as everything stays that ways, that I wont forget anything, so I dont need to think about that. If its not in that row but messed, I always need to think of, if I didnt forget something, and risc "loosing myself in a time hole". Try to reduce as well everything else that costs lots of thinking, because of being overwhelming. Choosing cloths in the morning out of a big clothcloset...and again 10 minutes wasted...do that the evening before and try to reduce anything out of the closet you dont need right now. No use for summer stuff in winter, no use for celebrities-clothing every day in your closet... The more you reduce it, the faster it gets. Same goes for schoolstuff. The less you choose and think in the morning and simply turn it instead into a routine, the faster it will go.

I like the trick with the music as well, so I dont have always the same music, but listen to CDs I know, so if the sixth song starts, I know that it must be now about 25 minutes since I started. Thats not stressing like someone pushing you, but simply reminds you softly.

We did everything the night before. Showers, clothes picked, breakfast decided on, shoes and backpack by the front door, if taking a lunch then it is packed in the fridge before I go to bed. I am absolutely not a morning person, so all of that is as much to help me as it to help the kids. At night (even if I am exhausted) I can make lunchboxes in a few minutes. In the morning it'll take me 3-4 times as long. They often slept in their clothes when they were small, and the youngest still does if we have to leave very early.

That leaves for in the morning--wake up, change clothes, use the toilet, eat breakfast, brush teeth, put on shoes, pick up lunch and backpack, leave. That's still a lot of steps, and still takes us between thirty minutes to an hour. (They all have short hair so no need to brush that unless a cow lick happens to be acting up)

I agree with many of the others on here. Keep it simple in the morning. Do as much the night before as you can. I found that even with only a few tasks, my son was taking forever because as he finished one task, he either did not remember or got sidetracked on the way to the next task. For example, wake up, go to the bathroom, on the way out of the bathroom sees a toy on the side of the tub and starts playing with it, looking for socks and stops to arrange his animals on his bed. For us it was a matter of having a list he could check off with a wax pen each morning, then being allowed to play on the iPad/phone while waiting for the bus as a reward for finishing early.

There are so many possibilities, fine motor issues - buckles, ties, putting clothes on, caps, lids; sensory issues - clothes don't feel right, itchy, tight, seams, toothpaste, breakfast food, lights; transitions - hard to move brain from finishing one task to start another; gaps in skills - not knowing how to rinse with the addition of rarely asking when you don't know; attention - easily distracted, memory for task steps; poor executive functioning - don't know where to start, middle, and end tasks, can't multitask, can't break tasks down into parts; slow to wake up - difficult to transition to daytime, brain feels foggy; low blood sugar - no food all night, brain foggy, cranky...

What I can almost guarantee is pressure to move faster, stress, yelling, loud alarms, are all going to result is slower pace, meltdown, or shutdown.

So much of what we do as parents is just detective work.

I've always had difficulties waking up. When I was a kid, my mum used to have to physically drag me out of bed. It was awful. When I try to get up fast, I feel so ill. She'd continually nag at me and hurry me along and I'd still end up late for everything.

Nowadays, what I do is use an alarm with a snooze button. I set it to go off a minimum of 2 hours before I need to be out the door. The snooze alarm goes off every ten minutes, which allows me to wake up in increments. After half an hour, I force myself to use my ipad, which helps me to wake up further. I use my ipad for half an hour, by which time I feel awake enough to be able to get out of bed (although on premenstrual days, or days after doing a lot of stressful things, it can take even longer).

Then I get up and use the toilet, brush my teeth and get changed. Then have breakfast and leave. This takes an hour.

There's no way I could fit in showering. I do that the night before.

On days when I'm still feeling very tired, or premenstrual, or stressed, or depressed, I need to return to my bed before doing each new activity. E.g. I'll go to the toilet and wash hands, then return to bed for ten minutes because I can't face brushing my teeth. During the ten minutes, I visualise brushing my teeth and try to build myself up for the task. Then I brush my teeth. Then return to bed for ten minutes to visualise getting dressed etc. On the bad days, I'm lucky if I make it out the house at all.

Another thing to consider is whether she's being late on purpose. I hate arriving to things early. I have issues with waiting for things, because when waiting, I feel like I'm going to wet myself all the time (because of anxiety), which is excruciating. Also, I fear having to talk to people when arriving early, so I usually try to arrive exactly on time or five minutes late. To deal with this, I try to find a private place to wait, with a lavatory nearby, an activity to do to take my mind off waiting, and a watch so I know exactly how long I have to wait.

I have 4 kids who I always thought were NT, but now I suspect my youngest son may have AS like I do. Both boys had ADHD. I had trouble getting mine up in the mornings for school, at least the oldest two. The younger two did fine. The boy I think has AS was never a problem, he would get right up and dress and mind me. It was the oldest boy and girl I had trouble with. This is what I used to do, it may or may not work for you and will depend on your child's personality and your tolerance level for morning BS from them.

My son wouldn't get up until about ten minutes before we had to leave. I would wake him and wake him, take the covers, etc. He would grab them back as soon as I went out of the room. I had three other kids to get dressed so he took advantage of my business. Finally, after trying everything I heard an idea that I tried that worked like a charm. However, it put him in a bad mood for the morning. But it kept him from being late to school, so it was a tradeoff. I put a sack of marbles in the freezer. He had three chances to get up on his own in the mornings when I came in there and woke him up. If he didn't do it, on the fourth try I would just lift up the covers and dump the frozen marbles in his bed. Marbles roll and follow you wherever you go to trying to get away. He HAD to get up then. He was tolerably upset for the morning, but when I tried it on my daughter all hell broke loose. I had to use a different tactic for her.

She was about 8 or 9, so I don't know if this would work with an older kid or not, but I did this for a couple years. She is also a very deep sleeper. I'd just dress her there in her bed. I'd get her clothes on her then stand her up and lead her in front of me, down the stairs and sit her in front of the couch and hand her a pop tart and brush her hair and put it up. She kept her eyes closed pretty much the entire time till she went to the bathroom and got in the van where she went back to sleep. Then she got out at school, went and sat in her line outside the school, and went back to sleep. She woke up for good when the bell rang and they had to go in.

I also sent my oldest to school in his pajamas one day in 5th grade because I was so sick of trying to get him ready on time. Sister said to, she said she tells parents to when they have that problem.

Since she is 12 you might want to try the "you're about grown now and it's time you took responsibility for yourself" and get her her own alarm clock and put her in charge of getting ready. Make it all about being grown. Tell her she has a week to get there on time by herself or you try some not so nice tactics. Like the marbles.

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ASD mom, I think you are pretty much right, but she also has to lean consequences. That's why I always used a little hicory off the bush. if nothing else, youd kids wll take a penchant for cordorou pants up in there.

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I'm giving it another shot. We will see.
My forum is still there and everyone is welcome to come join as well. There is a private women only subforum there if anyone is interested. Also, there is no CAPTCHA.

The link to the forum is http://www.rightplanet.proboards.com

Haven't read all the posts, but I I have a small contribution:

Sleep/wake transition is pretty hard for both my kids and I. I set the alarm 60 minutes before I need to get up. My tv in my room also automatically turns on at that time. I hit snooze 4 times (15 minutes each). I am in a half sleep/half wake state pretty much most of that time, but I am able to get up after the 4th snooze. For my son, he must stand in the shower for about 20 minutes in order to wake up. I don't even know for sure if he opens his eyes as he walks to the shower). For my daughter, I get her up about 30 minutes before she needs to be up and she sits in front of the television, without any interaction. After about 30 minutes or so, she will start to eat her breakfast, in silence. After that she is generally awake and ready to complete the rest of the morning routine. All of us are fine if we are allowed to sleep until we naturally wake up, but any time we need to be awoken, there has to be a transition period.

My son also does better when he has written checklists of what he is supposed to do or else he gets absolutely sidetracked, almost every time. He's not dawdling or intentionally being slow, he just gets "lost."

My daughter, too. Yesterday she was supposed to go upstairs to close the bathroom door before she left the house for a birthday party or else the dog goes in there and goes nuts. She was already carrying the birthday present because she was on her way out the door when she remembered the bathroom door was open. When she got upstairs she saw one shoe in the hallway. She put the present down to pick up the out of place shoe. This prompted her to realize she wanted to wear a different pair of shoes. She searched her room and couldn't find the shoes she wanted. Then she realized she was going to be late for the party, so she ran downstairs and told her dad "OK. We're ready. Let's go." The bathroom door was open and the present was upstairs. They left for the party.

As a matter of fact, I was supposed to come upstairs to get my cell phone and when I walked passed the computer, I thought of something I wanted to look up. I looked it up, which lead to looking something else up, which then prompted me to check my email, which then led me here. And now I was supposed to start dinner 30 minutes ago. I'm not dawdling and I am not trying to be late to prepare dinner. I just do not stay focused on the task at hand unless I am MAKING myself focus. For example, if I would have left the kitchen and said to myself "No going on the computer. Just get your phone." I would have just gotten my phone. But I didn't, so here I sit.

I know it is frustrating to other people. But for those of you who do not have this issue, I must tell you, it ain't a piece of cake for us, either. Especially when the "lostness" results in negative consequences. I get really frustrated with myself because it seems like I should be able to just not do "this." But to not do "this," it requires that I be able to predict what might distract me and remind myself not to be distracted by it before I become distracted by it. This is not always possible. And sometimes I think our kids don't even really understand what is wrong, so they end up just feeling upset without knowing why. And I remember feeling really mad as a kid because my parents would accuse me of being lazy or dawdling, but I wasn't. And when I would tell them that I wasn't, they wouldn't believe me. I guess the point I am trying to make is blaming the person who suffers with the problem by attributing it to something that they control will not help make anything better, and may only make them feel worse.