Directionally Challenged/Getting Lost

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Do you have a problem getting turned around and/or flat out lost? I do. I am so bad about going out and getting completely turned around and lost. If directions are really simple, like "go up to Pine St. and turn left and it will be on the right" then I'm ok. But overall I'm very directionally-challenged if I have to go far. I'm not sure if it's a sensory overload for me or what, but I get frustrated with myself because I'm always asking people if they want to go with me or if they want to drive and I know sometimes they get sick of it. But I'm so scared of getting lost that I inhibit myself and I feel that I miss out alot because of it. Even at work I have the opportunity of promotion and I thought "I'd better not, I'll have to drive out to {city name} and I it's so far I know I'll get lost, I have no idea where it is". It sucks, but I don't think there's a whole lot I can do about it. I did see a special on autism awhile back and a man that had severe autism couldn't go to the market by himself because he got lost every time he went alone, and it kinda reminded me of myself. I just won't go out unless I know exactly where it is and even then sometimes I have to go more than once before I can remember.

Non-verbal Learning Disorder may also have something to do with this. I have NVLD and difficulty following verbal instructions because something gets lost in translation from what I hear to what I comprehend.

I'm not the best with directions either; I like to have a navigator with me most times so I can concentrate on driving and they can give me driving directions. Otherwise, I get lost quite a bit.

I have absolutely no sense of direction. I could get lost between my bed and the front door.

I'm so poor at finding my way that I could get lost in a phone booth. In fact, it's my number one concern.

"Off the cuff" directions drive me crazy. I mean things like "watch for the supermarket, keep going (DONT' tell me how far?) until you see a new strip mall, watch for a wall with mermaids painted on it .....". However if you tell me something that uses numbers and measurements like "go South on Dixie Highway 4.2 miles and look for the 14,100s block" I can do it in my sleep. A few years ago I spent almost a month in Fortaleza, Brazil (over 3 million population) and was able to orient myself to anywhere in the city by learning the exit numbers on the highways. It was amusing to have native passengers in the rental car accustomed to buses/surface streets telling me I was about to get lost, then saying "here we are".

I have no sense of direction. There is no compass in my head, so to speak. I'm loath to travel on buses and trains for fear of getting lost.

My sense of direction seems to be fine, and I can manage to get anywhere as long as I have a map. But I'm no good at following verbal directions (and I'm even worse at giving them).

My parents tell me I had this savant ability when I was three where I knew the name of every road in town, and could tell them exactly which one we were on any time in the car. Sadly, it disappeared along with any sense of direction, and now I get lost on the way to the bathroom.

i didn't meet my biological family until i was seventeen. one of the more striking similarities between my sister and myself is that we hate driving (i still dont' have a license), and we get LOST. i don't know if it's because the info doesn't interest me, or because i zone out when riding in vehicles, or some combo of both. i just suck at how to get from point A to point B.

my high school was maybe ten mins from my house. after four years, i could KIND OF give directions to get home. could not give directions to get to school.

oh. soemtimes in convo people try to tell me where stuff is by naming all the streets and, 'you know where X meets Y?'
no. i don't. and stop trying to tell me.



on the other hand, i get around philadelphia really well. it's mainly a grid system so i have little problems there - it MAKES SENSE.

I get lost in my own school, not to mention any part of town.

Complete desorientation + lack of sense of direction.


Yeah, I guess that's pretty common, at least I have it to a full extent.

I have a license (don't ask me how), but I hate driving for the same reason.

Because of the way my mind works I am easily lost because I don't recall the landmarks in my head. I either recognize them when I'm in front of them or not. That means they have to appear in the correct order regally. Miss one and I'm lost. I remember trying t find this restaurant in a street after the Globe Theater in London. Somebody was talking to me when we passed. I went on walking east for a good ten minutes. It is nearly impossible to miss the Globe Theater. Pretty distinctive building.

When I was young I go lost on a mountain in Austria. Another time was when I go left behind a Birmingham university on an open day from my school.

Last edited by 0_equals_true on 28 May 2008, 12:36 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I never get lost as long as I am navigating by landmarks. I can't follow verbal directions that rely on street names (i.e, take a left on Monroe St, then go down three blocks and take a right on XYZ street, etc.). If I have a list of written directions, I have to keep checking it every few minutes, because I forget what I'm doing almost as soon as I put the paper back down. The names vanish from my head.

If I can map a route online and see the map, I can get there. (Go left, then go down a distance, then turn right, and go past the park, etc.) I see the map in my head as I'm going.

Normally I build maps in my head when traveling, so once I've gone to a place I can always navigate back - as long as enough of the landmarks are there. I can drive into a neighborhood I went to once five years ago and will know if the street "feels" right as to be the one I'm supposed to be on, or not. When I was a toddler and we went on driving vacations, we once went to the City of Boston. My parents were hopelessly lost, and when they asked I told them how to get back to our motel - turn this way, go that way, etc., and was right on it. I remembered the buildings and things I'd seen on the way. A number of years ago I went home to the town in which I spent my first years of life. We moved away when I was 10 and I'd never been back in the 20 years since then. I was able to navigate straight to my old house.

Just for jollies, I loaded Google Earth on my computer a few weeks ago and was able to trace the rather convoluted route my school bus took every day to my elementary school. Most of the old landmarks were long gone, but enough remained that I was able to click my way through the streets. It's a visual map thing in my head. I can't use labels, names of places. It's more how things "look" - kind of like those missiles the military use that compare what the radar sees to an onboard map to guide the flight.

But verbal directions, unless they're of the "go to the big red barn and turn right" variety, I forget almost immediately.

I have no sense of direction. I keep a compass on my keychain and usually print out mapquest directions to anywhere I'm not sure of, and still get lost sometimes. It was way worse before I got the compass. And sometimes I'll be driving through a place I've been through a thousand times before, and not recognize it. Yeah, don't know what's going on there, but I don't think I should be allowed to drive alone...

I myself am the totally opposite. Whenever we would have a substitute bus driver or something I would always want to direct him.

I'm the total reverse. I have never gotten lost and I always know which direction north is. (It is currently almost directly in the way that I'm facing, slightly off to the left).
My brother thinks that if I were spun around for three days I would still point towards north. (Interesting sidenote, I also don't get dizzy)