A different sense of the passing of time?

Page 1 of 1 [ 12 posts ] 

r2d2
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 14 Jul 2014
Age: 69
Gender: Male
Posts: 539
Location: Northern Mariana Islands

28 Jan 2015, 12:06 pm

Do you ever get the impression that many people on the Spectrum sense the passing of time differently than neurotypical people? IN my case other than working it out logically and subtracting numbers I don't know if I spontaneously sense if something happened days ago, weeks ago, months ago, years ago or even decades ago. My natural sense of whether something happened in 2013 or in 1989 just isn't there. Of course, I can logically think it through and realize one thing was twenty-four years earlier than the other. But I don't really feel it.

Does anyone else have this same experience?


_________________
"Everyone is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid."

- Albert Einstein


eggheadjr
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 3 Oct 2012
Age: 58
Gender: Male
Posts: 1,360
Location: Ottawa, Canada

28 Jan 2015, 1:02 pm

Yes - I know some things happened years ago but feel like they were yesterday. It's almost like I think of time spatially. Like being at the centre of a "time solar system" and events in my life are orbiting around me. I know that must sound odd but that's the only way I can describe it.


_________________
Diagnosed Asperger's


r2d2
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 14 Jul 2014
Age: 69
Gender: Male
Posts: 539
Location: Northern Mariana Islands

28 Jan 2015, 1:21 pm

eggheadjr wrote:
Yes - I know some things happened years ago but feel like they were yesterday. It's almost like I think of time spatially. Like being at the centre of a "time solar system" and events in my life are orbiting around me. I know that must sound odd but that's the only way I can describe it.


Thank you that pretty much describes my experience as well. IN 1989 I was living in Boston. But if I was to guess only from my feelings how long ago it was that I was living in Boston I would probably say, "Oh it must have been three or four years ago." If someone where to insist it was really eight or nine years ago, I would for sure be certain that they were mistaken. But, only by doing the math; 2015-1989 = 26 would I see how far off I was. My sense of the passing of time and the math tell a very different story.


_________________
"Everyone is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid."

- Albert Einstein


campboy92
Pileated woodpecker
Pileated woodpecker

User avatar

Joined: 1 Nov 2014
Age: 29
Gender: Male
Posts: 197

28 Jan 2015, 3:08 pm

Marilyn Manson:

It’s very difficult for me to determine time, so birthdays are strange for me because it’s really just a matter of, “Do you wear a watch or have a calendar?” And those [things] don’t make sense to me. It’s odd that we live in an era where people don’t really use normal clocks with hands on them. Or write cursive, because texting has sort of eliminated the tradition of a handwritten letter. I looked at my handwriting recently from when I was younger because my father — who recently visited me before my birthday — brought me my first grade to third grade report cards. And my cursive was really immaculate. I can’t even read my handwriting now. It’s just like hieroglyphics and gibberish. Sometimes it’s hard for me to decipher my own handwriting because sometimes my brain is working faster than my hand can write it down. And I think that also, it’s just more of … For some reason in my head I don’t think of it as … I’m not writing it down for someone else, I’m writing it for me, but then I read it the next day and I can’t read it. So, it’s kind of a real fuck-over for me.

I see numbers farther and farther away than I do in a square like a calendar. Time I usually judge by whether the sun’s up or not. I think not having the weight of age really helped me. It’s lessened the concern about it and, surprisingly, the damage I’ve done to myself. I think I have the same vitality, maybe even more, as I did when I was 23. I’m sort of trapped in the same age. The time that’s flown by in between doesn’t really register to me. Even when you point it out, it doesn’t.



felinesaresuperior
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 24 Jul 2011
Gender: Female
Posts: 1,050
Location: israel

28 Jan 2015, 3:22 pm

i might have a slight problem with this, especially in my insomniac nights. i look at the watch and am shocked to realize it's been hours when i thought it would be just half an hour or so.

but with me it's not so bad because i've obsessed with the passage of time. and i always do things and then check my watch to see how much time has passed, and i think this helps to get a sense of time through experience.


_________________
Blogging about childhood and adulthood with Asperger and my own personl experience with rage attacks, shutdowns, social phobias etc. https://aspergerlifeblog.wordpress.com/


Wildcatb
Tufted Titmouse
Tufted Titmouse

User avatar

Joined: 13 Sep 2013
Gender: Male
Posts: 35

28 Jan 2015, 3:23 pm

Yes. When asked my age, I have to do the math.

Anything that happened longer ago than 48 hours seems the same to me. Anything more than a day in the future is likewise the same. That causes problems - I can't budget time.



olympiadis
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 20 Jun 2014
Gender: Male
Posts: 1,849
Location: Fairview Heights Illinois

29 Jan 2015, 1:48 am

I absolutely perceive time differently than most.

I know that my conscious thought process works independent of time.



Edna3362
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 29 Oct 2011
Gender: Female
Posts: 12,524
Location: ᜆᜄᜎᜓᜄ᜔

29 Jan 2015, 5:02 am

My sense of time a bit inconsistent than usual. People mistook me for being patient and impatient. :lol: I had no idea how much time would it pass if I don't watch the clock.
Sometimes a minute turned out to be an hour. Then an hour turned out to be a minute. I wish I can control it. :lol:
If I look back at old memories, it's like yesterday. As if it just happened recently than several years later.
At sleepless nights, it's more likely too fast. Even I'm not doing anything for the entire hours on.
And day... I still had no idea. Sometimes it's too fast, sometimes it's too slow.

But overall, even inconsistent, I likely perceive 'faster'. Probably because I'm sort off waiting for something that I couldn't get a finger on it... Maybe it's death, maybe some major change. It's something I don't know.


_________________
Gained Number Post Count (1).
Lose Time (n).

Lose more time here - Updates at least once a week.


Andrejake
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 14 Mar 2014
Gender: Male
Posts: 544
Location: Brasil

29 Jan 2015, 5:30 am

I've wondered about this sometimes.
I have moments where i talk to people and mention facts that happened years ago and that (apparently) doesn't have any relevance for anyone anymore but for me it was like it happened yesterday and still matters. I never reached a conclusion about how/why i do this, but i definitely do.



untilwereturn
Deinonychus
Deinonychus

User avatar

Joined: 1 Aug 2014
Age: 53
Gender: Male
Posts: 386
Location: Tennessee

29 Jan 2015, 8:04 am

Andrejake wrote:
I've wondered about this sometimes.
I have moments where i talk to people and mention facts that happened years ago and that (apparently) doesn't have any relevance for anyone anymore but for me it was like it happened yesterday and still matters. I never reached a conclusion about how/why i do this, but i definitely do.


I can relate to this sentiment. Just this morning I was reminded of someone I met over 20 years ago, and how several years ago I posted a photo of her on Facebook. At the time she commented on how long ago that picture had been taken. But in my mind, 20 years seemed like a mere blip. I still remember being in that place and time - and, while I was younger and less mature, it still doesn't seem like very long ago to me.

It's hard to articulate what I'm trying to say, except that I don't seem to move past the past as others around me do. In the minds of most people I know, they've left the past behind them. For them, it's ancient history. I file away a lot of random events in life, and reviewing those events is a bit like taking a different book off the shelf. The shelf is always current, even if the books haven't been picked up and opened in many years.



Blender
Butterfly
Butterfly

User avatar

Joined: 11 Nov 2014
Age: 53
Gender: Male
Posts: 17

29 Jan 2015, 10:56 am

I do not have a consistent perception of time. Sometimes it feels as if a hole has opened beneath my feet and I am falling through time. All of my days run together. I remember events but do not know if they happened days, weeks, or months ago. I cannot keep birthdays straight and holidays sneak up on me. It seems that one moment I have brought home a new puppy and the next my elderly dog is passing away. I have lost friends and acquaintances simply because I did not realize how long it had been since I was last in touch with them. I look in the mirror and do not recognize the middle aged man looking back at me. I hate looking at photos of myself for the same reason. All of this can be quite disturbing.



btbnnyr
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 18 May 2011
Gender: Female
Posts: 7,359
Location: Lost Angleles Carmen Santiago

29 Jan 2015, 6:32 pm

I did a time perception eggsperiment in which my results were polar opposite of eberryone else's results, which clustered as a group. I told my labmate the I thought I perceived time differently before I knew the results. I feel that short times like one second take many seconds to pass. I like to look at things in quickly changing successive flashes for like 100 ms at a time, longer than that and I get bored.


_________________
Drain and plane and grain and blain your brain, and then again,
Propane and butane out of the gas main, your blain shall sustain!