Last updated August 1, 2026 — Added content.
“Chronic Lateness” is a negative behavior pattern that becomes apparent with “Love Avoidant” and “Distant Personality” disorders. We’ll examine each of these personality flaws that can hinder relationships.
When scheduling meetings or outings with friends or family, it is inconsiderate for someone to arrive late. It becomes even more frustrating when you end up taking the blame for their tardiness.
There are always acceptable reasons for being late—such as unexpected delays at airports, traffic on the highway, or bad weather.
People usually know the difference between occasional lateness due to an unintentional cause and being late for no good reason.
In that case, it's an inconsiderate attitude that frustrates friends and partners when always keeping them waiting.
Medical experts have determined chronic lateness to be related to attention-deficit disorder. According to psychotherapist Stephanie Sarkis, they call it "time blindness" because it's a difficulty with perceiving the passage of time.1
Time passes differently for various people. One of the most common reasons people are frequently late is that they can't accurately judge how long a task will take.
In addition, people who are multitaskers often tend to be late because they are involved with too many things at once and can't pull away from what they are doing.2
In a research study, Jeff Conte, a San Diego State University psychologist, found that chronic lateness can also be related to one's personality type. He discovered that "Type A" personalities tend to be on time because they are achievement-oriented, and "Type B" people are usually late because they have a laid-back attitude.3
It comes to a point when you must speak up and let them know how it's affecting you.
If their delay affects people in a social group, then ignoring the person might be the only solution to avoid being frustrated by their disrespect.
It could be a deal-breaker if they don't change their attitude. In that case, it could be time to leave the relationship. But if you're married, counseling might be the only solution.
It can become problematic when you always need to wait for your partner to get ready when meeting friends. And it can even be aggravating if you take the blame for being late and they never speak up to say it wasn't your fault.
Does this sound familiar?
I once had a friend who always disregarded other people's time. She was known to be very late when other people were involved, sometimes causing them to give up waiting.
We were good friends and were in a relationship with the potential for commitment. However, I often had to take the blame for the two of us being late when we met with other people, and I waited for her to get ready to go. That isn't very reassuring for a developing relationship.
The following is an example of someone who is often late and refuses to appreciate how their attitude affects others, especially their partner.
One day, a friend offered to take me out to dinner for my birthday. We made plans to meet at the restaurant at a specific time. After waiting about thirty minutes, I called her at home, and she said she was leaving now.
I waited another thirty minutes even though she lived only five minutes away. It was an hour now, and she was nowhere in sight!
I figured she must have been driving by now, so I called her cell phone. But I only got her voicemail. So I called her at home again, and she answered!
"You're still home?" I exclaimed! Of course, that annoyed her. Yes. She was the one annoyed. In her mind, I had no right to be upset.
When she finally arrived, I felt I had to express my feelings. Rather than keeping it bottled up inside of me all through dinner, I needed to get this off my chest so we could put it behind us and enjoy the rest of the evening.
I tried to explain how precious time is to me, and if I had known when she would arrive, I could have done some errands instead of waiting on the sidewalk in front of the restaurant for over an hour.
She got upset with me for expressing my feelings and would not allow me to feel annoyed. That was hurtful, realizing that she couldn't care less.
I knew from experience with her that I couldn't win. She had a way of looking at things only in terms of her own needs, without considering how it affected others.
That was her personality—no empathy and no respect for my feelings. That attitude is typical among people who are usually late. They have that mindset so they don't feel guilty.4
The following story shows how to handle chronically late people in a social setting.
I had led a hiking group to explore local nature trails. I always published the meeting time and specified how long we'd wait for late arrivals. But there was one woman who never could get there in time.
We knew who was attending because they registered for the events. After waiting for everyone to arrive, I began the hike even though this one particular woman never showed up.
Fifteen minutes into the hike, my cell phone rang. It was her!
She said she had arrived and no one was there. I told her that was because we already started walking through the woods after waiting fifteen minutes for late arrivals.
She asked me to turn everyone around and come back so she could join us.
Punctuality is necessary in social situations where everyone is expected to coordinate their time. Asking others to compensate for one person who can't abide by that rule is unacceptable.
I had to consider everyone in the group, so I told her the path we took and said she could catch up if she walked fast.
That was unacceptable to her. She still wanted us to turn around. That lack of empathy for others is typical among chronically late people.
Her insistence made it clear that she was in denial about her attitude and could not justify why others behaved toward her as they did.
So, instead, she went home rather than joining us in what turned out to be a pleasant day for the rest of us, enjoying nature.
People who tend to be chronically late can't take ownership of their attitude. When one has difficulty handling the passage of time, they tend to be in denial and fail to recognize their impact on others.
Repeated chronic lateness erodes trust and creates an inconvenience for others. If it's accepted in a social setting, it can lead to animosity among group members.5
If being with such a person interferes with one's social life, ending the relationship might be considered. That would be especially so when there is no hope of improving their attitude when expressing your feelings.
Try to communicate your priorities, the value of your time, and the consideration of others before giving up. If they refuse to appreciate you and your values, that could be a deal-breaker.
People with love avoidant personality disorder set boundaries with distancing techniques.
I once dated a woman with this personality disorder. She repeatedly pushed me away with her evasive disposition and pulled me back with her good nature.
The term ‘love-avoidant’ can be misleading. They don’t necessarily avoid love. In fact, they often crave it.
They desire to be loved and to love others, but their fear of intimacy and past experiences can lead to behaviors that seem like avoidance.
I know that because my girlfriend was previously married. Twice! The only problem was that her avoidance methods pushed both husbands away.
A love avoidant tends to use techniques to distance themselves from their partner. They might have been hurt before, and this is their defense mechanism. They struggle to protect themselves from imagined undesirable treatment despite the need to be loved.
Some distance is certainly understandable in a relationship, since partners continue to lead individual lives. However, lovers in a healthy, committed relationship expect to support one another, especially when they are most vulnerable.
When one has a love-avoidant behavior, they want too much distance. They set unrealistic boundaries, with distancing techniques such as the following: 6
When I researched the traits of a love-avoidant, I found it fascinating to see similar issues I had with my girlfriend that were discussed in “Top 6 Signs of a Love Avoidant” by Jim Hall.7
I noticed the following common theme:
I learned that many doctors confirmed that attitude when I read “Identifying and Understanding a Love Avoidant Person” by Ariel Quinn.8
I noticed two specific desires my love-avoidant girlfriend had:
1. They Want to Keep Their Life Private
They want to keep their life history private and not allow their partner to learn much about their life or background.
My girlfriend got angry when I asked questions to get to know her more. Her anger made me feel I was out of place for asking questions.
It was evident to me that she was using distancing techniques to keep me from getting too close, both emotionally and physically.
2. They Want to Avoid Repeating Hurtful Past Experiences
In many cases, love avoidants are afraid of being hurt by someone they love, so they keep a distance for their protection.
That fear of being hurt might be the result of a negative experience they had in the past. It could have been with another relationship, but it might have been a bad experience in early family life.
For example, if they had parents who argued and yelled at each other, that memory might create a fear of experiencing it in a personal relationship.
Her previous experience with two failed marriages left her with emotional scars. I’m not sure if that caused her to develop a love-avoidant personality or if that personality disorder was the cause of her failed marriages.
Either way, it caused tremendous problems in our relationship. Her bad experiences made her avoid me numerous times, thinking I’d be like the others.
Every time she noticed that I was moving away emotionally, she tried to pull me back. She was aware of her tendencies to do this, but it didn’t help her refrain from repeating the same push-and-pull technique.
I felt she was playing mind games with me because she’d turn around and say she missed me each time she pushed me away.
I may have desired to work things out. But since it was a new relationship, I had no desire to put more effort into it, especially with the constant push/pull craziness.
To my surprise, she called one day to admit that her son had just told her, “Yes, Mom, Glenn is right. You always push people away. You did that with Dad, too, before the divorce.”
This is a pattern of keeping emotional distance from others with protective strategies. The following is a real-life story of a relationship with such a person.
An ex-girlfriend tended to disappear for hours whenever we made plans. The most frustrating experience was when we had a reservation at a restaurant on Valentine's Day.
When I went to pick her up, she wasn’t home. I called her cellphone and she told me she was stuck at the checkout counter while shopping and would be home soon.
This type of thing happened frequently. It was her personality. She didn’t consider how her elusive behavior affected me.
I respected her and cared for her. I enjoyed noticing how she used her intelligence to solve problems in her life. I admired that about her.
That incident on Valentine’s Day didn’t end well. She kept giving me more excuses. I gave up waiting and canceled the reservations because we would have been late anyway if we had gone.
The Distant Personality
She had trouble opening up when I asked for explanations. One time she gave me an answer that didn’t help much. She said she is a very “private person.”
So I just let things continue as friends. I enjoyed hanging out with her. I helped her with her daily affairs, shopping for things she needed, fixing her computer, painting her apartment, and so on.
She never gave me the “real answers” to questions I had about her vanishing episodes. A fellow gives up after a while when he feels his girlfriend can’t trust him to discuss her personal issues that are affecting the relationship. It wasn’t a new relationship either. We were well into the third year. It’s time to share!
I found it so difficult to communicate with her that I just accepted it for what it was — with her privacy being so important to her, as she put it.
The way I see it, if you give someone a chance to talk and they refuse, it indicates that they are not interested in continuing the relationship.
Besides their character flaws, people can still do well in other areas of their lives. However, building a foundation of love and trust with another person may be one thing they will never realize.
I learned we need to quickly recognize when we are involved with someone who won’t be willing to communicate about issues that need to be resolved.
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