Showering in a time machine

[Turk]

Strange things happen to me in the shower. I find myself totally immersed in thought and ideas. Relatively harmless you'd think. Except inside my think tank, time stands still. The outside world ticks by, without me noticing. Doesnt happen all the time but, I've been known to have a 40 minute shower, after totally losing track of time. Its even more embarrassing to emerge and see the shampoo, that hasn't been washed out of my hair. That usually gets an eye roll from the wife, when she spots it. Pretty sure one day I'll be coming out with a beard. My son behaves similar, in the shower. It does worry me a bit, that I can be locked, for such long periods, without any ability to guage time. Which leads me to my question. Does anyone experience this time loss, when they shower. There is obviously some sort of sensory magic going on here. Anyone?

 

[Brent]

I do the same thing but I only last as long as the hot water and then my ability to think clearly goes away.

 

[King_Oni]

Oh, this sounds familiar, lol.

The shower is one of the few places I actually can relax and zone out a bit.

I tend to keep it at 30 minutes max on intuition. I never went over that. Still, it's 30 minutes, and it's a lot of "wasted" water. But between this and other things that help me relax, there's nothing free with any and all of those.

Add in that I tend to shower in near darkness, put the heating on max and turn it into pretty much a total darkness sauna. And before someone goes "How can you see?" well, I'm not that dirty that I need a severe scrubbing, I know where the shampoo is, I can find my hair, so that all works out fine

On the notion of relaxing I've ended up taking a can of beer under the shower and had a drink while enjoy the streams of water.

However, I can shower quickly when it's just for cleaning up. If I hit the shower when I woke up, it's to clean myself up and start my day fresh and washed, those tend to be 5 minutes at best. But I've also ended up doing showers before I'm planning to go to bed. That's usually the ones that take a lot longer and are more for relaxing and less for cleaning up.

 

[Archer36]

Quite often, i turn off the light and only leave a kind of blue glowing lamp on ... i get in the shower, the water is really hot ... i wash myself .. and can stay in there until the hot water tank is empty. I love sensory deprivation. It gives me a break from the world. I wish I had a steam shower.

Edit: Also the shower running is some sort of white noise ... Its an incentive to enter into trance/meditation/hypnosis ... once in that state, you lose track of time and its normal. I regularly do self-hypnosis, at the second your mind will need to pop out of trance, it will. Its not dangerous, you'll never get stuck in that state. If the fire alarm goes off or if your mind get worried about the energy/water bill, you'll come out of trance. If you ask my opinion, I will say its very healthy to experience this.

 

[142857]

Like a lot of people on the spectrum I am sensitive to heat, so I can only have a warmish shower.

I used to lose track of time in the shower, it is a soothing experience and it is very easy to slip into a state of meditation. These days I am in and out fairly quickly, and I only shampoo my hair once every few months (when I am going for a haircut).

My son will spend forever in the shower if I let him, and he tends to finish with his hair still full of shampoo.

 

[Ereth]

I've been trying to take shorter showers to save water, but I know what you mean, Turk. After a long, stressful day, a shower can really help.

Maybe you could set an alarm just before you go in. That way, you'll have an alert when it's time to get out.

 

[Turnip]

I saw this recently, and was reminded of this thread -

 

[Vanilla]

I definitely do this. I once bought a water proof clock to try to limit my time in the shower, but found sometimes my thoughts were so deep that even the clock was forgotten. Also it broke after some time...it was only a cheap clock.

I think the only thing that could ensure that I don't take too long would be an alarm of some sort. I do try not to have hot showers, and keep the pressure down, as I figured at least then I'm only using half of what I normally would...at least that's what I tell myself

 

[tlc]

Yes I do the same thing. Except due to a small water tank I keep the hot scalding and mix it with cold then screw with the cold continually till it's no longer warm, so that's my alarm. Otherwise I'd stay in there for close to an hour, and have back in college days during late nights when the suitemate was away. Water bill not an issue here, flat rate for the year no matter what but I'm not home that much either.

 

[Turk]

As an amendment to this thread, I like to say that my son and I have discussed this issue and come up with a solution. Basically its shock therapy. When my son notices ive been in too long or wants to use the bathroom, he now deliberately flushes the toilet. I need a seat belt now for how fast reality checks in, when the hot water arrives. As a father, keen to help his son through an equally debilitating problem, the favour is returned.

 

[Vanilla]

As an amendment to this thread, I like to say that my son and I have discussed this issue and come up with a solution. Basically its shock therapy. When my son notices ive been in too long or wants to use the bathroom, he now deliberately flushes the toilet. I need a seat belt now for how fast reality checks in, when the hot water arrives. As a father, keen to help his son through an equally debilitating problem, the favour is returned.

Haha, that should do it

 

[Autism]

Strange things happen to me in the shower. I find myself totally immersed in thought and ideas. Relatively harmless you'd think. Except inside my think tank, time stands still. The outside world ticks by, without me noticing. Doesnt happen all the time but, I've been known to have a 40 minute shower, after totally losing track of time. Its even more embarrassing to emerge and see the shampoo, that hasn't been washed out of my hair. That usually gets an eye roll from the wife, when she spots it. Pretty sure one day I'll be coming out with a beard. My son behaves similar, in the shower. It does worry me a bit, that I can be locked, for such long periods, without any ability to guage time. Which leads me to my question. Does anyone experience this time loss, when they shower. There is obviously some sort of sensory magic going on here. Anyone?

Yes, as a matter of fact, that does happen. I had to laugh when recognizing that. I am a very imaginative person that had to live a long life with an unimaginative person.
Without getting too much into detail, I enjoyed exploring different realities, even if it was in the shower. But when you live with a cold fish that wants none of that fun, well an Aspie is pretty much lost, dry bank without any water.

 

[Autism]

Haha, that should do it

Ok, that is torture, not fun. We should all be able to do what we want to do, especially in our own homes.

 

[Vanilla]

Ok, that is torture, not fun. We should all be able to do what we want to do, especially in our own homes.

Aw, don't worry, I'm sure Turk's only joking. Turk is a great dad, and looks out for his son, so would not intentially do anything harmful to him

 

[Ste11aeres]

I do the same thing but I only last as long as the hot water and then my ability to think clearly goes away.

My hot water doesn't last even for a medium-length shower. I have to plan the rinsing off carefully to avoid a cold shock.

 

[Turk]

My shower is smaller than a phone-booth (remember those?), so it's hard to get immersed in thought. When I turn around, my butt hits the door, the door flies open, and I get a blast of cold air. For me, the shower is not a place for a zen-like experience of quiet contemplation. It's more like trying to escape the womb after an abnormally long gestation period.

Im just hoping that your shower screen isn't made of clear glass. I have this image of fruit in a glass bowl for some reason. The connection between those 2 situations, is disturbing, to say the least. LOL

 

[Ste11aeres]

Im just hoping that your shower screen isn't made of clear glass. I have this image of fruit in a glass bowl for some reason. The connection between those 2 situations, is disturbing, to say the least. LOL

Now I have this combined image of a fruit in a glass bowl and a pig in a glass bowl. Confused mind