Your Neurodivergent Work Profile: a complete sample
Prepared for Ciara · Reviewed by Dave O'Byrne, NeuroAdapt
This is a fictional sample. Ciara is not a real person; her answers were written to show how a Profile works. They are listed at the end of this page.
1. Your questions
Ciara, you came to this Profile with three questions. This report is built around answering them as well as your answers allow.
| You asked | Where it's answered |
|---|---|
| Why do I go well for weeks and then crash? | Section 7, Why it builds up |
| Which parts of my job suit me? | Sections 3 and 9 |
| Should I tell my manager, and how? | Section 9, with language you can adapt |
Along the way, the report teaches ZONE, a simple way of noticing what state you're in and choosing what to do next. By the end you should be able to recognise your own patterns earlier, and you'll have a one-page map (section 11) to keep beside you on difficult days.
2. How to use this report
This Profile is built from your own answers: 60 questionnaire items, your notes on what helps, and eight written reflections. Where it says "you told us", that is what you reported. Where it says "this suggests" or "one possibility", that is interpretation, offered for you to test against your experience. You are the expert on your own life, so if something doesn't fit, trust that.
It is an educational and reflective tool. It isn't a diagnosis, a clinical assessment or a judgement on your ability to do your job. If you are struggling with your mental or physical health, please talk to your GP or another professional.
You don't need to read it in one sitting. Sections 3 and 7 are the heart of it. Section 4 explains ZONE, and section 11 is the page to keep.
3. Your snapshot
Your answers describe someone who does her best work solving live problems with people, and who pays a high price for the detail, noise and pace that surround that work.
What stands out
Urgency is your engine, and it has a cost. You find starting hard (5 out of 5) and time unreliable (5 out of 5), and a deadline or a crisis is what gets you going. That works, often very well. But it tends to pull your evenings later, and you find it hard to rest without guilt (4 out of 5). Section 7 explores where that leads.
Your job has two halves. You feel most like yourself "in a workshop solving a problem with a whiteboard". Yet the things that drain you most are detail-heavy reporting, chasing other people's updates and month-end. One half of the role gives you energy; the other takes it.
Office days cost more than the work on them. Open-plan spaces are among your highest-rated drains (5 out of 5), especially with back-to-back meetings. You also put real effort into "looking organised" (one of the things you listed as hard-won). That effort is invisible, but you spend it every office day.
Feedback lands hard, even when it's fair. Criticism, or sensing disappointment, hits you strongly (5 out of 5). You've found that feedback in writing first, then a conversation, makes it easier to take in.
Three strengths your answers show
- You get things unstuck. It's what people come to you for, you rate your sense of your own strengths highly (4 out of 5), and it's where you feel most yourself. Calm in a crisis is part of the same strength.
- You make people feel included. Colleagues tell you so, and you choose one-to-one coffees and walking meetings to connect. That is a real asset in a coordinating role.
- You design systems that work for you. Auto-pay, lists on paper, an "admin hour" with a friend on the phone, a colleague to work alongside. None of that is luck. You've noticed what helps and built it in, which is exactly the skill ZONE builds on.
Connections between your answers
- Calm for others, hard on yourself. You're steady in other people's crises, yet your inner response to your own mistakes is harsh (4 out of 5). The kindness you show others is already a skill; this report invites you to point some of it inwards.
- Strong values, uneasy rest. You know your values well (4 out of 5), and rest makes you feel guilty. One possibility is that rest feels like falling short of values such as being reliable. Section 8 offers another way to look at that.
- Choice helps, but imposed structure doesn't. Deadlines you set yourself help you start; other people's last-minute changes don't bother you much (3 out of 5), but being told how to work does. Freedom over the method, with a clear end point, may suit you best.
4. Understanding ZONE
ZONE is a way of noticing what state you are in, working out what is contributing, and choosing a response that fits. It has three parts: a curve, a map and a cycle. You don't need to memorise any of them. The aim is a few useful questions you can ask in the middle of a working day.
Why more isn't always better
Most of us learned that more effort, more pressure and more input lead to more output. Up to a point, that is true. A little challenge helps you switch on. Too little leaves you restless or unable to start.
Past a certain point, though, more input makes things harder. Thinking narrows, small things irritate, and work that would normally be straightforward starts to feel impossible. Psychologists described this pattern over a century ago: there is a workable range in the middle, with costs on either side.
That workable range isn't fixed. The same meeting can feel fine on a Tuesday morning and unmanageable on a Friday afternoon. What changed is not the meeting but what you brought to it, which leads to the second part of ZONE.
Two questions, not one
When something feels off, ask two things:
- How much input am I dealing with? This is stimulation: sensory (noise, light, crowds), cognitive (information, decisions) and social (people, expectations).
- How much energy do I have available to meet it? This is your physical, mental and emotional fuel right now.
Put those two questions together and you get a map with six states.
The six states
| State | It can feel like | Options to consider |
|---|---|---|
| Steady | Focused, grounded, able to think clearly | Protect what is working rather than pushing for more |
| Balanced | Manageable, though energy, input or comfort is a little off. You may be tired but coping at this pace | A small adjustment, or simply protecting a manageable pace |
| Wired | Buzzy, restless, driven, racing thoughts | Lowering the intensity before the pace turns into a crash |
| Overloaded | Tense, irritable, foggy, stuck | Less input and fewer demands; more effort is unlikely to help |
| Flat | Heavy, drained, blank or disconnected; hard to engage even when little is being asked | Recovery, basic needs, support or lower expectations |
| Understimulated | Restless, disengaged, unable to switch on | The right kind of interest, challenge, movement or change |
The map earns its place in four pairs of states that can look alike from the outside:
- Flat and Understimulated can both mean you can't get started. With energy available, adding interest or challenge may help. When you are depleted, adding challenge usually makes things worse, and rest, fewer demands or support come first.
- Wired and Overloaded both involve a lot of input. Wired often feels driven, with energy still available. Overloaded often feels as if there is nothing left to meet the demands.
- Balanced and Flat can both involve low energy. Ask: "Is this manageable at my current pace, or am I struggling to engage even with little being asked?"
- Steady and Balanced are neighbours. Steady feels grounded and workable. Balanced is manageable but a little off-centre.
The boundaries are soft, and the names are guides rather than boxes. Pick the closest one; you can add detail, as in "Balanced, with low energy, because today's demands are light". A state suggests options. It doesn't prescribe a move, and it isn't a judgement.
What pulls you off balance
| Pull | What it covers |
|---|---|
| Sensory | Noise, light, temperature, environment |
| Cognitive Load | Too much information or too many decisions |
| Uncertainty | Unclear expectations or outcomes |
| Scrutiny | Feeling watched, judged or evaluated |
| Transitions | Switching between tasks, places or people |
| Body Needs | Hunger, thirst, tiredness, pain, needing to move |
Usually more than one is involved. The most likely one is enough to start with.
The ZONE cycle
Each step has a quick version for a busy moment and a deeper version for when you have time to reflect. Section 8 shows the deeper version.
- Z: Zero In. Where am I right now? Pick the closest state. A first impression is enough.
- O: Observe. What's most likely pulling me off balance, and what matters to me here?
- N: Navigate. What response could work here, given my needs, values and circumstances? It might be a quiet adjustment, a difficult conversation or a bigger change.
- E: Engage. What's one small thing I'll do next? Do it, then look back later: did it help, what did it cost, and what would I keep or change?
Then the cycle starts again, and each time round you learn a little more about your own patterns.
The goal isn't to stay Steady
Working life involves all six states. Feeling driven can suit a short deadline for some people, some of the time. Some days may feel Flat whatever you do. ZONE is about choosing what serves your needs and values in the situation you are actually in. Sometimes that means carrying on with discomfort, sometimes changing the conditions, sometimes stopping.
Underneath it all
Your worth is not on the line at any point in this cycle. You don't earn acceptance by choosing well, and a move that doesn't work isn't a failure. It is information about that choice, in that situation, on that day. When something goes differently than you hoped, ask "What can I learn here?" with the same kindness you would offer someone you care about.
5. Your ZONE states
Here is what each state may look like in your working life, drawn from your answers. Treat it as a first draft: cross out what doesn't fit and add what you notice.
| State | What it may look like for you | Likely pulls | What has helped |
|---|---|---|---|
| Steady | A clear plan by 10am, one big task you care about, solving a problem with people around a whiteboard | (Things going right: low Uncertainty, manageable Cognitive Load) | A clear plan early, a walk at lunch, no surprise meetings |
| Balanced | A home-working day: a little tired, but headphones on and the list moving | Body Needs | Working from home, a standing desk, a water bottle you like |
| Wired | A crisis or a close deadline: fast, focused and calm, then still buzzing at bedtime | Cognitive Load, Transitions (losing track of time) | A swim; otherwise still to discover |
| Overloaded | An office day of back-to-back meetings in open plan, chasing updates, or month-end reporting | Sensory, Cognitive Load, Scrutiny | Noise-cancelling headphones, a desk by the window, a walk outside |
| Flat | The days after a crash, or evenings after office days when even school emails feel impossible | Body Needs (sleep), Cognitive Load (admin piling up) | A Saturday morning with nothing planned, a sea swim, an evening with nothing in it |
| Understimulated | Routine reporting or long meetings where you aren't needed: you can't get started | Cognitive Load (too little interest), Transitions | A deadline, music, working alongside a colleague |
Two things worth noticing. First, Wired may feel like you at your best: calm in a crisis, getting things unstuck. Often it is. The question section 7 asks is what it costs afterwards.
Second, your reporting work shows up in two states. It can leave you Understimulated (nothing to pull you in) and, at month-end, Overloaded (too much at once). The same task can need opposite responses on different days, which is why Zero In comes before choosing what to do.
Still to discover: your answers don't show how Wired turns into Flat, whether gradually or suddenly, or what your first sign is. Section 7 helps you watch for it.
6. Your main pulls
Three of the six pulls stand out in your answers: Cognitive Load, Sensory and Scrutiny. Each one below starts with what the pull is, then what your answers show, then something to try.
Cognitive Load
Every piece of work has two parts: the task itself, and holding it in mind. What's next, what's waiting, who needs what. When the second part grows, even simple tasks feel heavy. For many neurodivergent people, holding things in mind is the most expensive part of the job, which is why lists on paper and working alongside someone help so much.
What your answers show. Keeping track of several things at once takes significant effort (5 out of 5), and a typical day leaves you depleted (5 out of 5). Outside work, life admin takes far more effort than it seems it should (5 out of 5). Chasing other people's updates, one of your biggest drains, is pure holding-in-mind: open loops that aren't yours to close. You also feel shame about admin difficulties (5 out of 5), which adds an emotional cost on top of the practical one.
Something to try. At the end of each working day, spend two minutes writing your open loops on paper: what's waiting, on whom, and the next step. Put chasing into one fixed slot a day, using the same short message each time.
What to notice. Does your evening feel any lighter when the loops are on paper rather than in your head?
Sensory
Your nervous system processes the environment whether you notice it or not. Noise, light and movement use up capacity before any work begins. When an environment costs a lot, people often blame themselves for losing focus, when the room is doing part of the damage.
What your answers show. Open-plan offices, shops and public transport are among your strongest drains (5 out of 5), and certain sounds and lights affect you more than others seem to notice (4 out of 5). You also seek out input that helps: music, movement, a swim (4 out of 5). You already know what works: noise-cancelling headphones, a desk by the window, working from home.
Something to try. On office days, book the quietest spot you can for your first hour of focused work, and ask for meetings to sit in the afternoon.
What to notice. Compare your evening energy after office days with and without that protected hour.
Scrutiny
Being watched or evaluated gives your brain two jobs at once: the task, and monitoring how you come across. Managing feedback, reading unwritten rules and "looking organised" all draw on the same capacity.
What your answers show. Sensing disappointment and receiving feedback both hit you strongly (5 out of 5), and you replay conversations afterwards (4 out of 5). You spend real energy monitoring how you come across (4 out of 5) and feel exhausted after interactions (4 out of 5). What helps is already clear in your answers: feedback in writing first, then a conversation, and a manager who says what's going well.
Something to try. After any feedback conversation, write down the one thing you've agreed to do. When you notice yourself replaying it later, say "replaying" to yourself, and look at the note instead.
What to notice. Does naming it shorten the time it takes to settle?
The other three pulls
Uncertainty and Transitions show up less strongly in your answers. Body Needs matters mainly through sleep, which section 7 looks at closely.
7. Why it builds up
You asked why you go well for weeks and then crash. Your answers suggest a pattern that may explain it, and some points where you could step in earlier.
How load builds up
Every working day draws on two accounts. The first is the work itself. The second is everything around it: noise, travel, unwritten rules, watching how you come across, holding things in mind. The first shows up in your output. The second rarely shows up anywhere, so it is easy not to count.
Recovery refills both, but only when it gets the time and conditions it needs. When more goes out than comes back, the gap stays hidden for a while, because you keep delivering. Then it shows up all at once.
People tend to run this gap in one of two shapes. In a slow leak, a steady daily cost wears capacity down over months. In boom and crash, urgency carries you through a demanding stretch, often borrowing from sleep and rest, and the bill arrives when the pressure lifts.
What your answers show
Your answers fit boom and crash more closely.
The boom. Starting is hard for you (5 out of 5) and time feels unreliable (5 out of 5), so urgency does a lot of work. A deadline or a crisis switches you on, and you're good in it: calm, quick, getting things unstuck. Those weeks probably feel like you at your best. In ZONE terms, a lot of that time may be Wired.
What it borrows. At the same time, your mind stays active at night (5 out of 5), you feel most alert late in the evening (4 out of 5), and poor sleep hits your next day hard (4 out of 5). Resting makes you feel guilty (4 out of 5), so you're unlikely to stop just because you're tired. Add the office days that leave you Overloaded, and a busy stretch may be quietly running down sleep and recovery while everything looks fine.
The crash. When the push ends, the debt arrives. You describe evenings where even school emails feel impossible. That is Flat. Meanwhile, admin piles up (4 out of 5) and you feel shame about it (5 out of 5), which makes your inner voice harsher (4 out of 5) and restarting harder.
Check this against your own history. Did your crashes come after a big push, a run of office days, a change at home, or something else? If the pattern fits, it is good news of a kind. It isn't a lack of discipline. It is a cycle with predictable points where you can step in.
Something already working for you
You know exactly what restores you: a sea swim, an evening with nothing in it, a Saturday morning with nothing planned, cooking something new. You also have your sister to talk to. Those are your recovery tools. The plan below is about using them before the crash, not only after it.
One idea worth taking from your strength in crises: plan the landing, not just the take-off. When you know a deadline is coming, put a lighter day in your diary for straight after it.
Your early warning plan
The hardest time to notice the signs is during a boom, when everything seems to be going well. That's why this plan is best written now.
Signs worth watching, drawn from your answers. Mark the ones that fit and add your own:
- Your bedtime drifting later, night after night
- Still buzzing at bedtime after a Wired day
- Skipping the lunchtime walk or the swim "just this week"
- Life admin starting to pile up
- Your inner voice getting harsher about small mistakes
- Replaying conversations more than usual
| Stage | The sign I notice | What I'll do | Who I'll tell |
|---|---|---|---|
| Early: a sign that's unusual for me | Example: protect one evening with nothing in it; keep the swim | ||
| Building: several signs, or one that isn't easing | Example: ask my manager which deadline can move; hand on one piece of reporting | ||
| Urgent: Flat most days, and rest isn't helping | Example: talk to my GP; take leave I'm owed |
The stages are yours to define: go by what is unusual for you, not a set number of days. And if you miss the signs one time, that is information too. Come back to the plan with curiosity, not blame.
8. The ZONE cycle in practice
The quick version of ZONE takes a minute. This section shows the deeper version, for when you have time to look back at a difficult moment and learn from it. Then it walks through an example built from your themes.
Z: Zero In, more deeply
As well as "Where am I now?", ask "Where was I an hour ago?" The change often tells you more than the state. Moving from Steady to Overloaded in one meeting points somewhere different from a slow slide across the day.
O: Observe with a fishbone
Write the experience at the head of a fishbone, such as "I can't start the report". Each bone is one of the six pulls. Note anything that might be contributing on each, and leave the rest blank. Several small things often add up to one big effect.
Then look inwards with EMITS: the Emotions, Memories, Images, Thoughts and Sensations that are showing up. These are things to notice, not problems to remove. One or two is plenty.
Finally, ask what matters to you here. Values are the qualities you want to bring to your work and life, like being reliable, fair or kind. Noticing them alongside the difficult feelings gives your next choice a direction.
N: Navigate with towards and away moves
A towards move serves something that matters to you. An away move is mainly about escaping an uncomfortable feeling. The same action can be either: leaving a room can protect your health or avoid a conversation you care about having. Neither is good or bad. The question is what it does for you, here.
It also helps to look at your familiar ways of coping, using four prompts: Distraction, Opting out, Thinking (going over and over things), and Substances and other ways of changing how you feel, such as coffee, food or scrolling. Ask what each gives you now, and what it costs over time.
Then check workability: does this option move me towards what matters, at a cost I can sustain? A response can be uncomfortable and still workable.
E: Engage, then review
Choose one move small enough to do with the capacity you have. Later, look back without grading yourself:
| What happened | What you might learn |
|---|---|
| It helped | Try the helpful part again before drawing big conclusions |
| It helped, but cost a lot | The output improved, but the cost may be too high to repeat. Look at conditions too |
| Little changed | The pull you chose may not have been the main one |
| It wasn't possible | The setting limited the experiment. That is information about fit |
An example from your themes
This situation is illustrative. It combines patterns from your answers; it isn't something we know happened.
It's a Tuesday office day at month-end. You've had meetings all morning in the open-plan area. In the last one, your manager says the report "needs to be tighter this month". At 3pm you sit down to start it and can't.
Z. Tense, foggy, stuck. Is it manageable at this pace? No. Closest state: Overloaded. An hour ago, before the meeting, it was more like Balanced.
O. On the fishbone: Sensory, a loud morning. Cognitive Load, month-end and five open loops. Scrutiny, the comment about the report. Body Needs, no lunchtime walk and a late night. EMITS: embarrassment; the thought "I always get this wrong"; a tight chest. What matters: doing good work, and being someone your team can rely on.
N. Option one: stay late and rewrite the whole report. That would ease the embarrassment tonight, but it borrows from sleep, the start of a boom. Option two: ask what "tighter" means, in writing, then take a short walk before starting. That serves good work, at a lower cost. Option two looks more workable.
E. You send two lines: "Could you send me a couple of examples of what tighter looks like? I'll have a draft to you by Thursday." Then you take a ten-minute walk.
Review on Thursday. Did the examples make the report easier to start? Did you sleep better than on a late-night rewrite? Whatever happened, you have learned something about how you handle feedback at month-end.
9. Work that could fit
You asked which parts of your job suit you. Your answers give a fairly clear split.
| Gives you energy | Costs you energy |
|---|---|
| Solving live problems with people | Detail-heavy reporting, especially month-end |
| Workshops and whiteboard sessions | Chasing other people's updates |
| Being the calm one in a crisis | Back-to-back meetings in open plan |
| One-to-ones, walking meetings, connecting people | Long meetings where you aren't needed |
Your own description of a better fit matches this: fewer office days, more problem-solving and less reporting, someone else on the detail, and meetings clustered rather than scattered.
Directions worth exploring
Reshape your current role first. Small trades can shift the balance without a new job. You could take on more of the unblocking and workshop work, and hand some routine reporting to a colleague who likes detail. Clustering meetings and protecting a focus morning would help too. Section 10 has an experiment to test this.
Longer term, look for roles where problem-solving with people is the core, and detail is supported by someone else or a good system. Examples might include delivery or programme leadership with an analyst alongside, facilitation, operational troubleshooting or change work. These are directions to investigate, not a verdict on what you should do.
Whatever the role, ask these questions: How much of the week is reporting? Who owns the detail? How many office days are expected? Are meetings clustered or scattered? How is feedback given?
Should you tell your manager?
That is your decision, and there is no single right answer. Three things may help you weigh it.
- You don't have to disclose a diagnosis to ask for what helps you work well. Many of the changes in this report, like clustered meetings or feedback in writing first, are reasonable requests in their own right.
- Disclosure can give you a firmer footing. Depending on where you work, equality law may require your employer to consider reasonable adjustments once they know about a disability. If you work in Ireland, our guide to disclosure and reasonable accommodation explains how that works. For your own situation, check your workplace's policy or get advice.
- Your answers suggest planning the conversation carefully. Feedback and sensing disappointment land hard for you. Choosing the time, deciding in advance what you'll ask for, and following up in writing can make it easier.
Language you could adapt
Without disclosing: "I do my best work on problem-solving and coordination. On office days, clustering meetings into the afternoon and keeping a quiet first hour would help me deliver more of that."
About feedback: "I take feedback in best when I get the main points in writing first, and then we talk them through."
If you choose to disclose: "I was diagnosed with ADHD last year. It explains some things I've always found harder, like detail-heavy reporting, and some things I'm good at, like getting problems unstuck. A few changes would help me do more of the second."
These are starting points, not scripts. Change the words until they sound like you.
10. Experiments to choose from
Pick one, adapt it, or pick none. These are ways to learn, not homework. Use an ordinary week rather than your hardest one.
Plan the landing
Why this may fit you: your pattern looks like boom and crash, and the crash comes when the pressure lifts.
Try: before your next big deadline, put a lighter day in your diary for straight after it. Keep the swim or the empty evening in the week that follows.
Notice: how long it takes you to feel like yourself again, compared with last time.
Protect the first hour
Why this may fit you: office days are where Sensory and Cognitive Load pile up together.
Try: for two office days, book the quietest spot you can for your first hour and ask for meetings after lunch. Headphones on.
Notice: your energy that evening, compared with an office day without it.
Month-end with company
Why this may fit you: working alongside someone already helps you with life admin, and reporting is your hardest work to start.
Try: at month-end, book an hour with a colleague, each working on your own tasks, in the same room or on a call.
Notice: was it easier to start? Did the report carry less dread than usual?
Keeping track, lightly
A line in a notebook is enough: what I tried, what helped, what it cost, what next. There's no streak to keep and no wrong result. If none of these feels doable right now, rest is a valid choice too.
11. Your ZONE map
The page to keep. Print it, screenshot it, or copy it into the ZONE check-in.
Z: Where am I? O: What's pulling me? N: What could work here? E: One small thing, then look back.
| State | My signs | Options I can try |
|---|---|---|
| Steady | Clear plan, one task I care about, thinking well | Protect the plan; keep the lunch walk |
| Balanced | Tired but the list is moving | Headphones, water, keep this pace; leave demanding work for later |
| Wired | Fast and focused; still buzzing at bedtime | Notice the bedtime; plan the landing |
| Overloaded | Tense, foggy, back-to-back meetings | Step outside; open loops onto paper; one clarifying question |
| Flat | Even small emails feel impossible | An empty evening, a swim; lower expectations; admin can wait |
| Understimulated | Can't start routine reporting | Music, a deadline, someone working alongside me |
My main pulls: Cognitive Load, Sensory, Scrutiny.
My early warnings: bedtime drifting later, skipping the swim, admin piling up, a harsher inner voice.
What restores me: sea swims, an evening with nothing in it, Saturday mornings with no plans, cooking something new, my sister.
Words for work: "Could we cluster meetings in the afternoon?" "Could I get the main points in writing first?"
Remember: my worth isn't being tested. Whatever happens is something to learn from.
12. About this report
Your Profile was drafted from your questionnaire answers with the help of AI, then read and reviewed by Dave O'Byrne before it reached you. The interpretations are possibilities, built carefully from what you told us. They are not a diagnosis or a clinical assessment.
ZONE is NeuroAdapt's reflection framework. It draws on several established ideas:
- the relationship between arousal and performance first described by Yerkes and Dodson (1908)
- the ACT Matrix from Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, for towards and away moves and values
- the DOTS prompts from Russ Harris's ACT resources, for looking at familiar ways of coping
ZONE combines these for education and reflection. It hasn't been tested as a clinical intervention.
If anything in this report raised something difficult, please talk to someone you trust, your GP or another professional.
Thank you for the care you put into your answers. The detail you gave is what made this report yours.
The answers behind this sample
Ciara is invented. She is 38, a project coordinator at an engineering firm, works three office days a week, has two children, and was diagnosed with ADHD last year. Ratings run from 1 (not like me) to 5 (very like me), listed in questionnaire order.
| Domain | Label | Ratings | What helps, in her words |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 Executive load | Prominent | 5, 5, 3, 4, 5 | Lists on paper, working alongside a colleague, a deadline, music |
| 2 Sensory | Prominent | 4, 5, 4, 3, 4 | Noise-cancelling headphones, a desk by the window, working from home |
| 3 Feedback and emotional intensity | Prominent | 5, 4, 5, 4, 3 | Feedback in writing first, then a chat. A manager who says what's going well |
| 4 Masking | Active | 4, 4, 3, 2, 3 | With my sister and two old college friends |
| 5 Transitions and autonomy | Prominent | 3, 3, 4, 5, 5 | Choosing the order of my tasks, deadlines I set myself, visual timers |
| 6 Social navigation | Active | 3, 4, 3, 4, 2 | One-to-one coffees, team lunches when I know people, walking meetings |
| 7 Sleep and rest | Prominent | 5, 4, 4, 4, 3 | A swim, Saturday mornings with nothing planned, reading fiction |
| 8 Body signals | Active | 4, 2, 5, 3, 4 | Walking at lunch, a standing desk, a water bottle I like |
| 9 Shame and self-compassion | Prominent | 4, 4, 3, 3, 4 | Talking to my sister, an ADHD podcast, remembering what I've built |
| 10 Strengths and values | Active | 4, 4, 3, 2, 5 | People say I'm the one who gets things unstuck. That feels true |
| 11 Life admin | Prominent | 5, 4, 4, 5, 4 | Auto-pay, my partner handles the post, an "admin hour" with a friend on the phone |
| 12 Relationships | Active | 3, 4, 3, 3, 3 | With my sister, and at home |
Open reflections
- A good day: "A clear plan by 10am, one big task I care about, a walk at lunch, no surprise meetings, home by six with energy left for the kids."
- What drains me most: "Open-plan office days with back-to-back meetings, chasing other people's updates, month-end reporting, school admin emails."
- Where I feel most like myself: "In a workshop solving a problem with a whiteboard, on a sea swim, with my sister."
- What people value in me: "I'm the one who gets things unstuck. People say I'm calm in a crisis and I make people feel included."
- What I've learned to manage: "Detail-heavy reporting, sitting through long meetings, remembering everyone's birthdays, looking organised."
- What helps me recover: "Sea swimming, an evening with nothing in it, cooking something new, walking with headphones."
- What I'd like to understand: "Why I go well for weeks and then crash. Which parts of my job suit me. Whether and how to tell my manager."
- If work fitted me better: "Fewer office days, more problem-solving and less reporting, someone else on the detail, meetings clustered instead of scattered."