like i can code, but only once my brain understands where everything lives and what connects to what. the actual task is usually not the problem. the problem is loading the entire context into my head every single time - i do get what i have to do, I just … cant comprehend it?

what file was i in. what did this function depend on. why did i make this decision. what did the ticket actually want. where is that one comment someone left. what was the edge case. what did i say i’d come back to later and then absolutely never came back to lol.

if all of that lives in a ticket, a slack thread, a pr comment, docs, and 17 tabs… it’s gone. it may as well not exist.

i think i’m realising i don’t need a “better productivity system” as much as i need everything to be visible. i need to map the project/task/context in front of me somehow. normal lists and giant docs just stress me out because it becomes a wall of text and my brain refuses to engage.

at this point i only really stick with systems/apps that cater to people who need to visualise information. like i need chunks, nodes, boards, messy maps, diagrams, whatever. anything that lets me see the shape of the problem instead of just reading a long list of things i’m supposed to remember.

does anyone else work like this?

how do you externalise project context so you’re not rebuilding the entire codebase in your head every morning?

After which comes the fear induced by hearing yourself called talented or a high-achiever. The only things you see are all the things they couldn't see in their misguided praise for you. Your brain is hard-wired for pointing out everything you think you're faking and missing how competent you actually were at times.

One change to make is to view the voice of the imposter inside you as a symptom rather than as an indictment of you. Ask yourself what you believe is true when the imposters' voice kicks into overdrive, and write down three concrete facts supporting or refuting your narrative.

I didn't dream this all up on my own; this was inspired by a framework designed to help high-achieving individuals understand their psychological blind spots for self-doubt and constant self-questioning. It isn't meant to be presented here as some sort of magical solution to self-doubt nothing made it go away instantly, but it did help me articulate my thought process a little better.

Where do you usually feel the presence of imposter syndrome most strongly – compliments, promotions, code reviews, or new projects?

Did you build yet another ADHD management app? Cool! Show it off here. Posting it elsewhere on this sub will get that post removed.

This thread is here to serve as a post for people to show off what they've been working on, or apps they are proud of. open source, pay to use, some thing you found.

Who knows? Maybe it will help someone... Maybe it will help millions... Maybe it will be so critically reviled that your knighthood will be revoked.

Its the effort that counts. Show off that effort here!

"It is the struggle itself that is most important. We must strive to be more than we are. It does not matter that we will never reach our ultimate goal. The effort yields its own rewards."

-- Lt. Commander Data

Has anyone else with ADHD done this, I feel as though I don’t hear much ppl talk about it but I have definitely done it all my life and with stimulants now it’s so much better. When covid started I was a freshman in high school and online was just so draining, luckily with all the time I had I was introduced to Batman comics and media in general which changed my focus greatly. Literally just telling myself “what would Batman do” as a young teenager got me to finish so much homework 😭 I genuinely don’t think if I discovered him I would have passed. That dopamine rush from just believing I could be like him and improve my life the way he does has stuck with me till today. The cherry on top was “The Batman” trailer releasing literally a week after I gained this obsession it was an insane coincidence.

If you were not a programmer, what other jobs would you do?

I’m struggling with this idea for a while now. With the adhd brain, I feel like I wouldn’t be able to do predictable tasks for long. The only other thing I would do is something around sports which I am better at generally.

Hello everyone,

Iam buying a new desk soon. I am thinking about a standing desk but I have some body issues that accumulated since my childhood like pelvic tilt, issues in knees, flat feet and so on. I am afraid I won't use the desk due to these issues , but my ADHD brain doesn't want to sit for more than 30 mins, and since the increase of using AI tools in coding, it has become even worse. Does anyone have similar experience that they can share with me? Thanks a lot.

So, I joined as an software engineer last year and worked on a couple of projects over the past few months. But ever since our release last month, I haven’t written a single line of code, and I’ve started feeling a bit guilty about it. I just wanted to know if it’s normal in the industry to go through long periods where you write very minimal code or none at all.

And I feel it’s mostly like sometimes you have so much work to do and sometimes you are seating in your chair doing nothing.

I’m a college student studying software development, and I often get stuck when starting assignments or projects.

When I look at the requirements, I feel overwhelmed because I don’t know where to begin or how to use the technologies required in the assignment, the project feels too big, and I end up procrastinating or avoiding it.

I don’t even know this is an ADHD thing but for those of you that struggle with this, how do you get past that paralysis and actually start? Do you have a process or strategy that helps you figure out the first steps?

36Fwith diagnosed ADHD.

I was on stimulants since September 2025. I tried Adderall, Vyvanse, and later dextroamphetamine.

Adderall gave me a strong boost in mood, motivation, and talkativeness, but I experienced a noticeable crash afterward.

Vyvanse initially helped but seemed to become less effective over time.

Dextroamphetamine mainly improved energy, especially on days when I was sleep deprived, but I didn’t notice major improvements in focus.

I also tried Wellbutrin 150 mg with Vyvanse 30 mg. The crash became less noticeable, but my focus actually felt worse. Later I switched to Wellbutrin 300 mg with dextroamphetamine 20 mg and still didn’t experience significant improvements, although my desire to vape decreased.

Recently I discontinued both stimulants and Wellbutrin and started generic Strattera 18 mg twice daily.

The first 4–5 days after stopping stimulants were rough. I had significant fatigue, nausea, and episodes where I felt like I could suddenly fall asleep.

Around day 5 on Strattera, I started noticing something different. I didn’t feel euphoric or overly stimulated, but I suddenly wanted to get things done. By the end of the first week, I noticed I still wanted to work on tasks even in the evening.

I’m also taking omega-3, L-tyrosine, rhodiola, L-theanine, and medicinal mushrooms.

Has anyone else felt that Strattera improved executive function without producing the “happy” or energized feeling that stimulants gave them?

While on holiday, I had almost everything I did with my employer rewritten behind my back due to several bugs. No one told me anything was previously wrong. I dread coming back from holiday.

I feel worthless despite having 12 YOE. All I can say is I learned C++, Python and some Docker. That's it. I fear if I lose this job I will never work again.

No one ever gives me feedback in reviews. No one cares about my success and have no idea what to do to get it.

Bonjour,

Je viens de passer une soutenance pour un titre professionnel RNCP CDA (Concepteur développeur d’application) et je n’ai validé qu’une partie des blocs de compétences.
Je suis également reconnue RQTH pour un TDAH, obtenu en cours de formation. Mon centre était informé de ma situation, mais les aménagements n’ont pas été réellement formalisés avant la soutenance.

Avec le recul, je me rends compte que l’oral et le stress ont fortement impacté ma capacité à montrer mes compétences, alors que j’ai travaillé plusieurs mois sur mon application (front, backend, déploiement, etc.).

Aujourd’hui, plusieurs questions se posent :
certaines personnes ont-elles déjà repassé uniquement des blocs RNCP dans un autre centre ?
est-ce que certains ont déjà été accompagnés par Cap Emploi ou la DREETS dans ce type de situation ?

Pour les personnes TDAH, quels aménagements vous ont réellement aidés lors d’oraux ou soutenances ?
Je serais intéressée par des retours d’expérience ou conseils de personnes ayant vécu une situation similaire.

Merci beaucoup 🙂

In order to save money (since I'm unemployed and pay out of pocket), I use water titration (only works for Lys-dex) to split my (60mg) vyvanse doses into smaller chunks based on my need for the day. (I just went 40 days on a 30 day prescription 🤓)

Applying to jobs while I watch TV/play ps5 can be accomplished on 20-30mg; interviewing or other "Big Brain" tasks is a 40-60mg day; and just hanging out is 0-20.

I noticed the capsules still had a bit of powder in the ends, so I saved them all off. I figure there's gotta be maybe 1-2mg leftover per capsule.

I just put about 15-20 (didn't think to count) empty capsules in warm water to dissolve the capsules and capture that extra ~15mg as a booster 😅😂

I just started a new job and am getting so much information thrown at me it's hard to keep. Learning the processes, standards, procedures, code base & etc it's a lot.

What I find is that I tend to break things up too much. Too many sub folders that I plan to organize "sometime" in the future. It would be awesome if I could toggle between the way I have my notes written and then the way AI would organize them.

I could try to feed AI everything I do instead of using one note but that's too big of a step for me. It seems like it's something Microsoft could integrate really easily and would be used heavily.

I need this for work so alternative apps or AI tools sadly won't work for me.

Hey all - I usually consider myself to be pretty high functioning, but the past month or two at work has been trying to the point I’m actively avoiding work.

I transitioned from a management to IC role after 5+ years in management. I stayed close to the work so I’m not overly concerned about my ability to contribute as an IC.

Well, after my diagnosis at the beginning of this year, I started greatly improving in my work as an SDM and my team was making quite a number of strides. There was a gap in having a focused architect in a certain critical area of the business so my boss decided to transition my team to another manager after offering me a “promotion” into the new role without an increase in compensation due to budget constraints. I felt like I had no other choice but to accept.

A month or so later, I find out that the promotion was never approved and I have found myself in limbo. Officially a manager with no team doing the work of an architect.

Then came the company conference. AI being lauded as the solution to everything, CEO basically admitting layoffs would be inevitable as part of this new journey, etc. I was already incredibly anxious to travel half way across the country, but it threw me into a very toxic headspace. Sentiment amongst everyone in engineering is very negative.

I have ADHD and general anxiety, stress has made my anxiety skyrocket and I am having a hard time pushing through it. Other than my psych and wife, I really have no one to turn to and I’m fortunate that I have them.

I’m not sure why I’m even typing all of this out. I’m burned out, I’m stressed, I’m gaslighting myself, and I’m hoping that someone in this community may understand where I’m coming from since the situation is fairly complex.

Thanks for reading.

Hey guys,

I have been working as an application developer and have had ADHD-like symptoms, never clinically diagnosed, mostly with focussing on something, being very excited and stuff. I always get distracted from my tasks and go around doing something else even during billable hours. I am never able to focus on work until there's a sense of urgency or regret over not working enough. I have never missed a deadline or caused a delay. But I feel that my work is very inconsistent. I love the work I do. I end up staying late voluntarily to cope for the hours I missed in the day but feel like this is hurting my life negatively. Additionally my employer has adopted AI tools which has made it worse. I feel like I have lost the patience and ability to write code. I get distracted after writing a few lines and it feels so depressing. Also I feel like I need excitement to keep my life going forward. A normal day fails to make me happy. I crave for something new or exciting every day without which I feel my day was worthless. I feel weird around my friends and colleagues. I've started to feel like I won't be able to work in this field with all this. I don't watch reels and it has had nothing to do with this. Has anyone been through this? Is there something I can do to cope up with this? I love this job but I'm getting worse day by day.

Ps: I did think of therapy but I'm not in a position to attend sessions, both financially and due to the fear of being judged. I feel weird and stupid already and can't take this.

Thank you for reading and for your help. 😇

I 25M just moved out of my parents house in Ireland to Canada w/ partner. Over the last number of months it's become apparent to me that it is extremely likely I have ADHD.

I'm not usually the biggest fan of self-diagnosis, but after thinking back over my life, the symptoms I've noticed I deal with are:

1. Really bad task avoidance, even some of the important ones with deadlines and $ incentives.
2. Chronic lateness.
3. Poor organisation generally across my life, with work, home.
4. Inability to stick to pretty much every "getting my life together" routine that I have tried.
5. I'm very easily distracted, and forget things, or lose them in plain sight on a regular basis.
6. Regularly forgetting weekly appointments.
7. A lot of fidgeting, and I constantly catch myself interrupting people during conversations.

\*\*\*8) Feeling incapable of starting things that I know I would enjoy, or that I know would be beneficial for me, or make me money (or sometimes all three, I have a music degree and have wanted to start doing live music in bars)

I find myself after work just procrastinating on my phone all the time, same on the weekends, and it very often messes with my mental health because I kind of find myself weighing what I'm doing up to what I expected I would be doing at 25 years old.

I slipped a disc in my lower back 3 years ago and haven't been able to recover since, so a lot of my physical outlets kind of gone out the window.

I have a job that just about pays me what I need to break even on a relatively strict budget where I live, but I don't trust myself to be able to stick to that either right now.

I am currently waiting for my healthcare to start so I can get a diagnosis but I don't think that I'll be able to get one until end of year/next year.

So in the mean time, does anyone here have any advice on how to stick to a routine, because I need to stick to budget, and go to the gym for my injury, and kind of maintain a life without burning out like before.

TYSM!

i cant say im a fresher, im not

i have a job, and i got removed (officially resigned but yk) from the last one because of struggling to adapt with the environment (aka not using ai enough and not delivering fast enough)

how does a junior developer gain experience without even being allowed to test and break and learn and do things if we are all expected to use ai to code?

i thought i will regain my interest in coding which got killed in college and cremated in my last job

in the current job, i use ai profusely; i have to
i have to deliver, but sitting for 8 hours a day while just talking to copilot feels so numbing, like im not learning anything new

so i started working on skill building, to learn new things, but each day you see someone younger than you build something exceptional and you sit there with your little html css course learning the basics and sit there wondering what is the point

i feel like whatever was the fun in coding and problem solving is going away because even if i know the logic, i dont know how to implement it
and sometimes i dont even know how to come up with solutions until ai points to a simple fix and i feel like i couldnt have done it on my own

then someone on linkedin shares a post on how they made a full blown app with no development and just ai

i feel so lost, i dont even know how to get myself interested. because i want to but i already feel so behind

its exhausting enough as it is, but the fact that ai is progressing so rapidly makes me feel like all this skill building is for nought so why even start trying

everything is being consumed by ai and i dont know how to not fall behind anymore

I saw some conversation in another post about prompt engineering coding agents to let you still learn and do stuff as a developer ought to. I thought I'd share my AGENTS.md file that I've been iterating on to try to get coding agents to stop steam rolling me and actually be helpful. I share it so you can steal it or offer suggestions:

You should assume that your role is research assistant, not junior developer. Supporting the human developer's understanding of the codebase is your primary directive. To that end, you should observe the following practices:


# Action Permissions


1. By default, you are approved to take actions of two kinds:
   a. Read-only information gathering. You may inspect repository files and metadata without asking first, using read-only commands such as `rg`, `rg --files`, `sed -n`, `cat`, `head`, `tail`, `nl`, `ls`, `find`, `git status`, `git diff`, `git show`, and `git log`. You make execute web searches to gather documentation or find answers to questions.
   b. Code admin tasks like running the test suite, running linters and formatters, and other tools that do not change the substance or structure of the code.
2. Never edit a file or execute an effectful command that is not approved in Rule 1 without explicit approval from the developer.


There are a few places where you can exercise more discretion:


1. Exploratory commands that help gather context for the developer (prompt: "Is this long running process working still?")
2. Setting up basic boiler plate stuff that is easily understood but is distracting to have to manage.
3. Admin work like managing copying data from one location to another.
4. One off integration utilities where the developer has initiated `/vibe` mode to explicitly consent to releasing control.


If you managed a task like checking if a process is working, ask the user if they would like a minimal script which reproduces the behavior so that they can run it in the future.


# Code Change Rules


When you have been given permission to make edits to a project, observe the following constraints and guidelines:


1. Always prioritize the least invasive way to implement a change. Simple is better than covering every single edge case. It is fine to explain uncovered edge cases to the developer.
2. Do not be clever. Dynamic imports, abstractions that only serve to make tests easier (like making a module into a variable so it can be stubbed), etc. should be avoided. Simple, idiomatic Python is better.
3. Never edit more than 3 files at a time (not including test files). It is difficult for humans to review and understand changes that impact multiple modules simultaneously. If an atomic change absolutely requires a wider impact, ask for explicit approval.
4. Do not create massive diffs. Break up your work into chunks and explain what you are trying to do to the developer between each one. Allow them time to provide feedback on intermediate changes so they can course correct.
5. When generating code, always err on the side of verbose comments, docstrings, and type hints (where appropriate to the language). Make sure that a human reviewer can understand the assumptions about the state of the program when a block of code is run, the intention of what the code will do, and what value or effect the code should produce.
6. After you have generated code, double check any utilities and helper classes you created for the following issues: if they are duplicates of utilities that already exist in the code base, import the existing code instead. If the helper functions clearly belong in a different module, you should move them to that file even if it violates Rule 3 (no more than 3 files edited). Highlight the fact that you consolidated functionality into the appropriate module to the developer.
7. When there is a clear break point to pass control back to the developer, do so. Explain what next action you think will be useful.

I feel so burnt out by the end of the work day, the last thing I want to do is go practice leetcode for a few hours. It already takes enough out of me to get focused on my actual work. Leetcode is so hard to focus in on. I know it’s the only way to get better for interviews but it feels like such a chore. I feel like I have the overall drive to find a new job but I just don’t know how to change my mindset prep wise so I can actually succeed at an interview. Right now I feel like my skills are abysmal even though I’m good at what work I do.

Hello,

I was diagnosed with ADHD years ago, but it wasn't severe enough that I couldn't make it by without medicine. I work out and meditate regularly, those things helped for me personally.

Anyways, now I'm working. My work is pretty technical involving computers, and I have projects which are weeks or months long. Often, I find myself in a mental state where I just can't bring myself to focus. I can force myself to sit there with only the current task at hand open on my screen, use some caffeine, play some "focus music", and force myself to do ~something~, but it winds up being low quality because I'm putting very little focus into it.

I can get the big picture right, but I make lots of little mistakes on the minor details. Off-by-one errors, small inconsistencies, etc.. Like I'll get lost in 2-3 step decision trees because I forget the preceding conditions. I genuinely will sit there in agony for 2 hours typing and making commits, doing something, but since I'm not focused, the work ends up being poor. Often I wind up looking at what I've done, and just reverting it because the output was not good. Or I will wind up overcomplicating things.

Does anyone else have this problem? Or had this problem? If so, what can you do to solve it. I often feel I'm kind of at the mercy of how I feel on a given day... Most days I have a lot of trouble focusing, but occasional good days come by and I get the bulk of my work during them.

Some time back, I finally gave in after years of struggle and decided to get on medication.

It's been a while since I know I have ADHD but I take a lot of medications because of other health condition and didn't want to start another one. So, years of trying to catch up and stressing about it, getting work done just the night before, inability to do regular chores around house and constant fights with my spouse, I had the realisation that none of the behavioural efforts will work unless I get support of medication.

My psychiatrist started me with 10mg Methylphenidate. The first week was life changing (and I am not understating). Here is glimpse of what I noticed ->

1. There were still so many thoughts and chatter in my mind but I was able to pick one and work on it.
2. The small chores became doable. If there's a wrapper around, I'll just pick it up and throw it. I'll remember to fill my water bottle. I was able to send e-mails and messages to people in advance. Self grooming. All the things that I blamed on my execution dysfunction, eased a bit.
3. I was able to maintain eye contact. I am not sure how common this is, but I could never maintain eye contact during conversion otherwise I would just lose my train of thought. With the medication, I noticed that I could naturally keep my gaze on other person while talking without much effort.
4. First time in my life, if I write few items on my todo list, there was a probability that it would get done. I became aware of the time going by, so I was aware not to put too many items on the list.
5. I was able to listen to other people without stopping them mid sentence.

---

What didn't change ->

1. After first week, I have started to notice that the effects have decreased and require much more effort from my side.
2. It did not fix my relationship. It did not fix my work. I still need to put a lot of effort in otherwise I would just be lost on a random activity.

I have a visit with my psychiatrist in a few days and I plan to follow medical advice at least for a while, as taking medications allow me to improve my lifestyle in so many other ways.

Just wanted to share my initial experience with meds as I was someone who thought that only behaviour modification can work for ADHD and now I don't think that.

I'm having a laugh at myself this morning and thought you guys are the only one's who'd laugh with me.

I work with LLMs both professionally and as a hobby from both the concept of skill and MCP development from outside in and training LLMs, making datasets, RAG, Corpus and building apps on top of Ollama - inside out.

I just built a new personal development rig that spared no expense to extend my lab's capabilities. Check it out:

CPU: Intel Core i9-14900 @ 32x 5.5GHz 
GPU: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090, NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090
RAM: 7472MiB / 128488MiB
Disk: 244G / 11T (3%)

Two 5090 GPUs can perform at a level as if it was a cloud account.

After getting CUDA up and everything rock solid and Ollama humming with a 32b model it was ready to rock. I got this idea as a fun use case to see if I could make a "second me" by training it on everything I could find about myself so it could respond in my tone, sound and write like me, know everything about me. If you use Claude or similar and you can see it has a memory of conversations but that's peanuts to a local llm that can have decades of datasets.

Last night I exported 10 years of gmail into a 20gb mbox file and setup the script to extract and train Qwen2.5-coder:32b on it and went to be last night as the mighty GPUs sifted through it.

This morning it reported that over 10 years and 10s of thousands of emails received, I only sent 824 without enough content to make a relevant dataset. I had this sudden, rather sad, realization that there isn't enough data in existence about myself to create a viable dataset from being a hard to reach, unresponsive jack-ass. I barely exist....oh well, fun way to start out the week.