I Thought I Was Lazy. It Turned Out My Brain Just Worked Differently.

How understanding my AuDHD changed the way I organise my home, my work and my life.

I was at a networking event recently when the speaker, a lady maybe in her sixties, mentioned that she'd only had two jobs since leaving school. In my mind, I did a quick calculation.

"How many has it been for me?"

I guessed around fifty.  Then, true to form, I went home and started writing them all down. I got to around thirty before giving up.  Since then, several more have popped into my head, but I've since ditched the list as I’ve got better things to do with my time! This, I think, sums up my AuDHD brain rather well.

Why did everyone else seem to cope?

For years, I couldn't understand why life seemed to feel harder for me than it did for everyone else.  I always felt as though I'd missed the memo where everyone else had learned how to be an adult.  

I remember being on the Tube on my way to work in London, looking around at all the other women’s hands. Their hands and nails were immaculate. Mine were not … and  I found myself wondering, Where are all the other nail biters? Surely I can't be the only one?

Looking back, I wasn't really thinking about nails.  I was wondering why everyone else seemed to be coping while I was constantly just about holding everything together.

I was in my late thirties and my life was progressing as “expected”.  I had two babies at home, I worked in a demanding City job with a brutal commute (“Well it’s got to be done!”).  I also had a house to keep and bills to pay and, unsurprisingly, I wasn’t coping.  This was 10 years ago now and looking back, it just seems utterly bonkers.  

I was exhausted back then, but I simply thought I was lazy, not good enough and unworthy.  Those thoughts stayed with me for years. 

The diagnoses

Then life took another turn.  At the age of three my son was diagnosed with autism.  I was now the mother of a child with Autism.  My Husband and I struggled to process this new information, and we grieved for a time.  But then I started noticing something else.  As I learned more about my son, I slowly began recognising myself, and over the next few years, many pieces of my own life started falling into place.

I started to identify as someone with ADHD (and more recently AuDHD) and did so for a couple of years before speaking to my GP in early 2024, when I really felt a formal diagnosis was necessary as I believed my ADHD had been holding me back.  Receiving my diagnosis brought with it relief and answered questions I'd been asking myself for decades.

But alongside the relief came more processing and grief.  I couldn't help wondering what life might have looked like if I'd understood my brain twenty or thirty years earlier.  Would I have been kinder to and more accepting of myself?   Would I have spent less time believing I wasn't good or worthy enough?  Those feelings, as I’ve now discovered, are normal, and thankfully they didn't stay forever.

What came next was something much more valuable, understanding myself. Therapy, ADHD medication, Meditation and learning about self-compassion have transformed the way I see myself, and the way I exist in the world.  Instead of constantly asking, "What's wrong with me?" I now ask, "What would make this easier for me?". 

Why I'm a Professional Organiser

Because I’m a professional organiser, there's often an assumption that organising must come naturally to me. The truth is actually the opposite.  I'm organised because I need to be. The systems I create aren't about perfection. They're about making everyday life easier.  Every unnecessary decision I can remove, every obstacle I can eliminate and every habit I can simplify gives my brain a little more breathing space. Long before I knew I was AuDHD, I had unknowingly been creating systems to support myself and now I understand why they work.

The systems that support my AuDHD brain

One of the biggest lessons I've learned is to make life easier for my future self. If I use something every day, it needs to be easy to reach. Sometimes that means removing lids, leaving frequently used items visible or accepting that "good enough" really is good enough.

You'll find analogue clocks in almost every room of my house.  Digital clocks tell me the time. Analogue clocks help me see time passing, something my brain finds much easier to process.

Daily habits quietly keep my home running.  These include, 

A morning reset,

An evening reset,

A load of laundry,

Emptying the indoor recycling,

Making my bed each morning, or, if life gets in the way, just before I climb into it at night.  Climbing into a made bed at night is one of my daily acts of kindness towards myself.

One of my favourite examples of simplifying life came from my friend Sarah.

Every week after swimming lessons, she'd hang the towels and swimwear up to dry before putting them into the laundry basket.  Once they'd been washed and dried (again!), she'd fold everything away … only to get it all back out again for swimming the following week. One day she stopped and asked herself, "Why am I creating all these extra steps?" Now the swimming kit goes straight into the washing machine, and once it's clean and dry, it goes straight back into the swimming bag, ready for next week. This example taught me to challenge my own ways of doing things.  

My own systems may be tried and tested but can I remove a step?  Can I make this easier?  Can I reduce the number of decisions my brain has to make? Now when I'm overwhelmed, I notice how I’m feeling and I don't try to tackle everything at once. If the washing up has become a mountain, I'll start with the glasses, then the cutlery, then the plates, then the bowls. Breaking a huge task into categories always makes it feel manageable.

It's not about being organised

These aren't just organising tips. They're ways of supporting my brain. The older I get, the less interested I am in trying to organise my life like somebody else's. I'm far more interested in understanding how my brain works and building a life around that, and that's what I help my clients to do as well.

Whether someone is navigating life with neurodivergence, managing a busy family, caring responsibilities, bereavement, menopause, a house move, or simply years of accumulated clutter, my role isn't to create a picture-perfect home. It's to help reduce the overwhelm, to create systems that feel realistic, to remove friction and to make everyday life feel just that little bit easier.

If you've spent years thinking you're lazy... If you've wondered why everyone else seems to cope while you're constantly playing catch-up... If you've apologised too many times and feel like you’re always having to explain yourself, please remember that you don't need to become a different person. You may simply need systems that work with your brain instead of against it.

I spent nearly thirty years trying to fix myself. It turns out I didn't need fixing at all. I just needed to understand myself, and be a little kinder along the way.