Show HN: Shimmer – ADHD coaching for adults, now on web

Appreciate this question, it's one we've gotten a lot and quite frankly I agree we haven't nailed the best way to articulate it. To answer a few of your questions... - We don't use psychologists or psychotherapists as the front-line helper because there is a severe shortage of them and our main goal is accessibility. There is a provider shortage (psychologists, psychiatrists, therapists, etc.) in the US and most places in the world - Depending on someone's severity, helpers can include parents/teachers, peer support specialists, mentors, coaches, therapists, psychiatrists, the list goes on (I tried to broadly categorize from least to most intensive); our service does not aim to support the most severe. Anyone who screens with high degree of Mh impairment is not suggested to use Shimmer (and we have screening in the onboarding process) - Frankly, depending who you ask, you'll get a different answer for "are coaches respectable". Coaching is a modality that is "up and coming" because of (1) the need for more providers and subclinical support services, and (2) the credentialing / reimbursement models are evolving... see next point: - We align our model most closely to Health & Wellness Coaching, which is estimated to be reimbursed by next year: https://www.wellcoachesschool.com/post/medicare-moves-advanc...

Overall though, we use PhDs/psychiatrists/master-level coaches to supervise, create protocols, trainings, etc. and use coaches to deliver. (Not AI). Our coaches are either credentialed by ICF (International Coaching Federation) like BetterUp or Ginger or Lyra's coaches, NB-HWC (National Board - Health & Wellness Coaching), or have masters-level psych degree and go through our training.

Happy to expand on any of the above!

Looks like the same bait and switch Dr. K (Healthy Gamer) did. Put a real MD on the poster, and once they sign up hook your customers with people with 3 weeks of "professional training".

What I've seen from most of these services is they essentially hire independent contractors with experience in a related field. They "train" them with a series of required videos then send them on their way.

Not saying that's what this is doing, but that's what this whole industry does. Unfortunately, there simply aren't enough health care providers.

> Is this a better price than a licensed therapist? Yes

Good luck finding a licensed therapist who has bookings or availability. In Seattle I have had almost 0 luck over multiple years, and I have talked to many other people who have had the exact same amount of luck. The very few therapists around here who do specialize in ADHD either specialize in children, or they are so booked up they don't even bother with a wait list.

Mind you this is for cash payments, if you want insurance to cover care you are completely out of luck no matter how good your insurance is.

Thanks for your comment and perspective. Our services, as mentioned, are not medical services for ADHD. It is forward-looking, goal-oriented coaching with a specialty in ADHD and executive functioning. The entire modality is represented by organizations like ACO https://www.adhdcoaches.org/ and recommended by top ADHD experts and doctors alike - specifically as a non-clinical, non-medical addition to support people with ADHD. We welcome anyone who wants to come and be coached on ADHD-related skills & goals. For example, if you want to work on your executive functions but you don't have an ADHD diagnosis, you're completely welcome here! This is also because certain cultures (or an array of different circumstances could put someone in this position) prevent folks from getting a timely diagnosis and/or they don't want to tell their parents, etc. But in this case they can still get coaching with less of the stigma.

> But it just feels ethically wrong to promote your services to people who are "undiagnosed" or "think they have" ADHD.

You don't have to 'actually have' ADHD (whatever that means!) to benefit from advice, habits, or practices typically leveraged by ADHDers. You just have to have a similar enough struggle that works in a similar enough way that those techniques help you somewhat. Whether you have ADHD matters way less than whether those things help you.

That said, idk how to really evaluate for-profit companies orienting themselves around the ADHD label to provide services along those lines as opposed to freely associating online communities or whatever.

But the truth is that just like with an actual therapist (or medication) you actually have to evaluate the efficacy of the treatment for yourself. There actually isn't a formula for treating ADHD, and it's not something you can just hand off to someone else. In that respect, services like this are no different from their more authoritative counterparts in psychiatry or psychology.

> This is exactly what social media is doing today in the sense of trying to convince you have something because you happen to engage in said content.

Not quite, imo. The TikTok phenomenon is decidedly less practical (that is, less about doing anything) and more identitarian. It's about asserting membership in an informal group and differentiating yourself from others. It's 'finding yourself' like teens and young adults have always done laden so heavily with (sloppy use of) medicalizing language and a tendency to essentialize, run a bit amok. It's also innocent stuff, like in-jokes about the catharsis of finding a suitable label, of discovering that your struggles aren't totally idiosyncratic but 'a thing'.

But 'if you think you might have ADHD, check this thing out' isn't at all the same thing as 'if you laughed at this meme, you have ADHD'.

You're making a lot of assumptions here. Let's tackle them one by one:

1. "I see them all in the same light unfortunately of profiteering in various ways around the incompetent medical system the US has."

You're right, it is unfortunate that you see them all as profiteering off of the failures of the American medical system. As you've noted, the issue here is your choice not to look for nuance or independently evaluate each service.

2. "Is this a better price than a licensed therapist?"

Shimmer has been very clear every step of the way that coaching is not the same thing as — or a substitute for — therapy. For some people, therapy isn't necessary. For others, like me, therapy isn't enough. Coaching fills in the gaps and covers areas that aren't necessarily a great use of time in therapy. In my case, I use therapy to dig into major mental health issues (MDD and PTSD, primarily). I use coaching to help me figure out how to overcome executive functioning barriers and prioritize day-to-day tasks. Both are incredibly helpful in different ways.

3. "It just feels ethically wrong to promote your services to people who are 'undiagnosed' or 'think they have' ADHD."

Have you ever tried to get an ADHD diagnosis in the US? Until recently, testing was virtually impossible for many Americans to access because of scarcity and cost. I was initially quoted $1,700 for an ADHD evaluation from an out-of-network provider, and that was after calling around to numerous places that took insurance, all of which were booked up indefinitely and required referrals (which not everyone's PCP will provide for ADHD testing). I got lucky and found a $500 option, which was then treated as "unofficial" by some prescribers. Finally, I got an "official" diagnosis from an online testing service (unrelated to Shimmer) for $150. I'm incredibly fortunate to have had access to the $650 it cost me to get a diagnosis, along with medical and therapy providers who supported me along the way. Others are less privileged. Do those people not deserve help simply because they can't access a formal diagnosis?

4. "This is exactly what social media is doing today in the sense of trying to convince you you have something because you happen to engage in said content."

Shimmer isn't in the business of telling people they have ADHD or handing out stimulants to any random undiagnosed person who asks. If you take a few moments to look up Shimmer's website and social media, you'll see that they're clearly not aiming to convince people they have ADHD. Each potential client meets with one of the founders (or, I assume, another qualified team member) to discuss their specific situation and needs. If they're a good fit for one of those coaches, they're allowed to sign up and begin coaching. On the off chance that someone did fall through the cracks and begin coaching despite not having ADHD, and their coach didn't notice it right away, then one of two things might happen. Either they'd leave because ADHD coaching isn't suitable for them, or they'd continue because a lot of what happens in ADHD coaching is helpful for all kinds of people with executive dysfunction and trouble focusing.

5. "I mean just look at the eligibility"

"Eligibility" requirements are a bare minimum. One can easily infer from the content Shimmer creates that its services aren't intended (or useful) for all adults with smartphones and internet access.

6. Your link to an article titled "Teens Turn to TikTok in Search of a Mental Health Diagnosis"

Take another look at the eligibility requirements you posted. Shimmer is for adults only. Yes, technically people ages 18 and 19 have ages in the "teens," but they are legally and developmentally considered adults capable of making informed, reasoned decisions about their health. An adult seeking out ADHD one-on-one ADHD coaching from a mental health professional is not the same thing as a teenager scrolling tiktok and diagnosing themselves based on their uninformed interpretation of a video.

What's wrong with any of the eligibility?

> The dude coaching was someone with obvious ADHD who (like a lot of us) probably had an easier time communicating what should be done than doing it himself. He definitely was no therapist.

I just wanna add to this: ADHD is fundamentally about subjectivity. The trouble with ADHD lives in what it's like to be someone who has it. And medical doctors, scientists, and even psychologists, who don't have ADHD often attend so much to the objective facts that are known about ADHD or particular treatments for it that they neglect, discount, and basically fail to grok virtually anything about what having ADHD is like, what taking stimulant medication is like, and so on.

As a result I've consistently gotten way better care from 'less qualified' clinicians who themselves have ADHD than from 'more qualified' ones who don't. I would (and you should, too) expect a psychiatric nurse or nurse practitioner who has ADHD to do a better job with ADHD patients than a PhD-MD who doesn't. And it's totally reasonable that some random coach who has ADHD but only minimal training could be genuinely helpful.

The other co-founder and cto here, we just made the updates to the site so it should reference "pricing" in the subscription plans section! Really appreciate the suggestion here.

Also for the blank screen, I wasn't able to reproduce either but the quiz is an embedded Typeform. There may be a plugin/extension enabled on your browser that could be blocking it. What browser are you using and are you able to try viewing it on incognito?

Oh, this is a good idea re: "pricing"; right now it's on the homepage under the section "Flexible plans built for every brain". Thank you for this—will be adding today.

Hm, I'm not able to replicate the blank screen. For now you can bypass this section by going to app.shimmer.care and creating an account directly, but let me check in with my co-founder on the blank screen issue.

And awesome, glad you resonated! Let me know if I can help with finding the right coach! chris@shimmer.care

"Please please put a link to this information on the main site. Anything I'm half interested in using I do a cmd+F "Pricing" and if there aren't results I usually bail."

That's a pretty specific thing to measure folks on

Agree. Shimmer is currently in the "assume good faith" category and it would help everyone if commenters gave feedback and asked questions from this perspective.

From what I've seen of Shimmer, the rapid-fire negativity in this discussion is not warranted. I have run a mental health startup. Criticism is constant and highly energised, and it really wears you down after a while. I expect they're also copping it from established practitioners, their industry bodies, and various regulators.

I currently use Shimmer, I have used BetterHelp and TalkSpace. These last two are... not in the "assume good faith" category. Perhaps they could show up to HN for some "robust discussion".

The thing I would like from Shimmer is a policy and mechanism where if you stop accessing the app and showing up to coaching, they stop billing you. Of course this would be startup poison, businesses are built on subscription revenue from non-users. But only billing for care you provide is the strongest show of ethics and consumer-centering I can imagine. Especially when your client base is ADHDers! Shimmer, if you currently do this, put it on the front page in bold.

I never really trust these kinds of "reviews", where you talk about x and sell a product related to x, regardless if the review was positive or negative

Coaching works best for those who are ready for forward movement: unlike most types of therapy, coaching is goal-oriented / solution-oriented and requires the member to be in a good enough space to want to look into the future & put in the work. Often members use therapy / medication in tandem with coaching.

Coaching works least effectively for those with severe comorbidities like depression/anxiety/bi-polar that are not concurrently being treated or at least do not significantly impair their day-to-day functions.

We have really extensive testimonials on our homepage (you can load more as well) but a few of my favorites are: (1) a 45-50 y/o man who got promoted after thinkng he would not ever get promoted again—now he is director level and manages dozens of reports and has a renewed sense of confidence in himself; (2) and 24-34 grad student who was able to find her dream job post-MBA after burning herself out at almost every other job she's had before and never feeling like she "fit"; her Shimmer coach helped her look at jobs that fit her unique ADHD, find ways to approach the job hunting process in a way that fit her brain, and then eventually secure that job.

> Having a diagnosis that you have a recognized mental health disorder and then being able to, in less than a year, have a full platform launched and ready to go should make anyone who struggles with ADHD pause and ask how and question everything

Agreed. This 'origin story' reads a bit too much like it's written for a VC pitch deck. Theranos of course famously build their 'product' on the basis of the CEO's fear of needle pricks.

Hi yes, I am still here. (1) We currently only have self reported symptom reduction (83% state symptom reduction within 6 weeks) that we've been using as a proxy so far, but we know we need more. (2) We are actually in the process of designing a more formal pilot with our Clinical Advisor Dr. Anil Chacko. We will launch this in the next 2 months, which we're very excited by. We're just tying up the loose ends in terms of setting up the logistical infrastructure for data collection, etc., and making sure the process is designed to not be overly burdensome for people with ADHD.

I've seen the same ads, and we definitely don't advertise to "cure" ADHD in any way. We actually don't even do a free trial, as we want our members to be committing to the coaching process intentionally. We try to make our processes the opposite of predatory—e.g. if a member is inactive for 40+ days, we check with their coach and automatically cancel them. If they forget and tell us when the bill comes, we refund them.

Unfortunately ADHD-specialized therapists are few and far between, especially once you layer in insurance. We are working on creating recommendations & databases of other ADHD-specialized helping professions like therapists to informally connect our members to when they need that!

Thanks and agree on protecting our members and their private conversations. Right now, we use Google Meet videos for the video sessions with a coach and so they are encrypted end-to-end and not recorded. We also don’t store any information from the google meet session in our platform. We can definitely include this in our privacy policy and will look into how to make this more transparent with regards to our data policies. We will be building out video functionality in the near future and our privacy policies including opt-out etc will be included.

If you're curious, might I suggest directing these questions toward the email address referenced multiple times in the link you posted? In case you've forgotten, it's privacy@shimmer.care. I'm sure they'll be able to answer your questions better than the comments section.

Keep in mind that not everyone considers their ADHD their "deepest darkest secret." Some of us are open and unashamed of being neurodivergent. Obviously, unscrupulous employers are a thing, but many of us would be "found out" from our social media presence long before employers managed to find out we're receiving coaching services from Shimmer. As for having your calls leaked on tiktok due to lack of security, I regret to inform you that there are lots of ways to record "secure" calls (like taking a video of the screen). Recording someone without their consent in some states, so it's always possible that you could be putting yourself at risk when you divulge anything sensitive to anyone via video or phone. Think about it, though. What would happen to Shimmer if they leaked a user's private call on tiktok? Their business would lose legitimacy and crumble. If you're truly concerned that Shimmer would risk destroying their entire business by leaking your "shortcomings" on tiktok, in-person coaching may be a better fit for you.

Thank you, anonymous person! I appreciate the recognition a lot. I have personally gone through many routes as well, in support of my ADHD, and I hope to be able to continue creating & working on a piece of the solution that is beneficial to the community! My favorite part about work is hearing success stories or members working through challenges. It's an honor to be a part of their ADHD journey!

There is. (Assuming USA Tech Salary, and willingness to use money to fix problems.)

1. Clean up your place JUST enough to get some cleaning people in. (Yes, you can hire people to clean the apartment. Even if you are SITTING IN IT.)

2. Cooking: Find a meal service you like, and order. Honestly there's many good ones, we've been using Top Chef.

3. Get all your bills on auto-pay against your credit card. This will also make sure you are never late on your bills.

Money is merely potential energy. If you need to convert it into real energy... do it.

I think you shouldn't even try to self diagnose and get a professional assessment instead. To give my personal anecdote, to me it sounds more like depression. I have ADHD (diagnosed at a very young age) and the thing is I very very much want to do the boring stuff. However the procrastination and forgetfulness is almost unavoidable and much worse is how hard it is to focus. Couldn't read a page of a book if the window is open and I heard the slightest bird chirp. Need absolute silence and order to be able to focus on the task at hand.

Ideally, do just what you said and have another person to do those things. My wife has ADHD and I take care of all financial stuff and most of the cleaning (we also have a maid but she only comes weekly). We each cook for ourselves, but she largely does pre-made meals and takeout, whereas I actually cook all of my food from scratch.

That maybe sounds asymmetric and unfair, but though I'm healthy now, I've been in situations in the past where I couldn't even dress myself and she took care of me. It's a lifetime partnership. Workload doesn't need to be perfectly symmetric at all times. Besides, when I lived alone before getting married, I also paid all the bills and did all the cooking and cleaning myself, so it's not like this added work.

It sounds like you're maybe looking for a virtual assistant of some sort? I recently heard of a company Athena (more geared towards founders) and "The Doers" (more geared towards women business owners, I always get their ads on IG) but I think you can find a VA in many places. Not an expert in this space though!

> I just want others to do the boring shit like cooking and cleaning and billing for me and I can just work & play.

Congratulations, you are just like every other human on the planet. We really need to stop passing off regular human traits as medical disorders.

I love this question! This is the exact problem (or one of them) that we're solving. All the info is out there, but it's about practice. With your coach, you'll be experimenting each week with different skills or habits and trying to arrive at the system that works best for you. Your coach will help you prioritize & keep you accountable, but also help you remove roadblocks and learn from reflections. There are also "hacks" as well that our coaches and members share with each other, for sure.

Indeed, I have ADHD and it's evening now, so I got no meds in me.

With my hamster brain, I saw a wall of text at the top of this page, clicked the link, a wall of text on the landing page, even the title is too much information to digest. I literally have no idea what this thing does, and I won't allocate any effort in diving deeper. Focus is precious, I don't give that away easily.

I don't want to make assumptions, but this seems it has been done and designed by someone that has no idea how ADHD works.

Here's the ideal landing page for a product like this tailored for us: a clear tagline, 3 bullet points, pricing, and a FAQ section. That's it. Anything else is completely wasted on us.

People with ADHD like me don't read, they skim for anchor points. Even under the magical effect of amphetamines, unless I am deeply engaged, reading one sentence after the other is asking too much, especially since I learned to extract a ton of information from skimming and by the shape of things on a page. 80% of prose is filler after all.

In any case, good luck and I hope this help reaches those that need it and cannot afford focus in pill form.

I'm unsure if you know this, but everyone with ADHD responds differently to different stimuli.

I have ADHD and am, and always have been, a reader and writer. Once I get locked in on something, I have trouble refocusing my attention elsewhere.

I work with individuals with ADHD who regularly point out that I have provided too much text for them to process.

We each have our own unique challenges in this, and recognizing that helps strengthen the community as a whole IMO.

We love Focusmate!!

If you can successfully do all of the first 6 items on your list then you probably do not have ADHD, so no wonder they work so well.

Not saying they are not good habits to develop, but come on...

That's like telling someone in a wheelchair that they can climb stairs by putting one foot in front of the other.

> I doubt the author has a grasping of ADHD

Do you? It can be hurtful to tell someone they "aren't ADHD enough".

First line of the article:

> I was diagnosed last year & wasn’t able to find an affordable, quality ADHD coach

ADHD people might like the animations, emojis, and colors, and might not read a long boring plaintext article linearly from start to finish. Everyone has different preferences though...

Personally I didn't find anything confusing or distracting about the article, and I felt like I could jump between random sections that look interesting (where the colors, emojis, and animations draw me in to different topics).

I know a pair of BFFs who both have ADD. Watching them try to have one conversation is quite eye opening. And a bit exhausting. I'm thinking back to every conversation I've ever had with a polymath or a person with ADD and asking myself, "man, is this what everyone else experienced listening to me?" No wonder the conversations always devolved to 1:1.

People with ADD understand why they shouldn't distract others, but theory and practice are poles apart, even by academic standards. Seeing tangents in text is a good indication they have an accurate diagnosis.

This is sort of the thing. Everyone I meet with ADHD has some similarities, an a lot of nuanced differences and lots of their own little tricks and methods for dealing with it. Many of them have therapists they believe have had a positive effect on them. Many have medications that they believe have a positive effect. That may or may not be true depending. Whatever seems to be working is whatever they're evangelizing and while I'm glad that mental health is becoming more accepted and discussed, I wish treatments/rituals/coachings/medications were left up to the patient and whomever they chose for professional care

Therapy helped for me until it didn't and then medication did and still does. That's just me. My nephew struggles with medications. It's so easy just to get an initial reaction with mental health issues, and then want to evangelize whatever stimulated that reaction, but this stuff is nuanced. There's all kinds of variables commonly shared and some not so common.

Anyway, be cautious of telling people what they grasp with personal health issues, they likely just don't grasp your particular flavor. But with regard to this website, I'd be cautious in general.

It reeks of excited evangelizing done by someone who's way of interacting with the world is business and computers.

Appreciate the feedback! I'm the author here (Christal)...unfortunately I definitely have ADHD!

Many of our members and team need the emojis for the visual relation but I definitely see your point. I will tone down the emojis and make the newsletter show up only at the end of the article. I'll also send this to a content editor for the confusing wordings, etc.! If there are any specific examples, don't hesitate to let me know.

This is an incredibly rude way to give feedback.

I didn't look at the article until now. Gah that's terrible. I think we found a new low, folks!

I assume this is basically their main "secret sauce". I wouldn't count on it being shared.

Yes, definitely! Would love to chat and hear more about what you're building, and share whatever we can to help. Email us directly at hi@shimmer.care, both Vikram & I get emails from there!

That was my initial question as well. What are their qualifications for calling themselves ADHD coaches?

I'm bombarded with ads from ADHD apps since my diagnosis and I have tried many. None, none at all, have helped me. It's praying on the weak.

We also would like this to be covered through reimbursement, however we're not there yet (with ADHD Coaching) and right now it's primarily out of pocket. The team at Well Coaches and other organizations (including ICF, ACO) are working hard to progress the modality.

In terms of cost, we do try our best to keep costs as affordable as possible and have a needs-based financial aid program. We also do a lot of scholarship sponsorships whenever we can with our community partners. We hope to do more in the future (and some are coming in October!)

Good point and thought. I started this because of my ADHD built the product with a community of 50 ADHD-ers alongside us (not including the coaches and experts). We also do a lot of work in advocacy for adult ADHD, women x ADHD, BIPOC x ADHD, and more. Our mission is rooted in helping people with ADHD succeed, however if we happen to help others that's even better! I guess we're choosing the harder route.

You’ll find that ADHD is a really hot topic at the moment. Everyone I know is getting diagnosed and the stigma is disappearing. It’s actually to the point that you will get cancelled if you question the “science”.

Thank you for sharing your experiences - neurofeedback/ neurostimulation is indeed a novel and promising pathway to, ultimately, improving quality of life for those who has ADHD. While we can't talk about all of coaching since it differs, our coaching offer which is informed by the 3rd wave cognitive and behavioural psychological approaches, is situated firmly within the practices that were demonstrated to be useful and helpful to those with ADHD. This is supported by the ongoing research in coaching and psychotherapy. In addition, our view is that it is a combination of different types of interventions which really makes a difference for those with ADHD. I am eagerly watching the progression of Neurode though, and the trials!

Thank you—we have received this feedback a few times, and will definitely be decreasing the size and amount of text on our homepage. With 2 FTE (me and my co-founder & CTO Vikram), we haven't gotten around to it yet (but it's high on our list!). I think right now the website reflects a bit of my writing/speaking style, which is a bit of "oversharer" but working on changing that.

The biggest difference between Shimmer & e-therapy is that we offer Coaching. Coaching is a partnership for action—for goal-oriented action. You partner with your coach and make changes in your life to reach those goals: e.g. you may be perfecting your morning routine or working on your habits for work-from-home, whatever it may be. For e-therapy, or therapy, it's more about unpacking past to present, talking, processing, etc.

Lastly, for Typeform, we are also working on moving off of it, bad reason but also because we are a lean team and test each part of our flow first (with 3rd party services) and have slowly been migrating to build in house for parts most important. Right now many of our priority features are focused on member experience with coaching for building in-house.

Definitely drug/alcohol. Among adults who have an alcohol use disorder, ADHD is 5-10 times more common (American Addiction Centers); Among children, children with ADHD are 2-3X more likely to abuse substances than kids in the general population. Other areas where folks with ADHD have pretty alarming stats: School (46% more expulsions), Healthcare (33% more ER visits, 3x more motor vehicle accidents), Home (3-5x more divorce). It's a really important problem that has far reaching impacts, where multiple solutions are necessary to make a sustained dent to improve the lives of people with ADHD!

The ADHD community, like many underserved populations, tends to be overrepresented in the prison population due to lack of accommodations and resources, along with stigma. There's a great deal of peer-reviewed research on the subject of ADHD and drug addiction. The overall gist is that people with ADHD are at higher risk for substance use disorders than their neurotypical counterparts due to several possible factors, including chronically low levels of dopamine and contextual factors like lack of resources and stigma.

Keep in mind that those numbers may be skewed based on how ADHD was diagnosed in the past. Only in the last few years have we started to see more traditionally "successful" people being diagnosed with ADHD, which is revealing that the percentage of the general population with ADHD is likely much higher than previously thought. ADHD was considered a "disease" that caused people to make trouble. That created a vicious cycle of stigma and punishment for those who had been diagnosed or expressed obvious symptoms. Meanwhile, lots of people with more subtle ADHD symptoms, stronger support systems, and greater privilege were never diagnosed at all. I'd take that 27% statistic with a big grain of salt, especially if it's coming from nootropics websites.

I'm not on that team, but: that doesn't meet my experience in the slightest. My parents are great, and I didn't have any significant childhood trauma. In retrospect, my symptoms went back to when I was a wee little lad, well before I had to deal with any of life's curveballs.

It really depends on the person. It's the case for some folks but definitely not all (not myself) and in that case, it's important to address the root cause. Our team actually advocates for mixed treatment when relevant (while acknowledging the provider shortage, differences in means/access to quality healthcare) - this usually includes working with psychiatric, clinical, counseling and psychotherapy practitioners (and/or coaches). These treatment protocols may include medication, therapy, and more. Doesn't need to be done all at once, but drawing on these tools as needed.

Yes! There are tons online, many great quality ones too. For us, we offer robust and reliable service with coaches who we have vetted, are supervised, and are accessing professional development opportunities on regular basis. In addition, our coaching philocosophy and practice has solid foundations in evidence-based practices. Individual providers of ADHD coaching may not have these checks and balances in place, unfortunately. We also have an app that supports growth and accountability throughout the week, which can be a challenge for individual coaches who use email/google docs, etc. And lastly, quite practically we can offer at a lower rate per face-minute because we handle all the "back-end" tasks for them (e.g. advertising, tech, customer service, billing, etc.). Especially for coaches who have ADHD themselves, us handling all the "other stuff" can be a gamechanger. Happy to jam offline on specific coaches or your specific situation! chris@shimmer.care

We thought about this a lot and asked many potential members and members. The purpose of this question is to get a sense of the most pressing challenges (such that if they begin, the coach knows them) so we don't want folks to answer "all of the above". Also, in coaching often only a few can be tackled at the same time. It also forces some reflection of prioritization (which in itself can be super hard for people with ADHD, we acknowledge) which hopefully is helpful to folks. There's some tradeoffs here, we acknowledge. We try to balance the purpose (for us, Shimmer, and for the member) and the logistics of it, but are always open to suggestions!

Healthcare providers in countries with universal healthcare are doing it for a profit; they get paid, after all.

Conversely, most US hospitals are nonprofits and US insurance companies' profits are capped by ACA. But that doesn't stop them from being expensive.

We're currently applying, thank you!

Thank you so much!

I have some powerful coping mechanisms. I can manage my ADHD on my own. But earlier this year, I finally got around to working with a doc who prescribed me meds. It's amazing how much extra mental energy I have now that I'm not expending so much of it on those coping mechanisms.

It's great to learn how to get by without meds. That's important, and the meds aren't a magic wand that will miraculously make you happy and productive without any lifestyle changes. But oh, wow, what a difference those meds can make!

https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Ray_Peat

I think there's some important things to say about neuroscience and ADHD, but I don't think Ray Peat is the authority you want to quote about this subject.

Thank you for this comment and the text. I'm also curious about where this text comes from, I'd love to read the rest of it.

And yes, I agree. ADHD is not a "mental" problem, and cannot be "coached" away. ADHD Coaching is one part of a greater pie (e.g. I personally use both medication and ADHD coaching, and a mix of productivity tools). What ADHD Coaching uniquely offers, is to work with what you have, create systems around you and your life, and to get support from someone who gets it.

However, as you mentioned, it doesn't "solve" ADHD or "coach it away", that is not the purpose for sure!

I can personally (and our members too) attest to the fact that there definitely are benefits, perhaps not for every single person and every single coach out there. For me, I've become more productive as I work to manage my energy, align my days with my circadian rhythm, I've learned new techniques around time blocking, my coach has kept me accountable to things that are hard for me to pull through on, and my general quality of life has improved. Could I have gotten this a different way, on my own? Sure, most definitely. Tons of alternatives including self learning and experimentation! That route was just personally very hard for me.

Surely coaching could help develop better coping mechanisms for various issues that arise from living with a brain energetics disorder?

(To be clear: I'm not recommending Shimmer; the fact that they mention positive psychology is a red-flag for me).

Where does this come from? I'd like to read more of the quoted text.

Also, can we take the next step? If we do now treat ADHD as a brain energetics disorder, how do we treat it? Are drugs like Adderall or Ritalin sufficient based on this view?

Is this the same Ray Peat that claimed Mexican Coca-Cola could cure almost any medical emergency?https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KE-PEJ9Uu50

There is no such elephant in the room. Your abject dismissal of the real harms and problems that people struggle with as a result of this real and well-established disease is harmful, hateful, bigoted, ignorant, and shameful.

What about the ones who give you relaxants? (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guanfacine)