You know why some things cost you so much: because you translate, constantly. Adjusting your tone, asking fewer questions, preparing your sentences, not interrupting, working with twenty tabs open at once in your head, putting up with noise and light, and keeping up appearances while all of that runs in the background.
It's called masking, and it's a real processing cost, one that leaves your nervous system on alert for hours afterwards. From the outside, the effort doesn't show: either you pull it off beautifully and pay the bill in the evening, or it does show, and you're blamed for a lack of rigour or commitment. A diagnosis explains your particularities; it doesn't tell you how to handle the next morning.
ADHD, autism, AuDHD, HSP: coaching that starts from how you work
With or without a diagnosis. To understand how you function, and organise your life and your work around how you're wired, rather than against it.
What you're here for:
Pas un diagnostic, mais une façon d'organiser ta vie et ton travail en fonction de ton fonctionnement, pour briller sans te brûler.
In practice, the change can look like this:
Stop fighting yourself. Whether that's setting a fidget on the table in a meeting instead of coming out drained from "behaving properly", or deciding to move to a fully remote job to spare yourself the open-plan office.
Understand instead of judging yourself. Realising you get impatient in meetings because you think faster, and making it an asset rather than a reason to sigh at yourself. Or accepting that some stimuli are very draining, and planning around outings instead of blaming yourself for leaving early.
Let yourself breathe. Accepting that your rhythm may not be 9 to 5, and that running full throttle for three days and then producing nothing for the next two is OK too. And understanding that if that report has been dragging for two weeks, it's because your brain needs to approach it differently, not because you're lazy.
Neuro-affirming coaching is the moment when the question is no longer "how do I keep holding on", but "how do I organise my life around how I function rather than against it". We look at the pace you think at, what drains you and what recharges you, what you need to feel safe, and what you do effortlessly when the conditions are right. Together, we turn that into concrete decisions: what you change at work, what you ask for, what you stop carrying. It's an action-oriented partnership: you leave with your user manual and a life designed so you can shine without burning out.
Note: I use "women" as shorthand for people socialised and treated as women. If this space speaks to you, you're welcome here.
What is neuro-affirming coaching?
Neuro-affirming coaching treats neurodivergent traits as valid human variations to work with, not deficits to fix. For a woman in transition, it means we start from how your brain and nervous system actually function, then design your work and your life from there. No formal diagnosis is needed.
The usual model asks you to cope, to mask, or to hold on despite how you function. Here, your attention, your energy, your sensory load, and your recovery are design parameters, not problems. Your limits become accessibility tools, not proof of a lack of confidence. We translate "I should" into "I need".
Who neuro-affirming coaching is for
I work with women who are ADHD, autistic, AuDHD, gifted, highly sensitive, and with those who tick several of these boxes at once.
This grouping is deliberate. These aren't the same ways of functioning, and I won't pretend otherwise. But the problem you bring is often the same: you've spent years compensating in environments that weren't designed for you, nobody saw it because you managed, and now the cost has become visible. It's that cost we work on.
This coaching is probably for you if:
You've just been diagnosed and don't know what to do with the information.
You're waiting for an assessment, hesitating over one, or you don't want one, and you don't want to put your life on hold for it either.
You've always compensated, and the strategies that used to work are no longer effective.
You're often twice-exceptional: very capable in some areas, genuinely struggling in others, and both are true at once.
You're rereading your whole life in this light and it's dizzying, sometimes angry.
You've been offered help that amounted to adapting better, or one more organisational method.
You don't know what you're allowed to ask for, or whether you're allowed to ask at all.
You've long called yourself highly sensitive, and you're starting to think it's broader than that.
You don't want to be treated as a case.
What we actually do in coaching
We write your user manual. Not a list of weaknesses to manage, but a working document: what loads you and what recharges you, the pace you think at, what you do effortlessly, what costs you three times more than others, what you need to feel safe. That's the basis of Inside-Out Design: we start from the inside, and redesign your work, your limits, and your environment from there.
You learn to be on your own side. You stop treating your needs as whims, and you tell apart what's you from what you learned to perform. It's often the longest step, and the most important.
You decide by your own criteria. We set up ways of working that hold because of how you function, not despite it: limits that are accessibility tools, a pace that doesn't depend on the day's motivation.
You find your Shine Zone. It translates into concrete decisions: this role or not, this adjustment, this conversation, what you say and to whom.
How a coaching goes
Most clients choose a multi-session programme, spaced two to three weeks apart, which gives things time to move in your real week. Sessions last 60 or 90 minutes, online or in person in Stuttgart, in English or French.
The coaching setup is built for how you function. Written notes after each session and a questionnaire beforehand, so you don't have to improvise. Camera off if you prefer, and part of the work can be done in writing. Your access needs aren't special requests here; they're starting parameters.
I don't diagnose. A diagnosis is a clinical assessment, and I don't carry it out. If you want an assessment, I can help you clarify what you're looking for and prepare for it, but the evaluation happens elsewhere.
This isn't therapy, and I don't treat: if a clinical subject comes up, I name it and point you onward. It isn't executive-function remediation either, since the goal isn't to make you better at working the standard way; if skills training is what you need, I'll tell you and point you where to go. And you'll find here neither a symptom checklist nor a self-test; you've already come across plenty.
Why I won't ask you to leave your comfort zone
Most advice hands you someone else's template and tells you to leave your comfort zone. The data is less enthusiastic. The Yerkes-Dodson curve, established in 1908, shows that performance on hard tasks drops as soon as arousal passes a certain threshold. Google's Project Aristotle, in 2012, followed 180 teams for two years: the top predictor of performance was neither talent nor experience, but psychological safety.
In other words, safety is a condition for clear thinking, not a reward you earn after pushing hard enough. And for an atypical way of functioning, what the standard model calls "a bit of discomfort" can mean several hours of recovery. What you need is an environment where your safety and what you do without forcing meet: your Shine Zone. So we don't try to raise your tolerance for a badly designed environment; we design an environment that fits you. It's what the biologist Olivier Hamant calls robustness: not maximum performance, but the capacity to hold when the context shifts.
Demanding work doesn't have to be heavy work. You don't need to try harder.
Who I am
I'm a certified professional coach, holder of a French RNCP level 6 state-recognised title, trained in the ICF ethical framework, and holder of a neurodiversity coaching certificate, which serves to work with how you function rather than to correct it.
Before coaching, fifteen years in post, from the French public sector to an international tech scale-up, with one expatriation and two changes of profession. I held on in standardised environments by compensating a great deal, and I know what it costs, because I'm concerned too: ADHD and autistic, what's called AuDHD, with giftedness. That's also why I'll never ask you to adapt better. More about me.
Frequently asked questions
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No. The work starts from how you actually function, not from a label. A diagnosis is sometimes very useful vocabulary; it's never an entry condition.
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Yes. Many women arrive with that word, because it's often the only one they've been given: you feel intensely, you absorb the mood of a room, noise, light and interactions cost you more than others, and you recover slowly. Some discover along the way that there's a broader way of functioning behind it, others don't, and it doesn't change our work much: I don't diagnose, and we start from what's true for you, not from a label. If you want to explore the idea of an assessment, I can help you clarify what you're looking for and prepare for it.
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No, it's often the right moment. A diagnosis explains the past, it doesn't reorganise the present. Coaching is precisely about translating what you've just learned into concrete decisions.
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Yes, and it's common. Living with the brake and the accelerator at once calls for both novelty and structure, and that can be worked with.
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If your question is whether to perform better, no. If it's the twice-exceptional experience that concerns you — very capable on one side and genuinely struggling on the other, without the two being recognised together — then yes.
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In part, and not everywhere. We look at where it still protects you, where it costs you more than it earns you, and where you can ease off without putting yourself at risk. The goal isn't to unmask you everywhere, it's for it to be your choice and not a reflex.
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No. That's exactly what we undo. We change the design, not you.
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We adapt. Camera off, breaks, written exchanges. Anything that helps you feel safe and grow further.
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Three to six months for the deeper work. A specific subject works out in about two months.
Shall we talk?
Tell me about what you're going through and what you'd like to feel differently a few months from now. We can have a chat and see if it’s a good fit and how we can work together.
Then, we start with a 90-minute Lantern session to shed some light (yes, I know… but I love this light metaphor, bear with me) on your situation and your goals going forward.