BONUS EPI: When Autism Meets ADHD; AuDHD

When your nervous system wants two different things at once, life can feel like a constant tug; one part craving structure and quiet, another chasing novelty and movement. We open up about living at the intersection of autism and ADHD, especially when trauma adds an invisible tax that turns everyday tasks into uphill climbs. Instead of pathologizing that reality, we walk through practical, compassionate strategies that help you build a life around your actual capacity.

We dive into energy mapping so you can schedule hard tasks during your true peaks, not the clock’s. We talk sensory-friendly environments and why fidgets, weighted supports, and noise-canceling headphones are more than gadgets; they’re nervous system allies. You’ll hear how micro-rest, slow breathing, and short outdoor resets can prevent spirals before they start, and why flexible routines with visual cues, checklists, and alarms can lower cognitive load without killing your freedom.

We also explore the mindset shift from shame to stewardship. Treating yourself by the “toddler rule” (food, movement, novelty, rest) is not indulgent, it’s smart regulation. Task chunking, Pomodoro pacing, and timing chores train your brain to trust reality over dread. And when the voice of “I’m behind” grows loud, you’ll have mantras and journal prompts to translate that alarm into care:

1. What moments today felt overwhelming, and what energy or sensory factors contributed?
2. Where did I try to push through, and what might have been a kinder approach? 
3. Which tasks or responsibilities could I delegate, delay, or simplify?  
4. What small action can I take today to honor my nervous system?
   
   

About Me:

I’m Autumn Moran, a Licensed Professional Counselor in Texas specializing in trauma-informed care for neurodivergent women and trauma survivors.

Therapy (Texas residents only):

I provide individual therapy in my private practice for women working through trauma, late diagnosis processing, relationship challenges, and healing from narcissistic abuse or toxic family systems. My approach is neurodivergent-affirming and focuses on helping you understand your patterns while building practical tools for nervous system regulation and authentic living.

Life Coaching (available anywhere):

For women outside Texas or those wanting support alongside therapy, I offer:

•Somatic Healing Coaching: Bridges the gap between cognitive understanding and embodied healing through nervous system work, movement practices, and practical integration tools. Perfect as a complement to talk therapy or for those ready to work directly with their body’s wisdom.

•Unmasking Journey Coaching: Specialized support for late-diagnosed neurodivergent women learning to reconnect with their authentic selves after decades of masking. We work on identifying your real needs, rebuilding your sense of self, and creating a life that fits who you actually are.

Whether you’re healing trauma, discovering yourself after late diagnosis, or both, my goal is to help you not just understand your story, but feel genuinely safe and at home in your own body.

Subscribe & Share:

New episodes drop every Wednesday and Friday. If today’s episode resonated, please share it with someone who needs to hear it or leave a comment—it helps other women find this space and know they’re not alone. Check me out on Apple Podcasts and many other platforms.

Work With Me:

Ready to start your healing journey?

Book a free 15-minute consultation: (http://linktr.ee/EmpoweringWellnessHub)

Listen to my

Chapters

• 0:00 Grounding Welcome And Intentions
• 2:44 Autism And ADHD Intersect
• 5:50 Lived Contradictions And Sensory Overload
• 9:10 Trauma’s Layer And Daily Shame
• 13:20 Reframing Failure As Capacity
• 16:50 Energy Mapping And Micro Rest
• 20:30 Sensory Tools And Environmental Tweaks
• 24:00 Flexible Routines And External Supports
• 27:10 Self-Compassion And Toddler Rules

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:00

Welcome to the Awaken Heart, a podcast for healing women, a space where your voice matters, your body is sacred, and your journey home to yourself is always honored, no matter how winding the road. I'm Autumn Moran, licensed professional counselor, life coach, yoga instructor. But ultimately, I'm here to be your companion on this divine path of healing. And to start off, if it feels safe, I would invite you to close your eyes or soften your gaze. Take a nice deep breath. Inhale deeply. Let that belly rise. As you exhale, let your body settle into the space you're at. Or at minimum, at minimum, settle into this podcast. Settle into my voice. This is your time. This is your safe space. No one else needs to understand or approve. You are allowed to be here exactly as you are. So if life has ever felt too much, if your mind races while your body feels frozen, if you experience sensory overload or emotional overwhelm that keep you from functioning like others expect you to, you are not broken. You are not failing. You might have heard me say this before, but I will always say this. You are navigating a unique wiring in a world that wasn't designed for your rhythm. And that is a fucking challenge. And the specific challenge I'm speaking about today is when autism and ADHD intersect because they're often spoken about separately. But when they live in the same nervous system, life can feel chaotic, contradictory, and exhausting. I've always said a couple of things about myself. One, I have always tagged myself as a free-spirited robot. I like routine, I will do the right thing, but don't tell me what to do if I don't like it, if I don't agree with it, if I feel it's harmful or rooted in negativity, I'm not going to follow it. I'm not going to have it around me. So I can be a robot to an external extent, and then my free spirit reigns. And my second comment about myself is that I'm consistently inconsistent. There are multiple sides to me, but also I'm a very simple person. I'm always creating in some form, even if it's just in my head. But I also want to lay around like those women in Victorian leisure paintings, right? The Renaissance lady, fully clothed, mind you, relaxing on my chase lounge, just reading a book. So autism craves structure, predictability, and rules. It's a roadmap for safety for the autism side of you. And then ADHD may crave novelty, stimulation, and immediate engagement, a way to anchor attention and avoid internal boredom or overwhelm, underwhelm. One of the two. When these two systems coexist, you might feel pulled in opposite directions. Parts of you want routine, but parts of you crave novelty, newness, and freedom to do whatever the fuck you want to do. Maybe hard, um, maybe being calm is hard to come by because parts of you respond or crave stimulus, right? That's when stimming comes in. Like I can't rest, I need to move. I want something that I feel like I need to do something. Okay, grab a fidget, put something in your hands. Try to give your hands something to do. But this is also this tug of war can make daily life feel quite impossible, can make simple tasks feel very heavy. Planning feels futile. Even your best intentions crash against an invisible wall of overwhelm or lack of energy capacity. What sounded good yesterday may no longer feel doable today. And if you have trauma layered on top of that, it's even more intense. Trauma teaches your nervous system that safety is conditional. Your body spends constant energy scanning for threats, emotional, social, or environmental. And whether you're neurodivergent or trauma experience, that happens for both brains. Because somewhere along the way, as a neurodivergent, you were taught that you needed to scan, you needed to fit in, you needed to know the right things to say in order not to be embarrassed, exposed, called out, ridiculed, told you're doing it wrong. So every day becomes a negotiation between your internal wiring and the world around you. You can feel distracted and frustrated by your own thoughts, exhausted from masking, guilty for needing downtime, rest, or just silence, or ashamed for not keeping up with expectations. All of this is real and it's valid. You're not imagining this. You're not lazy or defective. You are human and your nervous system is doing its best in an environment that doesn't always meet your needs. So let's talk about what it might feel like. I want to try to go a little bit deeper, if we will, if we can. If I can. Let's do it. Like some mornings, it may feel like your brain won't cooperate. You're scattered in thoughts. Evening opening up your email or making breakfast feels like climbing a mountain. Like you just would rather fall into a hole. Some days your sensory system is on high alert. Lights, the humming of lights, the sound of lights, the texture or tightness or feeling of your clothing, the pitch of someone's voice, someone chewing, someone breathing. It all feels magnified. You might feel overstimulated before you've even left the house. And other days, your ADHD impulses scream for movement, novelty, or engagement, while your autistic side longs for calm and predictability. You may push yourself to follow the plan only to feel exhaustion or shame for failing to meet it. And most of the time you're doing this in silence, in private, hiding the chaos from the people around you because you don't know if they'll understand. Or you know that they won't understand, that you've tried to explain, that you've tried to give resources, and still they have the same expectations for you, the same as when you before you gave them the resources and explain. And that is the part that often feels lonely because you feel like, why can't I just do this? Why can't I focus? Why can't I stick to a plan? Why is everything so freaking hard? You are allowed to feel what you feel, and you are allowed to experience overwhelm without judgment. And if you have a history of trauma, your nervous system may already be hyper-vigilant. Autism and ADHD both create sensory and executive demands. And trauma adds another layer, often creating an invisible tax on every task you attempt. Even small responsibilities like paying bills, scheduling doctors' appointments, responding to a text require energy that your nervous system may not have. And when you don't meet those expectations, your expectations or others' expectations, what do you think happens? Shame rushes in. But I want to just say that shame is not a signal that you're failing. Use that shame as your nervous system saying, Hey, I'm overextended, and I need you to care for me. I need you to be kind, compassionate, and nurturing right now because everything's a little too much. And sometimes this overwhelm can feel constant. And at first, when you start to pay attention to it and you start to identify and notice, it's going to feel like a lot because you don't have systems and accommodations in place. So it may feel like super duper chaos at first. But it's not. It's not brokenness, it's not laziness, it's your body, it's your mind, it's your nervous system communicating honestly in a world that often doesn't pause for that. So it's it's it's a rebellion, but it's a good rebellion. It's a rebellion that you need to have to pay attention, to understand what nurtures you, what supports you, and what systems you need to have in place to go in certain environments, to be around certain people, to do certain tasks. I want to so talking about productivity and success, right? Because a lot of the times we feel that if we need support, if we need breast, if we have executive dysfunctioning or sensory struggles, we're broken. But it's all a rhythm, your nervous system, your attention, your capacity. And when you start living in alignment with these rhythms, life becomes more manageable, not magically, but over time, it becomes more sustainable. So instead of asking, why can't I just do it like everyone else? Please try to ask yourself, how can I design my day around my unique capacity? If you find yourself saying, why am I failing? Why am I behind? I would like you to ask yourself, what support or accommodation would make this possible? What do I need? Is it in the environment? Is it lighting? Is it seating? Is it screen? Do you need something over the screen? Do you need to dim a screen, dim some lights? Do you need something to smell good, a candle, essential oils, comfy clothes? Do you need a buddy? Do you need a buddy system? Do you need accountability, someone to talk to to validate what you're doing? Do you need to ask for help or delegate some things? And if you ask yourself, like, why do I feel so overwhelmed? Try this instead. I want you to ask yourself, what is my nervous system telling me? And how can I honor it? How can I soothe my overwhelm? So, practical practical supports. Couple of tools. First, there's energy mapping. Like step one, track energy over the day. Notice when you feel alert, scattered, anxious, or depleted. What happened before it, what happened after it, were their triggers? What what led to any of that? And then use that information after you track yourself a few days or a week. Use that information to schedule tasks in alignment with your energy peaks, not just the clock. Find your highest energy moments, your highest like mind moments, and work during those pivotal moments. Get the hard stuff done then. Breaks, regulating breaks, taking micro rest. Even two to five minutes of breath work, ground ring, grounding work or sensory sensory relief can restore capacity. Grounding, use all your senses. What do you see? What do you hear? What do you taste? What are you touching? What do your clothes feel like? Wiggle your toes. Sensory relief. Again, the environment, some way to stem, whether that's some candy, some sour candy, something squishy or poppy in your hand, a fidget, weighted blanket, walking outside, noise canceling, headphones, stretching, put your legs up the wall. Slow breathing. Several things you can do several times throughout the day, not just once, not just when you're spinning out of control and can barely hang on, but before you get to that point. When you're doing well, do these things. Don't do these breaks and rest just because you're having a hard time. Do them before you start having a hard time. And try to structure your flexibility. Build routines that allow wiggle room. So if you have a morning routine, try to structure it with flexible time blocks instead of rigid appointments if you have that control. Use checklists, visual cues are alarms. Alarms are your friends, visual cues are your friends, and checklists are your friends. Put a whiteboard on your refrigerator. Put a whiteboard in your room. Write notes on your mirror with dry erase marker in your bathroom. Use visual cues of what you need, not to force compliance, but to reduce your cognitive load. Rely on external supports. Delegate tasks when possible. Grocery delivery, grocery pickup, put them in your trunk. Shared responsibilities. If you are partnered and you are doing the brunt of the work or the default parent, have a conversation. Speak to a couple's counselor. Get this right. And also virtual assistance. If it's in the budget, if it's something that works for you, virtual assistants are out there. Communicate with your support network about your capacity. Ask for patience and understanding and compassion. Anyone that doesn't want to give you patience, understanding, and compassion, there needs to be boundaries. They're not nice. They need to work on themselves and not project their shit onto you. How about practicing some self-compassion? Please, please, please practice some compassion. When I say this, I want you, I don't know if you've ever, I'm trying not to assume that everyone's been around a toddler. But if you've been around a toddler, and there's a few things that you gotta know about a toddler. And that is they need rest, they need naps, they need fun time, some excitement, some novelty. Snacks and food, nutrition is always important, and some comfort. There's comfort, snuggy blanket, stuffed animal, something. I want you to treat yourself like a toddler. Make sure you're always fed well. Make sure you always have fun time. Make sure you're always resting. Make sure you're not pushing yourself through so that you're screaming and crying and fighting sleep. Take care of yourself before that happens. Anytime you notice frustration or say a shame, I would like for you to acknowledge it in a gentle way. Say something to yourself like, I'm doing the best I can with the resources I have today. This can create some internal safety, which can conserve energy and reduce the overwhelm. Just naming it like, sis, I know this is a hard day. I know this is a hard task. Would you like to take a break and go splash some water on your face or go breathe outside and then hop back in after a five-minute break? Like, talk to yourself with compassion, patience, and understanding. And I said this and I'll repeat it again because it's worth it. Accommodations environmental and sensory-wise. Identify your triggers and design your environment to reduce them. Lighting, textures, sounds, and seating arrangements can make a huge difference. Another recommendation is task chunking and prioritizing. Break large task into small task, manageable pieces. So if you've got the laundry, you've got a couple of steps. You can break it down. I'm just gonna put it in the washer, then I'm gonna put it in the dryer, then I'm gonna fold it, hang it up, whichever one you do. Break it down. I often talk about the Pomodoro technique. 20 minutes of work, five minutes of rest, repeat that three times, and then take a real break. But if you've got something like laundry and folding clothes, set the timer for 10 or 15 minutes. Do it, then give yourself a break. See if you can beat the clock. A lot of the times, if it's not extraordinary, you can get the dishes done in less than 15 minutes. Time yourself to see how long it actually takes you to do a task so that when it comes up in the future, your brain and nervous system know exactly what's required of you and can answer it in true capacity form. Not what you perceive it to be, but what it truly is. You're like, oh, that's 15 minutes and I've got an hour to do this, and then I can rest. Okay, I can get that done. So time yourself in your task so that you know genuinely how it lit how long it literally takes you to do something. Prioritize your task based on energy, cost, and importance, not urgency alone. And then lastly, I invite you to take a mindful pause. Build intentional micro pauses throughout your day to just simply check in with your nervous system. Ask yourself, what do I need right now? Or ask yourself, what can I release right now? Check your jaws, make sure your teeth aren't clenched together, check your shoulders, make sure they're not stressed, tensed up in the ears. Check your body, see if you're holding tension anywhere. Take a nice deep belly breath where that belly rises and that exhale is longer than the inhale. Speaking of breathing, let's let's take a breath. Take a nice deep inhale. Inhale deeply, breathe in slowly. Notice your body. Where do you feel tension or tightness? Where do you feel lightness or ease? Let the air out, let the ease come in. Please acknowledge that both tightness and lightness, they're all valid. Your nervous system is always communicating, and listening is a radical act of self-care. The more you are in tune with your body, and the more you speak to that inunement, sis, you become a powerful woman, I'm telling you. All these years, they've made us think that some of this anxiety we have is because we need meds, and it's not, it's because we're highly intuitive, powerful beings. Women are amazing. I'm a little biased because I am one, but I think we're great. So listen to yourself, listen to your body, honor your body. It's yours, no one else's, and no one else is gonna take care of it. I'd like you to imagine creating a day where you're where you honor your energy first, not your clock, not the expectations, please, not comparison. Just imagine giving yourself permission to start small, to rest, to ask for help, to release negative shit like shame and guilt and expectations and comparison. And notice what that feels like in your body. Let that imagination, let that dream of a slow day of letting it linger, like let that linger here for a moment. Savor in that dream. Because you are not broken, you are navigating a complex, beautiful wiring that deserves care and respect. Today I invite you to give yourself permission to honor your capacity, to prioritize your nervous system, and to do your best to live in your rhythm. Here's a little mantra affirmation for you. Repeat it silently, are allowed. I am allowed to move at my own pace. I am allowed to rest. I am allowed to exist fully as I am. Take up space in a good way, not in a negative, needy, toxic way, but in an enlightened, positive, loving way. And that happens when you start loving the shit out of yourself. Here's some journal prompts I thought you like, thought prompts, journal prompts, get a notebook, get something right with. Here we go. What moments today felt overwhelming? And what contributed to it? What factors contributed? Where did I try to push through? And what might have been a kinder approach? Which tasks or responsibilities could I delegate, delay, or simplify? What small action can I take today to honor my nervous system? How can I practice self-compassion when I notice frustration, shame, or guilt? Take your time with these prompts. I'm gonna try to put them in the show notes. I have it on my mind now. I think I'll put it in there in the show notes. There's no rush. Write freely. Let your body guide your reflection because this is not about being productive. It's about integration, understanding, and fucking self-care. You've now set with yourself through recognition, reflection, and guidance. It's okay to witness the collision of autism and ADHD. You are seen, you are valid, you are capable of creating safety and ease, even in small steps. Because this is the work of living fully in your neurodivergent trauma-informed body, and it is sacred. And that's a wrap, my dears. I'm here. If you want to message, comment, leave an emoji. How about a dove emoji, right? Rising above. Let's have some peace. If you'd like to work with me, I offer virtual sessions, whether you're in the state of Texas for therapy or outside of Texas and living abroad. They're all virtual therapeutic life coaching sessions. We can dive more. That's what I do every day. It is my blessing to help women every day just grow and heal and find their true self. Sometimes for the first time, and that's such a beautiful thing. So I'd love to help you. The link tree in the show notes, you can click on that and fill out a 15-minute consultation form, and we will have a free chat to see if we're a good fit. Also, there are some other goodies on there. You can follow me on Instagram. You can follow a good playlist with music that is nothing but empowering healing music for you, my dears. Alright. You're never broken. You're never too late. You're never alone. Until next time, may mine and your healing ripple out into the world to bless everyone with happiness and freedom. Take care of you, and I'll see you soon.