What we’re doing
Building Productivity Tools for the Neurodivergent (ND) Brain
ND describes individuals with brains that function differently from the norm, including those with ADHD, Autism, Dyslexia, and OCD. These conditions often involve executive dysfunction, making it hard to decide, prioritize, manage time, and start or switch tasks.
If you’re ND, your brain works differently. This can cause tools that work for others to not work for you. We’re re-imagining traditional productivity tools for the ND community, so that they work with your brain not against it.
Who we are
We were college roommates, and now we’re on a mission to build a tool to support our brains—and yours. We’re tired of struggling, and watching our friends struggle, with overwhelm, anxiety, procrastination, and burnout while trying to work in a world that doesn’t always fit how our minds work. It often feels like there’s a missing gear between knowing what we need to do and actually doing it. So, we’re creating tools to bridge that gap—helping you stay aware of time, plan better, and execute more effectively, while reducing stress.
Ross Thomas
Founder
Henry Lynn
Developer
Our Story
Henry and I were roommates during our junior year of college in 2020, navigating the challenges of remote learning during the Covid era while still attending morning PT for ROTC. For Henry, balancing all-night coding sessions as a computer science major with waking up before 6 AM for PT was a constant struggle. Our suitemates and I tried everything to help—from scheduling strategies and creative alarm setups like hiding a Tile tracker in his bed or moving his phone across the room to brainstorming a pressure-activated alarm. But nothing worked, and it was hard to watch him struggle through burnout cycles.
Fast forward to 2024: I’m now in the Army full-time and have been married for almost a year. My wife, Emma, also has ADHD, and it’s been eye-opening to discover how this affects our marriage as we balance my work, her job, her grad school applications, and exploring life in a new city. Early on, we noticed challenges like time blindness. Often, I’d need to get to bed, but she’d feel blindsided by how late it was, thinking it was much earlier and we had more time left together. We worked on strategies for tracking time, but I realized we needed something more as I watched her tackle the intense process of applying to grad school.
Grad school applications are overwhelming for anyone, but for Emma, like most people with ADHD, they were especially challenging. They required hours of shadowing, volunteering, essay writing, informational interviews, and self-paced research—on top of working full-time. She struggled with scheduling, managing deadlines, and sticking to plans, often feeling down, overwhelmed, and frustrated. She’d compare herself to others who seemed to navigate the process with ease, and she hated that she couldn’t always execute her plans as intended.
Watching her go through this was incredibly difficult. I know how talented, passionate, and capable she was, but the process—designed by and for neurotypical (NT) individuals—was overwhelming for her. I started looking for tools to help her, but every option was a dead end. They were tools she’d already tried but didn’t work, relied on negative reinforcement (a dealbreaker due to past experiences), or felt overly complicated and intimidating. I couldn’t believe there weren’t effective productivity tools designed specifically for people with ADHD and executive dysfunction—people who need these tools the most.
That’s when I started brainstorming ideas for a better solution and reached out to Henry. He hadn’t found anything that worked well for him either and loved the idea of creating something new. Together, we started Fixate. I drew inspiration from friends and family, learning about the strategies they use and turning those into wireframes. Emma helped refine the designs, brainstorm ideas, and guide the vision with her lived experience. Henry further refined the wireframes and turned them into reality.
Fixate is our attempt to reimagine productivity tools for neurodivergent (ND) brains—tools designed to reduce overwhelm and boost confidence in the ND community. It isn’t a perfect solution, but we hope it will help create an easier day-to-day experience. However, we can’t do it alone—we need your help. If you have suggestions, tips, strategies, or feedback, we’d love to hear from you. Together, we can build tools that make a real difference for the ND community.