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Burnout, Comebacks & Who Am I Really? Lessons from Alysa Liu and an Identity Crisis I’m Still Working Through


Hi everyone 👋

Right, this one has been swirling in my head for a while. Three things I have been sitting with this week: Alysa Liu’s incredible Olympic win, a bit of an identity crisis, and why every company needs a neurodivergent ERG. Bear with me, it all connects.

🥇 Alysa Liu, ADHD & What Her Comeback Taught Me About Burnout When stepping away is actually the bravest thing you can do



Have you been watching the 2026 Winter Olympics? I’ll be honest, I don’t usually follow the Olympics, but Alysa Liu’s story has been impossible to ignore and it hit close to home.

Alysa is a 20 year old American figure skater who has been very open about having ADHD. She said herself:

“I have ADHD and I love situations that I’m not expecting. It gives me a dopamine rush.”

After finishing 6th at the 2022 Beijing Olympics, she retired. Then she came back entirely on her own terms, with creative control over her programs and a team that actually understood her ADHD, and last week she won Olympic gold. The first American woman to do so since 2002.

What a role model for young ADHDers. The idea that having fun, hyperfocusing on what you love, and doing things your way can genuinely lead to gold, literally.

This has been on my mind a lot because of burnout. We use that word quite casually, but ADHD burnout is something much more specific. It is a state of severe physical and mental exhaustion from trying really hard to executively function in controlled environments, day after day, year after year.

When I am coaching my clients with late-diagnosed ADHD, around 70% of them are navigating burnout from work. They feel enormous guilt because their neurotypical peers seem to be coping better. And I always have to remind them:

  • Our brains are working 10 times harder to fit into a highly stimulating world

  • We have little control over what lands in our inbox or what is being asked of us

  • We often have no say over our workflow or environment

  • The comparison to neurotypical colleagues is simply not a fair one

Reading about how Alysa left and came back on her own terms reminded me of what I did 5 years ago, when I stepped away from finance and just decided I was going to start living and working differently. I started looking for:

  • Roles with more say over my own workload

  • Flexibility in how I showed up at work

  • The option to work from home

My mental health has improved ever since.

The key message here? It is okay to take a step back, if you are privileged enough to do so, to reset after intense ADHD burnout. Not everyone can, and I know that. But if you can, it might be the thing that eventually brings you back to your gold.

I have built a simple burnout checker tool if you want to sense check where you are on the scale. It is something I use regularly with my clients too:👉 flairtoolkit.com


🤔 Who Am I Outside of ADHD? When your diagnosis becomes your whole personality and you’re not sure how you feel about that

Recently, I have been having a bit of an identity crisis.

Ever since I was diagnosed with ADHD back in 2020, everything I have focused on has been ADHD. How to help people with ADHD, how to use tech and AI to support neurodivergent people. And at one point I had to stop and ask myself: who am I outside of ADHD?

Before my diagnosis, I was always interested in finance. But the world of finance I was in felt stuffy, required high levels of masking, and was not somewhere I could be myself. I still miss those conversations though, thinking about capital and its allocation. I started feeling a bit down about how much distance I had put between myself and that world, just to figure out how to manage my own brain.

I am now exploring something new: a strand of business consulting around founder executive functioning, potentially working with venture capital too. It is still early and I am figuring it out, but watch this space.

It has also made me think about a bigger question: is ADHD part of my personality?

My honest answer is that ADHD has shaped certain parts of me, such as:

  • My curiosity and love of learning

  • My ability to hyperfocus on things I find genuinely interesting

  • My intense passion for justice

But there are elements of unmanaged ADHD I would not call personality traits. Being overwhelmed and getting irritable, for example. That is not me. That is my ADHD when it is not being managed. And I genuinely believe this and say it to my clients too:

Your unmanaged ADHD is not your personality.

Of course, everyone has a choice about how they view their ADHD and whether it becomes part of their identity. But I think it is a really important question to sit with.

🏢 Why Every Company Needs a Neurodiversity & Disability Employee Resource Group

I have been in touch with a lot of companies where neurodivergent people have stepped up, advocated hard, and built Employee Resource Groups (ERGs) for disabled and neurodivergent colleagues. And honestly, it is one of the most powerful forms of inclusion I have seen.

Disabled and neurodivergent ERGs are voluntary, employee led groups that:

  • Foster inclusion and a genuine sense of community

  • Provide safe spaces for people to share their experiences

  • Advocate for practical workplace adjustments

  • Help educate organisations on how to build more accessible environments

  • Improve retention of neurodivergent and disabled staff

I always say this is the best form of grassroots advocacy and support that any company can nurture. HR teams are stretched. A bottom-up employee support group is a genuine way to create safe space without putting everything on one overloaded department. I would argue every company should be allocating budget for this.

If you need help setting up an ERG at your company, whether that is strategy, thinking through processes, or figuring out where to even start, get in touch with me. I have helped other companies do exactly this and would love to support yours.


📅 Upcoming: Join Me Live Organisation Without Overwhelm

My weekly group coaching sessions are continuing every Wednesday at 7pm GMT and this week’s session is one I know a lot of you need

Organisation Without Overwhelm

📅 Wednesday 25th February 🕖 7pm — 8pm GMT 📍 Zoom 🎟 £20

This session focuses on diary management and why ADHD brains often struggle with prioritising tasks in a way that actually sticks. We’ll explore:

  • How to plan your day based on energy and capacity rather than unrealistic to do lists

  • How to break tasks down so they feel more doable instead of overwhelming

  • Why the standard productivity advice simply does not work for our brains



Around the Table: Conversations on Neurodiversity

I am also organising an in person event in London to mark Neurodiversity Celebration Week and I would love to see some of you there.

📅 Tuesday 17th March🕡 6:30pm — 7:30pm 📍 LSE Generate, London

This is not a panel or a lecture. We will gather around small tables with thoughtfully designed discussion prompts around neurodiversity, disability, identity, and work. The aim is honest conversations, shared learning, and meaningful connection — whether you are neurodivergent yourself or simply curious and committed to building more inclusive environments. You do not need to identify as neurodivergent to attend. All that is required is openness, curiosity, and respect.


💛 How to Support Me & What I Am Building

If any of this has resonated with you, here are a few ways to support what I do:

Work with me directly

Free tools for neurodivergent people

  • I am building free interactive tools for the ADHD and neurodivergent community, including a burnout checker, dopamine menu builder, and more. Have a play and let me know what you think: www.flairtoolkit.com

My neurotech inclusion platform

  • I am currently in conversations with HR teams and companies who want to be early testers of Flairya, my neuroinclusion platform for the workplace. If you work in HR or know someone who would be interested in giving feedback, please get in touch. I would love to connect: www.flairya.com

Sharing this newsletter with someone who might find it useful is also one of the kindest things you can do. Thank you for being here 💛

Wishing you lots of dopamine and love

Kim


 
 
 

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