What Burnout Buddy is
A quick briefing first, so you are not sharing something you know nothing about.
Burnout Buddy is for when you are burnt out and trying harder has stopped working. It tells you what kind of rest you are actually short of, and gives you one small thing to try in the time you have got.
It is a web app you open in a browser on your phone. No app store and nothing to download. It is built for late diagnosed autistic and ADHD adults, and it works just as well for anyone running on empty.
What happens when you open it
- One question, seven statements. "Which of these feels most true right now?" You tap one. Things like "my brain will not stop whirring, too many tabs open", or "everything is too loud, too bright, too much". No typing and no blank box to fill in.
- It names the kind of rest. "It sounds like you need some sensory rest", and then a short piece on what that kind of rest is and why people run low on it. The statement you tapped maps straight to the type, so nothing is being guessed about you.
- You say how much you have got. Two minutes, a lunch break or an hour or more. Smallest first, and two minutes counts.
- One idea, and a way out of it. A suggestion appears. If it does not suit, "Something else?" swaps it. There are 63 of them and every one is written by hand and approved, rather than generated.
Everything else that is in thereThe check-in is the heart of it. This is the rest.
- Permission slips. Written permissions to rest, keepable and shareable, because most of us need it in writing before we believe it.
- Put it down. A box for whatever your brain is still holding while it is meant to be resting. It clears when you close the app and nothing is saved.
- The diary. Type it or speak it, and the audio is never kept. Tap mood words and body signals rather than finding the language from scratch.
- Glimmers. One question for catching a good moment before it evaporates, and a screen of only the good ones to read on a bad day.
- My Pattern. Your last two weeks side by side. Plain counts you could recount by hand, never scores and never verdicts.
- The Bigger Picture. The printable long view for appointments. Months of what you noticed in your own words, so "how have you been?" finally has an answer.
- Brian. The small green blob who lives in it. A written conversation and no chatbot theatre. He offers from the same approved activities and never invents any, and conversations are never saved.
- Privacy. Only you can read your entries. Never sold, never used to train AI models and deleted within 30 days of leaving. Memory is opt-in and the app works fully if you say no.
Worth knowing for anyone who asks: most of the app has no AI in it at all. The check-in, the activities and My Pattern are hand written and the same every time.
Who it is for
Not a demographic. A set of moments, and anyone who recognises one is who this is for.
- Being told autistic burnout runs to months and sometimes years, then doing the arithmetic on that from the couch.
- Wondering why trying harder is not fixing this, when trying harder has fixed everything else you have ever faced.
- Resting properly for weeks, feeling no different, and deciding you must be bad at resting too.
- Being asked how you have been and hearing yourself say fine, because six months will not fit in a sentence.
Why I built it
I taught secondary music for sixteen years and I was signed off in March 2021. I never went back. The ADHD and autism diagnoses came in 2022, and somewhere in the middle of all that a GP told me to my face that there was no support for someone like me.
That is the gap. Most people either find out they are neurodivergent because burnout forced the question, or hit burnout not long after the diagnosis, so burnout is the common thread and nobody hands you a map for it. This is the thing I needed in 2021 and did not have.
Four ways you can share it on the day
Smallest first. Open the one you fancy and ignore the rest. One is plenty.
1. Reshare the launch post to your storyTwo taps and about thirty seconds. This is the one I would choose.
On the morning of the 8th there will be a launch post on my grid. Tap the paper plane underneath it, then "Add post to your story". The link and the tag travel with it, so there is nothing to write and nothing to paste.
If you would rather make your own story, the graphics are further down and here is the text to go with one. The link goes on a link sticker.
2. Be a collaborator on the launch postNothing to make at all. The only one I need your handle for.
I create the launch post and send you a collaborator invite. You accept, and it appears on your grid and in your followers' feeds with both our names on it. The likes and comments pool together.
Two things make it work. Your handle by Friday 2 October, and a heads up that you will accept on the day, because an invite nobody accepts does nothing at all. A story reshare is just as welcome if the grid is precious.
3. Post your ownTwo captions, written and ready. Graphics further down.
Two versions, because we do not all sound the same. The bits in yellow are where your own words go, and a caption in your voice always does better than one in mine.
The warm one
The plain one
- Facebook and LinkedIn. Links work in the post itself on both. Paste https://subscribe-bb.audhdistically.me/ straight in and delete the bio line.
- A story. The link sticker is the only properly tappable link on Instagram, and every account can use one now. That is why the story option is first on this page.
4. Email your listThe biggest one, and the one that moves the most.
Written to be topped and tailed. Take the middle, put your own hello and sign-off around it, and it will sound like you.
Subject lines
The body
The link
One link, everywhere. It goes straight to the sales page.
https://subscribe-bb.audhdistically.me/
Good for a link sticker, a bio link, an email button, anywhere.
Images and video
All downloadable. Right click and save, or long press on a phone.
Three things that keep me out of trouble
- Nothing before Thursday 8 October. The waitlist hears it first and that is the only reason they joined.
- It is not therapy, not a medical device and not a crisis service. So it never treats, cures, fixes or heals burnout, and it never diagnoses anything. What it does is work out what kind of rest somebody is short of. That is the claim, and it is the only one.
- Burnout is never a personal failing here. Obvious for this crowd. Saying it anyway.
What I owe you
A swap is a swap. Whenever you have a launch, an event, a book, a podcast season or a thing you are nervous about putting out, tell me and I will do the same for you. Email to my list, a post, a story, a collab, whatever suits. No expiry and no keeping score.
If you have not had your free access yet, message me and I will sort it. I would far rather you had used the thing before you told anyone about it.
Jenny
jenny@audhdistically.me