Ep 12: Understanding AuDHD - Executive Functioning and Daily Life: ADHD, Autism & AuDHD (Part 1)

Send us Fan Mail🎙️ Episode 13: Executive Functioning in Daily Life: ADHD, Autism & AuDHDEpisode SummaryIn this episode of The AuDHD Psych Podcast, Aaron Howearth explores how executive functioning shapes everyday life for autistic, ADHD, and AuDHD individuals. Why do tasks that “should” be simple – studying, working, organising the day, or following through on plans – so often feel overwhelming or impossible, even when we know exactly what we’re meant to be doing?Drawing from both clinical psychology and lived experience, Aaron explains executive functions as the brain’s “mental mechanics”: planning, organisation, working memory, impulse control, sustained attention, and cognitive flexibility. He unpacks how differences in these areas are common across neurodevelopmental conditions and how they influence our ability to start, persist with, and complete tasks in real-world contexts.Aaron also explores the apparent contradiction between autistic and ADHD profiles – rules, structure, and rigidity on one side; impulsivity, distractibility, and jumping between tasks on the other – and how these traits can coexist within AuDHD individuals. Rather than seeing executive functioning as a fixed trait, he highlights how attention, motivation, and follow-through shift with factors like environment, stress, novelty, interest, and internal state.This episode offers clarity, validation, and a practical language for understanding why executive functioning challenges show up the way they do, and invites a more compassionate, neurodiversity-affirming perspective on how we navigate daily life with different “mental mechanics.”Key Themes & TakeawaysExecutive Functions Explained – What planning, working memory, cognitive flexibility, impulse control, and self-monitoring are, and how they operate as the brain’s day-to-day management system.ADHD Executive Profiles – How inattention, distractibility, impulsivity, delay intolerance, and working memory challenges affect studying, work tasks, multi-step activities, and follow-through.Autistic Executive Profiles – How differences in flexibility and planning show up as routines, rules-based thinking, “rigidity,” and difficulty shifting track in conversations or when plans change.AuDHD Internal Tension – Why having both rule-following drives and impulsive, distractible tendencies can create chronic stress, self-criticism, and a build-up of unfinished tasks.Working Memory & Everyday Life – How reduced working memory capacity contributes to lost intentions, forgotten items, and difficulties holding and manipulating information in the moment.Impulse, Consequences & Social Impact – How acting on impulses without fully projecting consequences can subtly but significantly affect learning, relationships, and self-image over time. Rigidity, Routine & Habit Stacking – How turning cognitive rigidity into structured routines and habit stacks can reduce executive load and make important tasks more automatic.Contextual Functioning – How environment, expectations, stress, and internal states influence executive capacity, and why functioning can fluctuate rather than reflect a fixed level of ability.Reframing “Difficulty” – Moving away from moralising language like “lazy” or “disorganised” toward a neurodiversity-affirming understanding of executive functioning differences and how to work with them.Support the showKeywords: AuDHD podcast, autism and ADHD, neurodivergent psychologist, neurodiversity affirming, Howearth Psychology, queer psychologist, autism diagnosis, ADHD awareness, lived experience, neurodivergent mental health, clinical psychology podcast