tl;dr: After supporting adults with ADHD across 80,000+ coaching sessions, we kept seeing the same gap: people gain clarity about what matters, but struggle to hold onto it in everyday life. Indy is a free, AI-powered ADHD support app designed to help people stay oriented to what matters and translate that clarity into daily action, without relying on productivity pressure or generic AI advice.

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Hi YC family! 👋

We’re Chris & Vikram, and we’re building Shimmer. Our mission is for every individual with ADHD to reach their full potential, their way. Shimmer began after I (Chris) was diagnosed with ADHD and struggled to access affordable, high-quality behavioral support. Since then, we’ve grown into the #1 ADHD coaching platform recommended by clinicians across North America.

As large language models became viable, we saw a clear opportunity. ADHD isn’t a problem of knowledge, it’s a problem of continuity. Insight is available, but support disappears between moments. AI, for the first time, makes it possible to provide consistent, personalized scaffolding in the flow of daily life.

That opportunity is what led us to build Indy.

❌ The Challenge

Across tens of thousands of ADHD coaching sessions, one pattern shows up again and again.

Breakthroughs don’t fail because people forget what they learned. They fail because daily life takes over.

People leave a session with clarity about what matters and where they want to go. Then the week happens. Context shifts. Energy fluctuates. Emotions spike. Urgency crowds out direction.

For ADHDers, this breakdown is predictable:

1. 🧠 Executive function is state-dependent: What feels obvious in one moment is inaccessible in another. Memory, motivation, and prioritization fluctuate with energy and emotion.
2. 🕳 The future fades quickly: When goals are not emotionally present, the present always wins. ADHD brains respond to what feels salient now.
3. ⏳ Support is episodic and constrained by human capacity: Coaching, therapy, etc. work primarily during sessions, but disappear when real decisions are being made.

Existing tools don’t address this well. General AI gives answers. Productivity apps manage tasks. Neither maintains orientation or adapts as conditions change.

✨ The AI Opportunity

AI changes what’s possible here.

For the first time, software can:

• Hold personal context over time
• Reflect patterns back to users
• Adapt support based on energy, emotion, and behavior
• Provide lightweight scaffolding between human interactions

This is especially powerful for ADHD, where the problem isn’t knowing what to do, but staying connected to why and when to do it.

✨ The Solution

Indy is a daily AI-powered ADHD support system designed to help people stay oriented to what matters and translate that clarity into everyday action.

Here’s how it works:

1. Future mapping: Users map key moments from their past, present, and future to anchor what they care about and where they’re headed.

   

2. Daily and weekly check-ins: Indy helps users set lightweight intentions, anticipate obstacles, and reflect without pressure.

   

3. Insights over time: Indy turns check-ins into pattern visibility. Users start to see what drains them, what helps, where momentum shows up, and what keeps derailing progress, so they can adjust earlier.

   

4. Problem-solving when stuck: When friction shows up, Indy uses science-backed frameworks to help users identify what’s actually blocking progress and choose a small next step.

   

5. Progress made visible: Wins, effort, and insights are tracked so progress doesn’t disappear just because it wasn’t perfect.

   

AI gives us a chance to rethink how behavioral support works for ADHD. Indy is our first step toward making that support continuous, accessible, and humane. Check out Indy to see it in practice! And here is the full blog post!

🙏 Asks

• Try Indy for free: https://www.shimmer.care/indy-redirect