You have been staring at the same search results for three days. Maybe you finally looked up ADHD coaching after another week where your performance review at Baptist Health did not match what you know you are capable of. Or after missing a shift-change deadline at Toyota for the second time this quarter. Or after your advisor at UK sent a gentle but pointed email about your research timeline slipping. Whatever the moment was, you decided to do something about it. And then you ran into a problem that feels painfully familiar.

Lexington is not a small town, but it is not Louisville or Cincinnati either. The coaching options here are limited, and the ones that show up in a search are hard to evaluate. A handful of therapists mention coaching in their bios. A couple of life coaches list ADHD as one of fifteen specialties. One or two profiles look potentially legitimate, but there is no clear way to tell whether their ADHD training goes deeper than a weekend workshop. You are weighing the gamble of committing to one of a few unclear options, knowing that if it does not work out, you are basically starting from zero in a market that did not have many choices to begin with. Meanwhile, the tabs sit open, the decision stalls, and the thing you need help with (following through on important decisions) is the exact thing preventing you from getting help.

This guide covers what ADHD coaching actually is, which credentials separate genuine specialists from generalists, how to evaluate methodology, what to expect on cost, and how to make this decision without letting it become another project that quietly fades off your list.

What makes ADHD coaching different from therapy or psychiatry

Lexington has solid clinical mental health infrastructure. The University of Kentucky's healthcare system, Baptist Health, and CHI Saint Joseph Health all offer psychiatric and psychological services. The presence of UK's medical and psychology programs means there are more clinical providers per capita here than in most mid-size Kentucky cities. But coaching is not a clinical service, and understanding where it fits before you spend money on the wrong type of support saves real time and frustration.

ADHD coaching focuses on the present and the future. It is a collaborative partnership where you and your coach build practical strategies, systems, and habits for reaching your goals. The work is action-oriented. You identify what you want to accomplish, figure out what keeps getting in the way, and develop personalized tools for handling challenges like time management, prioritization, task initiation, and follow-through. A good ADHD coach works with the way your brain actually functions rather than expecting you to force yourself into systems designed for neurotypical people. Neurotypical is a term that simply means someone whose brain processes attention and information in the way considered standard or typical.

Therapy addresses the emotional and psychological layers underneath. A therapist helps you process past experiences, work through anxiety or depression (both of which frequently co-occur with ADHD), and understand emotional patterns that may have been building for years. In Lexington, where the professional culture across manufacturing, healthcare, and agriculture tends to value quiet resilience and just getting it done, a lot of adults with ADHD have spent years pushing through without understanding why everything felt harder. Therapy is the right space for unpacking that weight. But therapy on its own does not typically hand you the concrete, day-to-day systems for managing a shift schedule at an Amazon fulfillment center or staying on top of a grant deadline at UK.

Psychiatry covers the medical side. A psychiatrist can formally diagnose ADHD, prescribe and manage medication, and oversee your treatment plan over time. If you are exploring whether medication might help, or need an official diagnosis, that is where to start on the clinical end.

These three types of support work alongside each other, not in competition. Many adults with ADHD benefit from a combination. You might see a psychiatrist for medication management, a therapist for processing the emotional weight of decades spent compensating without a diagnosis, and a coach for building the daily systems that hold your professional and personal life together. In Kentucky, therapy and psychiatry are often at least partially covered by insurance depending on your plan, while coaching generally is not. We will talk more about cost and workarounds later.

The essential thing to understand about coaching is that it is forward-looking and practical. You are not spending sessions unpacking your past. You are building a specific plan for how to manage your energy, stop losing track of commitments, and follow through on the things that matter to you.

What credentials should an ADHD coach actually have

Before you start comparing coaches, there is one fact that changes how you should approach the entire search: the title "ADHD coach" is completely unregulated. Kentucky has no licensing requirement for coaches, no state oversight board, no required exam, and no minimum training hours. Anyone can build a website, list ADHD coaching as a service, and start scheduling clients this week. In a mid-size city like Lexington, where the pool of coaches is already small, this makes the stakes higher. You have fewer options, and the cost of choosing poorly is not just wasted money but potentially months of lost momentum before you try again.

So how do you protect yourself?

PAAC certification is one of the most reliable signals. PAAC stands for the Professional Association of ADHD Coaches. Coaches who hold PAAC certification have completed rigorous ADHD-specific training programs, logged supervised coaching hours, and demonstrated genuine competency in working with ADHD-related challenges. This is not a weekend course or a short online module. It represents a serious commitment to specialized education.

ICF credentials are another strong indicator. The ICF, or International Coaching Federation, is the most widely recognized credentialing body in the coaching profession globally. An ICF-credentialed coach has completed extensive training hours, accumulated a minimum number of client coaching hours, and passed a formal evaluation process. ICF credentials alone do not guarantee ADHD expertise, but when you see them paired with ADHD-specific training, you are looking at someone who takes their professional standards seriously.

NBC-HWC certification is also worth knowing about. NBC-HWC stands for National Board Certified Health and Wellness Coach. This is a board certification indicating training in evidence-based coaching techniques. When combined with ADHD specialization, it adds another verified layer of competence.

Lived experience with ADHD can make a coach more intuitive and empathetic. Many excellent coaches have ADHD themselves and bring genuine personal understanding of the challenges you face. But lived experience without formal training and a structured methodology is not sufficient on its own. You want both personal understanding and evidence-based frameworks working together.

Red flags to watch for:

• No specific credentials or training programs listed anywhere on their website

• The only stated qualification is personal experience with ADHD

• Promises of guaranteed outcomes like eliminating procrastination or fixing distractibility

• No mention of continuing education, supervision, or a defined methodology

• An approach that sounds more like casual conversation than structured coaching support

Questions to ask any coach you are considering:

• What ADHD-specific training have you completed, and through which program?

• Are you certified through PAAC, ICF, or another recognized body?

• Do you receive regular supervision or participate in peer consultation?

• What methodology or framework guides your coaching sessions?

• How do you track and measure client progress?

• What does support look like between sessions?

A qualified coach will welcome every one of these questions. They have invested real time and money building their expertise and will be glad to walk you through it. If someone becomes evasive or defensive when you ask about their training, that tells you something important.

Why does virtual coaching work well for ADHD in Lexington

Lexington is compact compared to sprawling metros like Louisville or Nashville. The urban core is manageable, and most drives within the city take 20 to 25 minutes. But in a market with limited ADHD coaching options, geographic convenience is not really the point. The real issue is that filtering by who happens to have an office within Fayette County leaves you choosing from a very small pool, and small pools mean you are more likely to settle for a coach whose expertise or style is not the right fit.

Virtual coaching changes this equation entirely. Instead of being limited to whoever is local, you can match based on what actually determines whether coaching works: their depth of ADHD-specific training, their experience with your type of challenge, their coaching style, and their understanding of your professional context. A coach who specializes in working with healthcare professionals navigating executive function challenges in fast-paced hospital systems might be a dramatically better fit than a local generalist. Someone with deep experience supporting shift-based workers managing inconsistent routines could be exactly what an operations manager at Toyota's Georgetown plant needs, even if that coach is based in another state entirely.

Virtual coaching also helps with consistency, which is one of the hardest things to maintain when you have ADHD. Every logistical barrier between you and your session becomes one more reason to reschedule. When your session is a video call you can take from your home office in Hamburg, your desk at a UK research lab, or your kitchen table in Nicholasville, the friction drops. You show up more often. The coaching relationship builds momentum. Progress compounds over time instead of stalling out whenever something comes up.

For Lexington specifically, virtual access also solves the scarcity problem without requiring you to drive to Louisville or Cincinnati to find a specialist. You get access to the full national pool of credentialed ADHD coaches while sitting in your living room on Richmond Road.

And if a coaching match turns out not to be the right fit, pivoting is straightforward. You are not restarting a geographic search in a market with limited options. You match with a different coach and keep moving forward without losing ground.

What does a strong ADHD coaching methodology look like

Methodology is the invisible dividing line between coaching that creates lasting change and coaching that feels like a supportive conversation you forget about by the next morning. Two coaches can have similar websites, similar pricing, and similar professional bios, but their actual approaches might be fundamentally different underneath.

Evidence-based frameworks form the foundation of quality coaching. One widely used model is the COM-B framework, which breaks behavior change into three components: Capability, Opportunity, and Motivation. Rather than offering generic advice like "just use a planner" or "try setting more alarms," a coach using COM-B helps you identify whether a particular challenge stems from a skill gap (capability), an environmental barrier (opportunity), or a drive issue (motivation), and then addresses the actual root cause. Another evidence-based tool is implementation intentions, which are specific if/then plans designed to bridge the gap between wanting to do something and actually doing it. Instead of "I will work on that report this week," an implementation intention sounds like "When I sit down at my desk after my Monday team huddle, I will open the project file and write for 25 minutes before checking email."

Structured sessions versus open conversation is one of the biggest dividing lines between quality coaching and everything else. In a structured approach, each session follows a framework. Your coach prepares. Goals carry forward from previous conversations. Progress is tracked over time. You are building on a foundation week after week rather than starting fresh each session with whatever feels most urgent. Unstructured conversation can feel supportive in the moment, but without that continuity, it rarely produces consistent, measurable behavior change.

Between-session support matters more than most people realize when they first start looking into coaching. ADHD does not take a break between your weekly calls. New habits are fragile. Motivation fluctuates constantly. Quality coaching includes some form of ongoing connection between sessions, whether that is messaging support, accountability check-ins, or access to a community of people working through similar challenges. That continuity between calls is often what determines whether a new strategy actually sticks or fades by midweek.

Executive dysfunction-specific design is non-negotiable. Executive dysfunction refers to difficulties with the brain's management system: working memory, planning, task initiation, emotional regulation, and the ability to accurately perceive time. Generic coaching techniques frequently assume a baseline level of executive function that people with ADHD do not consistently have. A methodology built specifically for ADHD accounts for these realities and designs systems around them rather than pretending they are not part of the equation.

Peer community and shared learning add something that isolated one-on-one sessions cannot replicate. Connecting with other adults who face similar challenges creates accountability, normalizes the experience, and generates practical strategies you might not encounter on your own. Hearing that someone in a similar professional role found a particular approach helpful carries a different weight than hearing it from a coach alone.

Ongoing coach supervision is something most people never think to ask about, but it is one of the most meaningful quality indicators. Coaches who practice in isolation with no external oversight can develop blind spots or drift into outdated methods over time. Regular supervision means a qualified professional is reviewing their work, providing feedback, and holding them to a consistent standard of practice.

The frustrating part is that none of these methodological differences are visible from a website or directory listing. Two coach profiles can look nearly identical while representing very different levels of rigor underneath. The only way to distinguish them is to ask the right questions during your vetting process.

How much does ADHD coaching typically cost

Cost is a real factor, and having clear expectations going in is better than being surprised after your first session.

Nationally, individual ADHD coaching sessions range from about $150 to $300 per session. Monthly coaching packages, which typically include regular sessions plus some level of between-session support, fall between $300 and $600 per month. Those ranges shift based on coach experience, credentials, session length, and how much support is included between calls.

The instinct to look for the lowest price makes sense, especially in Lexington where the cost of living runs below the national average and most household budgets are structured around that reality. But cost and credential depth tend to correlate. Coaches who have invested thousands of dollars in ADHD-specific training, ICF certification, supervised practice hours, and continuing education charge more because their overhead is higher and their expertise runs deeper. That does not mean the most expensive coach is automatically the best fit. But consistently choosing the lowest price point increases your odds of working with someone who has minimal specialized training.

Insurance generally does not cover ADHD coaching. Coaching is not classified as therapy or a medical service under most plans, and Kentucky does not currently mandate coaching coverage.

FSA and HSA accounts can often be used for coaching. If your employer offers a Flexible Spending Account or Health Savings Account, ADHD coaching may qualify as an eligible expense. This lets you pay with pre-tax dollars, effectively reducing your real cost by 20 to 30 percent depending on your tax bracket. With major employers in Lexington like UK HealthCare, Toyota, Amazon, and Lexmark offering competitive benefits packages, this is worth checking before you assume coaching is out of reach financially.

When evaluating cost, it helps to weigh it against the cost of not getting support. Stalled career momentum because you cannot consistently deliver on deadlines. Strained relationships from forgotten commitments. The mental and emotional weight of feeling like you are falling behind despite knowing you are capable of more. Effective coaching pays for itself when it helps you show up reliably in the areas that matter most to you.

How do you find and evaluate coaches in Lexington

With a solid understanding of what coaching is, which credentials matter, and what strong methodology looks like, the practical search can begin. Lexington's particular landscape creates a few specific challenges worth understanding before you start.

Where to look:

The PAAC directory (Professional Association of ADHD Coaches) is the most targeted starting point. Every coach listed there has met specific ADHD training requirements. The ICF directory is broader but useful for independently verifying credentials. Lexington does not currently have a dedicated CHADD chapter. CHADD stands for Children and Adults with Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder, and it is the leading national organization for ADHD information and support. The nearest chapters are in the Louisville and Cincinnati areas. Virtual CHADD meetings and national resources are available through CHADD.org, and these can still be a useful way to connect with community members who may have coach recommendations from personal experience.

The Lexington-specific challenge:

Lexington sits in an unusual spot. It is big enough to have a diverse economy and a well-educated workforce, thanks largely to the University of Kentucky, but it is not big enough to support a large specialized coaching market. Most directory searches for ADHD coaching in Lexington return a small number of results, and those results are often mixed in with therapists who offer some coaching, life coaches who list ADHD alongside a dozen other areas, and wellness practitioners whose ADHD-specific training is unclear. The city's professional culture, shaped by manufacturing, healthcare, agriculture, and the equine industry, tends to favor practical, results-oriented approaches. That is actually a good instinct when it comes to coaching, but it makes the lack of clearly credentialed local options more frustrating. You know what you want. You just cannot easily find it here.

The vetting process:

Once you have a shortlist, go beyond what their website says. Verify credentials independently through the PAAC and ICF directories. Schedule consultation calls, which most coaches offer for free or at a reduced rate. Use that conversation to ask the credential and methodology questions outlined earlier in this guide.

During a consultation, pay attention to:

• Whether they ask about your specific challenges or move straight into describing their packages

• How clearly they can explain their methodology and framework

• Whether they mention supervision, continuing education, or structured approaches

• How natural and comfortable the conversation feels

• Whether pricing, session structure, and expectations are transparent from the start

When a match does not work out:

This happens more often than anyone talks about. You go through the search, commit to one of the few available coaches, attend a few sessions, and realize the fit is off. Maybe their approach does not match how you process things. Maybe they lack depth in the specific area where you need the most help. In a bigger market, you would have other options lined up. In Lexington, you might be looking at starting over with even fewer choices, or expanding your search to Louisville or Cincinnati and adding a drive to an already packed schedule. For someone with ADHD, restarting that kind of open-ended process can feel nearly impossible.

Even with the right directories and a thoughtful approach, the full weight of research, vetting, and risk sits on your shoulders. That is a heavy lift for anyone, and it is an especially difficult one when the executive function challenges you are trying to get help with are the exact same ones making the sustained research feel exhausting.

Why a Shimmer ADHD coach might be the better option

Every frustration described above is why Shimmer exists. We built it because we have lived through that same draining search ourselves and knew there had to be a better way.

The vetting is done before you ever show up. Shimmer coaches go through a selection process with a 4% acceptance rate. Every coach holds ADHD-specific credentials, whether that is PAAC certification or equivalent specialized training. They are not just hired and left on their own. Shimmer coaches receive ongoing supervision and continuing education, which means their practice is consistently held to a high standard. The methodology is grounded in behavioral science frameworks designed specifically for how ADHD brains work, and it is consistent across the entire platform. In a market like Lexington where vetting local options requires significant effort with limited choices, having the quality question answered before you even start changes the experience entirely.

Matching is built into the system. Instead of spending weeks scrolling through sparse directory results and hoping for the best, Shimmer matches you with a coach based on your specific needs, preferences, and goals. If the match is not right, you switch. No awkward conversation. No penalty. No restarting the whole search from scratch. You match with someone new and keep building momentum. This is especially meaningful in a mid-size market where the traditional alternative to a bad match might mean running out of local options entirely.

The methodology extends beyond your weekly session. Shimmer's coaching approach is rooted in science-backed frameworks for behavior change and executive function support. Sessions are structured, goal-oriented, and connected from one to the next. But the support does not disappear between calls. Shimmer includes community access where you connect with other members working through similar challenges. That combination of expert one-on-one coaching and peer community creates a layer of accountability and shared learning that a single weekly session on its own cannot replicate.

The financial risk is minimal. Shimmer offers a 30-day money-back guarantee. Pricing is transparent and published upfront, so you know exactly what you are committing to before you begin. Compare that to the traditional path where you might spend $300 on a first session with a coach you found through a directory, only to realize after two or three sessions that their approach does not work for your brain, and then face the prospect of investing more money to try again with someone new.

Virtual-first means all of Lexington is covered equally. Whether you live near the UK campus, work at a manufacturing facility in Georgetown, are based in a home office in Nicholasville, or split your time between Hamburg and downtown, you get the same quality of coaching without geography being a factor. No driving to Louisville to find a specialist. No settling for a less-qualified local option because it is the only one within a reasonable distance. Just consistent, expert support that fits into your life where it already is.

Shimmer's coaches work with professionals across every industry and context that shapes Lexington's economy. Healthcare workers at UK HealthCare and Baptist Health managing cognitive overload in demanding clinical environments. Manufacturing and operations professionals at Toyota and Amazon navigating shift schedules and production deadlines. University of Kentucky students and researchers juggling academic demands alongside ADHD. Professionals in the equine and agricultural industries dealing with seasonal rhythms and unpredictable workloads. Financial services workers managing detail-heavy responsibilities that leave little room for missed steps. The matching process accounts for these differences so you work with someone who genuinely understands your professional and personal context.

Members consistently describe the difference as significant compared to previous coaching experiences. The structured methodology, the ongoing accountability between sessions, and the ability to switch coaches without friction combine to create something that works with ADHD instead of requiring you to power through a broken process just to access help.

How do you get started with ADHD coaching

Taking the first step can feel like a big decision, especially if you have been researching ADHD coaching for weeks or months without actually committing. If that sounds familiar, you are in very good company. That kind of decision paralysis is one of the most common ADHD patterns, and there is a real irony in the fact that the challenges you need help with are the same ones making it hard to seek help in the first place.

Getting started is simpler than the research process makes it seem. You sign up, get matched with a coach, and have your first session. That initial conversation is about your coach getting to know you: your goals, your challenges, what you have already tried, and where you want to focus first. You do not need to arrive with a polished list of objectives or a complete history of your ADHD experience. Your coach is trained to guide that conversation and help you figure out where to begin.

The first few sessions are about building a foundation. You and your coach will identify what matters most to you right now and start developing strategies tailored to how your brain works. Expect it to feel exploratory at first. You are testing approaches, finding out what sticks, and building trust with someone who is going to be in your corner consistently.

Set realistic expectations. Coaching is not an overnight fix. You will not leave your first session with every executive function challenge resolved. What you will have is a structured starting point, a knowledgeable partner who understands ADHD deeply, and a framework for making steady, compounding progress. Most members start noticing meaningful shifts within the first few weeks as new strategies take hold and small wins begin to build on each other.

If you have been putting off this decision, that is okay. The fact that you read this far says something about your intent. Whenever you are ready, the option is there, and starting is a lot less complicated than the search made it feel.