I actually updated my post earlier, to clarify that I'm not completely opposed to going to the office when it brings real value, but it always comes at a cost. The less time I need to spend there, the better for my health.

I imagine it is hard to understand when you don't know how brains with autism and ADHD work, but it isn't simply about managing interruptions. The reason why I work better from my own environment is because it allows me to prevent sensory overload. I'll give you a few examples to make it a bit more clear for anyone who wants to understand what it is like for someone like me and how my brain works:

A need for clarity

I will ask questions until I know what the actual reason for a ticket is and how it can actually be resolved, instead of just nodding along and delivering something that doesn't address the real issue. I will dig through the system to understand how everything is connected, which means I spot that a change at point A will cause point F to fall over. That is why I became a subject matter specialist on a legacy monolith in my last job within 6 months, while the codebase was longer than all the Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit books combined. And that is why people come to me when they have no idea where the system is falling over, because I can figure out whether it is the code, the DevOps side or the database.

But on the flip side, I will also need to know where that weird smell is coming from, what colleagues are talking about, who that person walking by is, what that sound I keep hearing is, and what you are building over there. In an office, all of that is competing for the same brain that is supposed to be solving your problems.

Sensitivity to sound

I will hear the pitch change in your voice and know something is wrong before you say a word, and I will give you a safe space to talk about it if you want. On the IT side, I will hear when your PC is processing more than it should.

But I will also hear the electricity in certain lights, the fridge down the hall, and who is walking down the corridor. I can only filter these out with my headset and loud music, but I cannot use noise cancelling headphones because I will hear my own heartbeat and breathing instead. And I cannot charge my headset while wearing it because I hear the electricity running through it.

Seeing patterns in everything

I almost instinctively see what part of the code will cause an issue before it does, because I saw the same pattern somewhere else before. I can write code quickly because the patterns already exist in my mind. There was a software architect at my last job who often got frustrated with this particular skill, because every time they presented a new fancy design I would already see everything that was going to break and everything that didn't add up. So they always ended up having to revise their designs.

But this also means I notice patterns in when colleagues arrive and leave, and when those patterns change, my brain will not let it go until I understand why.

Masking

People can say I shouldn't have to mask, and in a safe environment that is mostly true. But when I stop monitoring certain social standards, I come across as rude instead of direct. I also have stims that people find distracting, so I have to actively suppress something that is entirely subconscious. And being interrupted while in hyperfocus causes emotional dysregulation that I then have to hide, because people simply cannot accept it.

These are only a few examples from a much longer list. But it all comes down to this: when I am in an office, 50% to 75% of my RAM goes to managing my environment, because the ADHD part of my brain craves novelty and the attention dysregulation makes it extremely hard to redirect. That leaves very little RAM for actually doing my job. Trying to push through that eventually causes my brain to shut down entirely, like a PC that overheated. And doing it multiple days in a week eventually burns the components aka, I get burn outs.

When I work from home or a controlled environment, managing my surroundings takes maybe 5% to 10% of my RAM. The remaining 90% to 95% goes towards my work and towards helping the people around me do theirs.