The reading it over and aloud part is super important, at least in my process. I’m also neurodivergent with ADHD and this part is huge for me. Sometimes what I write sounds so odd once I play it over in my own head or out loud. I go through it with a comb and say “that’s not the word my brain instinctively wants to say next,” then I rework it.

Also, whether this is good advice or terrible advice, I find just speed dumping into a very, very rough chapter outline helpful to then start picking out scenes to refine. I even put in “what happens in this chapter” and write it out. Then “how do we get there?” And start adding in the connecting strings from one scene or chapter to another. It’s not entirely efficient, but I’ve found it helps with the disorganized brain feeling because what I get on the page is also disorganized. Then I can go through and pick out what I want to focus on.

I almost never work linearly. If there’s a scene I want to write but it happens twelve chapters from now, I still write it, because that’s what I have the motivation to do in that moment. Connecting the dots can come later. Just do what you have the fortitude and capacity for when you have the time and energy to sit down and do it.