The bit I'm not good at
The work, I can do. It's the admin that gets me.
Messages especially. I'd open one, mean to reply, and it would just… go. Same place as odd socks and hoof picks. Not because I didn't care. Usually because I cared too much, sat on it too long, got interrupted, and my brain ticked it off as done.
It wasn't done.
What people don't see
They see the missed reply. They don't see the day behind it.
Three cancellations — one of them at the vet school. Two add-ons that weren't there this morning. One who can't do before 2 or after 3. Six people all wanting a morning slot you've already promised to someone else. A gate code that's changed. Rain coming in. And the phone going when both your hands are full.
They don't see you awake at midnight because something from three days ago has just surfaced. Or what it takes to keep all of that straight in your head — bookings, routes, payments, half a dozen yards — and still turn up and do the job properly.
Then I got diagnosed
ADHD, as an adult. Explained a lot.
Time that runs away without telling me. Anything out of sight falling clean out of my head. One interruption wiping whatever I was halfway through.
Not that I was careless. I'd spent years thinking I just wasn't trying hard enough.
Nothing fit
I tried the booking apps. Loads of them. They're made for salons and clinics — tidy half-hour slots, no muddy gateways, no “farrier's late, can you come Thursday now”, no three counties in a day. They wanted me to fit my work into their slots.
Mobile equine work doesn't go in slots.
So I built my own
YardLoop is the thing I needed.
Reminders that nudge me to send out appointment times. A route planned for me in the most useful order, so I'm not doubling back across the county. A one-tap WhatsApp button — no looking up their number, no typing it out. One tap and my next client knows I'm on my way, ETA 15 mins, before I've even left the yard.
Little things, but they're the ones that lift the weight. They've helped me more than I expected — and if your head carries the same load mine does, I really think they'll help you too.
ADHD or not. I hope so.
