Why FirstThen?

Built by parents for parents, FirstThen is on a mission to put a virtual ADHD coach in the palm of your hand.

Navigating a pediatric ADHD diagnosis can feel overwhelming, exhausting, and deeply isolating for parents and caregivers. If you’re raising a child with ADHD, you are far from alone: approximately 1 in 9 U.S. children ages 3 to 17 live with this chronic mental health condition, which is characterized by impairing attention problems and impulse control issues.

You already know that every single day can bring challenges like conflicts with parents and other adults, difficulties with siblings and peers, lower academic achievement, and behavior struggles in school. Our children also face heightened long-term risks during adolescence and adulthood, including school dropout, anxiety, depression, substance abuse, and unemployment.

Beyond your child's daily struggles, there’s also a heavy caregiver burden that can include lost work productivity, increased parenting and medical costs, relationship strain, and elevated household stress.

While scientific consensus emphasizes the inclusion of science-based psychosocial care for ADHD treatment, actionable solutions remain frustratingly out of reach or difficult to implement for too many families.

Behavioral Parent Training (BPT) is a well-established intervention that equips caregivers with practical skills to foster positive behaviors, improve the parent-child relationship, and relieve family stress. Yet, less than one-third of families may ever access BPT and other non-medication components of gold-standard care. And if they do, sticking with all the strategies for how to parent differently is still extremely hard.

All of this is what inspired the creation of FirstThen. Co-founders Amanda and David Schnetzer experienced many of these frustrations firsthand as parents raising a child with ADHD. Refusing to accept the status quo, they decided to channel their personal struggles into building a meaningful solution: a self-guided mobile app that translates complex ADHD parenting principles into actionable daily guidance and tools.

The company name “FirstThen” comes from a behavior change strategy that links completing a required task first before then getting to do a rewarding one. David and Amanda leaned heavily on this principle to help their son stay motivated and cooperative.

"FirstThen" also reflects our core philosophy: big challenges become far more manageable when you focus on one small, clear step at a time. First, this. Then, that. You don't have to navigate this path alone—FirstThen is here to support you.

A SMALL SHIFT: Try using a “First...Then” statement with your child this week. For example, “First, put away your toys. Then you may ride your bike.”