My Story So Far, 191 Days Clean

[DrewK15]

Hello All. I have been visiting these forums off and on over the last few years, but never posted myself. Reading about other people who have similar struggles has helped me through some tough times, so I want to add some of my story here in case it might help anyone who might find this.

 

I started using Adderall when I was 22, just a few months out of college. At the time I wasn't in a great place emotionally; I was really depressed, discontent, and bored with what I perceived life to be after college. One Friday night, being bored with weed and alcohol I asked a friend to procure some Ecstasy, instead he showed up with some Adderall. My immediate reaction was that I really liked the way I felt, which very quickly turned into a 'realization' that ADD was and always had been what was 'wrong' with me. I messed around with Adderall XRs, IRs, and Vyvanse for a few weeks before taking my self diagnosis to a psychiatrist. Upon my presenting a litany of ADD symptoms, strategically admitting my illicit use and how much the drugs 'helped' me, I requested and was 'awarded' a 50mg/day script of Vyvanse.

 

My first few months on Vyvanse were awesome. I worked in financial sales, and my production skyrocketed. I was making more money than I knew what do with, I enjoyed and seemed to be enjoyed more by my friends, lost some weight, girls seemed to like me way more, I was a way better golfer. The list goes on and on. What is less clear, is how quickly things turned on me for the worse. Over the course of my first year on Vyvanse I developed a severe obsession with sports gambling. Very quickly I became a guy who spent all day at work researching sports bets, and all night smoking weed and gambling in his closet, alone. 

 

About a year into my use I ended up in a tremendous amount of credit card debt from my gambling, quit my job, and moved in with some extended family out of state. I made my first attempt to quit, flushing my pills and swearing that I wouldn't go to a psychiatrist in my new home state. I made it 3 months or so before I had enough and visited a new psych to procure another script. 60mg/day Vyvanse. This time was very similar to the first time around. Things got better for a few months, and then they started to get worse. People around me liked my production at work and home, but started to confront me over my ever increasing weed/alcohol habits. Instead of quitting this time, I told my psych I wasn't getting enough out of the Vyvanse, and he added 15mg Adderall IR to my daily regimen. The Adderall became my 'fun' script by design. I would blow through it in a week or so every month, time my crash for a weekend, and keep my Vyvanse as a baseline. My attention was pulled further and further away from my actual job as my obsessions became more and more ridiculous. I was going to be a pro golfer, but for sure was not good enough. I was going to be a pro gamer, enough said. I was going to make a living flipping Pokemon cards, not sure how or why. The point is I transformed from reasonable and responsible to ridiculous and it's hard for me to even recall how it happened. 

 

This went on for a couple years until I once again quit about 7 months ago. It was terrible. I became severely suicidal, lost my job, and ended up in inpatient rehab for a month. Right now I am 191 days clean, unemployed, living with my mom and step-dad, focusing on my recovery. I am sleeping, eating, and exercising much better than I was. On Wednesday I begin the process of filing for bankruptcy. The mental health and financial cost of my past use is enough to keep me from going back at this point. At the same time its very difficult. I have no clue what interests me anymore. Anhedonia is awful and I feel deeply nihilistic at times. I can stay strong today, just in case those of you who say it gets better are right. 

[SeanW]

I have a very similar story. Ended up rock bottom, moved back home, went to an outpatient rehab for about two months. I'm 19 months clean and my anhedonia is still very prevalent. I find it very hard to find any motivation to do anything and I'm bored all time. I force myself to workout daily and eat healthy. Things have gotten slightly better with time. I'm am definitely a lot better than the first few months. I'm going to hang in there and hope for the best because a lot of long time quitters say you don't get significantly better till year two and three.

[SeanW]

Day one off I was paranoid, severe social anxiety, dropped out of school, no job, no money, unable to get a job or communicate at all. 

Today I have a job, I can communicate though it still is uncomfortable, planning resume school in January. 

When I take things day to day a lot of the time I feel angry and helpless like I'll never get out of this but there has been progress you just have to look at the big picture and hang in there. 

I too have no clue what interest me. For the most part I feel numb and that I've lost my passion. Before I was so use to following what I felt but I can't do that anymore so I tell myself to just do what is logical and follow my brain make a decision and stick with it.

we all had adderall dreams for me I want to be a musician and play professional tennis

[DrewK15]

Thanks for the reply Sean. It really is crazy how similar so many of our stories are on here. 

 

That term ‘Adderall Dreams’ really resonates with me. Until the last few weeks before my quit I had so much optimism about a life that was going nowhere. Now I have to remind myself daily that I’m actually going somewhere even if it doesn’t feel like it at that given moment.

[Frank B]

Definitely hang in next week I’ll hit the three year mark and things improving a lot. Think out of all three people that quit when I did on here I might have had a longer time to really get back to a new normal. Might have been how long I took addy and how much plus I was abusing pain pills. But regardless yes coming into year three things are getting so much better. The start of year two I would not have said that. 

On 11/12/2018 at 3:48 PM, SeanW said:

I have a very similar story. Ended up rock bottom, moved back home, went to an outpatient rehab for about two months. I'm 19 months clean and my anhedonia is still very prevalent. I find it very hard to find any motivation to do anything and I'm bored all time. I force myself to workout daily and eat healthy. Things have gotten slightly better with time. I'm am definitely a lot better than the first few months. I'm going to hang in there and hope for the best because a lot of long time quitters say you don't get significantly better till year two and three. 

[hyper_critical]

Awesome to hear, Frank. And well done, Drew and Sean. Great to see!

[Danquit]

This story sounds so familiar now. We all wound up on Adderall and it was the best thing ever for a while, then everything went south. I’m coming up on almost three years clean and I am so happy I made it. Life isn’t perfect but I shudder to think how I would be today if I were still on Addies. The crazy part is I also sometimes think how awesome I would be if I never quit, like I’d be some rockstar in my career or how I’d be building some awesome business like Elon Musk. That is what a great liar Adderall is, even after all this time, it still whispers bullshit to me. Fuck Adderall.