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Favorite things about being adderall-free!


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What are your favorite things about being adderall-free?

Or, to word it differently, what are your most hated aspects of taking it? The worst side effects? The things that make quitting worthwhile?

I'm putting post-it notes around my house to help me stay motivated to stay quit. I've got lots of ideas about how much better I like myself without it. But this forum is AMAZING and I would love to hear from you all!!!

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I don't miss feeling like a rat in one of those experiments where they keep relentlessly pressing a lever for more drugs, even after physical exhaustion ...

I'm 7 days into quitting and although I feel pretty bad right now (exhausted, depressed, slug-like) -- I will never forget the wired feeling of desperation that led to the big flush. I do have hope though thanks to reading this forum. Now get busy on those post-its!

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YEAHHH!!! My list includes:

-Increased desire to be physically active

-Creativity!

-Remembering that OMG I am an artist! And I don't feel the need to overwork my paintings --or my writing-- the way I used to on adderall!

-The feeling of the fullness of my being

-SNUGGLING and making out!

-FRIENDSHIP and love! For example I texted everyone I love the other day telling them how much I love and admire them...... I feel all my love for people returning!

-Increasing desire to make new friends

-Massive smile on my face

-DANCING!

-Not getting annoyed with my kittens for being loud and climbing on everything while I'm "busy" working

-Having better conversations with people

-Drinking less

-Not being so hard on myself!

-OMG yes and the email thing...... who needs to spend an hour on a short email?! NOBODY! :)

-Adderall sometimes gives people B.O..... anyone else notice that? It used to make me all sweaty and stinky, but also cold all the time. My heating bill is about to go down!

-I'm pretty sure that paradoxically enough I've LOST a few pounds..... maybe my metabolism is back up because my body is no longer starving for nutrition?

-Spontaneity!

-Time has slowed down

-FEARLESSNESS!!

-Did I mention SMILING?!?! and laughing!!! A LOT!!!!

-The light in my body and soul returning!!

-TOTAL EMPOWERMENT to take on everything and anything!!!

I have many more..... thats my stream of consciousness though! :)

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+ feeling connected, or starting to... like my soul is returning

+ liking me when I look in the mirror (not loathing myself and my vapid seeming life)

+ feeling healthy, physically, mentally, emotionally, for the first time in decades

+ social and sociable, talking to strangers, connecting with people, not seeing that wtf is this guy on? look in peoples eyes...

+ quit smoking

+ quit smoking weed

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mmmmmm FOOD. I love eating and eating healthy! Adderall left me totally malnourished. I would start the day with a green smoothie and drink those for breakfast/lunch (if you can call it that), but later all I wanted was beer and maybe pizza or something greasy and gross.

But the side effects got worse...... I was hungry, but having serious trouble swallowing anything except almond milk, water, or beer. All those adrenaline chemicals deprioritize your digestive system and I think my esophageal muscles temporarily stopped working. I think I accidentally aspirated food a couple times during my late-night adderall sessions. Just a little bit, and coughed it right up, but that's an actual choking risk and really really scary.

I will not miss that god-awful feeling of telling your stomach to shut up because you know that you're addied up and incapable of choking anything down.

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" I will never forget the wired feeling of desperation"

Lea, my sentiments exactly!. And I never, ever want to forget that feeling either... I don't want, 3 months from now or 3 yrs from now, to look with long eyes back at adderall and romanticize it. The honeymoon when addy was so sweet to me has BEEN gone for years and years and wasn't coming back-- it was all a toxic relationship over the years, even though I kept letting it back in. Each time I'd use it, I'd ask" why the hell do I keep taking this? There is just no good feeling/benefit/drive to be had from it anymore! I HATE how I feel on it!!"

All of the above posts about what you all were like on adderall was me on adderall too- I never want to forget it.

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plus, looking down at that pill and thinking that it contained the power to bring me up, make me motivated, give me the extra something that I "needed", at this point in my life I'd rather find within and create myself than relay on a soul starving pill. It took turning 40 for all of this to come about. For the previous 20+ years I had no qualms about taking anything nor did I see the harm in it, but turning 40 literally changed my outlook... I quit the adderall a few days after my birthday... quit week a few days after that, and quit cigs about 6 weeks in...

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... which means that Sky, you and I are almost twins... I turn 40 in a month. Honestly, I can't WAIT to put my 30s behind me... all that angst and striving and pressure I put on myself....

Hurray for all that wisdom and grounding that comes with the entry of middle age. I love being the age I am. I must be the only woman in this country to feel this way, if the media is to be believed.

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I will never forget the wired feeling of desperation that led to the big flush.

Hold on to that. As you get further away from your last pill, you will forget that feeling, especially as the cravings hit... you'll remember the original clarity and brilliance you felt way back when, and you'll most likely forget the shitty horrible feeling you felt more often than not. Addiction has an awfully selective memory.

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... which means that Sky, you and I are almost twins... I turn 40 in a month. Honestly, I can't WAIT to put my 30s behind me... all that angst and striving and pressure I put on myself....

Hurray for all that wisdom and grounding that comes with the entry of middle age. I love being the age I am. I must be the only woman in this country to feel this way, if the media is to be believed.

OMG you called it MIDDLE AGE!!!!!!!!!! ugh, that sounds so old... can't we consider mid 50's to be middle age? let's call this the AGE OF ENLIGHTENMENT!!!!!!!!!!!!! :D

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I realized another favorite thing about being off adderall... noticing these sudden wisps of, I don't know... nostalgia? I mean like when a certain smell or sound or sight takes you back for just a moment, to a good memory/feeling that you forgot about.

Last week, I was walking my girls to the bus stop and there is a tall fir tree on the corner (in our otherwise very urban neighborhood), walk past it everyday and am sure I heard this sound 100 times but never noticed.The wind was blowing through that tree just right, making a whispering sound. I felt like when I was a little girl and used to go out to our cabin in the woods with my family, like I hadn't heard that sound in years. Just little stuff like that I notice and appreciate, stuff I just filtered out on addy.

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Taking work breaks and a lunch break like a normal human being. Imagine that. On Adderall I wouldn't take too many breaks and the ones I did take weren't really breaks because I'd be still addied up-- cleaning or going for a walk or even trying to lay down--but always feeling hollow.

The breaks I'm taking now aren't very hard earned.... yet. But they are meaningful. They involve food, friends, dancing, and my soul. Because that's what taking a break is: being YOU for a little while.

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  • 6 months later...

- Feeling like I can be around people at night instead of hibernating because I feel so miserable from the crash

- Quitting cigarettes

- Feeling even all day, even if it's evenly tired

- No longer having trichotillomania

- Not staring into mirrors every time I pass by one

- Not exploding on people over minor things because I feel so overstimulated

- Having time to respond to my friends' texts instead of ignoring them all day

- Gained 5 pounds in 2 weeks, which helped a lot since I am am already super skinny. I don't look like I'm starving so much right now.

- I am able to eat fruits now!!! Before I would purposefully avoid lemons and oranges, anything citrusy, because acids lower the pH of your stomach, thus speeding Adderall excretion... AND OHH NOO I COULD NOT HAVE THAT! I would take tums with my Adderall just to keep my pH up! Sad.

Edited by whosthisguy
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This is a fantastic idea! I feel like there is a similar thread somewhere here, but I can't find it. There is this one which is about being adder all free and working, which has got some cool mentions like not being late all the time, etc.

http://forum.quittingadderall.com/topic/778-how-are-you-better-at-work-without-adderall/#entry2937

As for me, there are just so many benefits, despite the suckiness of withdrawal. Stream-of-consciouness reflections are:

- being able to sit and read a book, and recall what I've read 2 days later

- taking naps (my fave hobby of all time)

- enjoying my family

- not overthinking everything, being happy (mostly) with decisions I've made rather than picking apart every single action I've taken

- Being ok sending an email without re-reading it 10x over

- Getting the jokes

- Making the jokes

- No "noise in my head" all the time

- Not being so selfish

- Buying things only that I need! Shopping and adderall are magnificent bedfellows.... ipso facto...

- Loving my husband's company rather than wanting him to leave me alone all. the. time

- Genuinely caring about things and people

- Seeing myself as I am when I look in the mirror, not some tweaked out lady with nasty dry hair and skin

- Being touched and cuddled... I hated being touched on adderall

- Not having to worry about getting prescriptions, getting them filled, going to different pharmacies, worried about people seeing me popping pills all over the place (at work, at dinner, with friends, drinking)

... that should be a good start?!

 

Wow you captured all the negatives so eloquently.  It's crazy how everything you said I could relate to.  I never realized how adderall is what's caused me to be more careless w money, buying random things just for the hell of it.  I was never like that

 

And the being touched part is scary, I always attributed that to me being a cold person, but now looking at it that way, I don't even want anyone to hug me

 

And it's crazy about the selfish thing, I never nu a drug could induce that in so many people strange

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YEAHHH!!! My list includes:

-Increased desire to be physically active

-Creativity!

-Remembering that OMG I am an artist! And I don't feel the need to overwork my paintings --or my writing-- the way I used to on adderall!

-The feeling of the fullness of my being

-SNUGGLING and making out!

-FRIENDSHIP and love! For example I texted everyone I love the other day telling them how much I love and admire them...... I feel all my love for people returning!

-Increasing desire to make new friends

-Massive smile on my face

-DANCING!

-Not getting annoyed with my kittens for being loud and climbing on everything while I'm "busy" working

-Having better conversations with people

-Drinking less

-Not being so hard on myself!

-OMG yes and the email thing...... who needs to spend an hour on a short email?! NOBODY! :)

-Adderall sometimes gives people B.O..... anyone else notice that? It used to make me all sweaty and stinky, but also cold all the time. My heating bill is about to go down!

-I'm pretty sure that paradoxically enough I've LOST a few pounds..... maybe my metabolism is back up because my body is no longer starving for nutrition?

-Spontaneity!

-Time has slowed down

-FEARLESSNESS!!

-Did I mention SMILING?!?! and laughing!!! A LOT!!!!

-The light in my body and soul returning!!

-TOTAL EMPOWERMENT to take on everything and anything!!!

I have many more..... thats my stream of consciousness though! :)

 

Time has slowed down is so on point.  I haven't stopped taking adderall yet, but now i realize once i take it i get into the mode of "omg I'm late" no time to clean this house and if I'm getting ready on it forget it, clothes everywhere, looking for things I probably really don't need for that particular outing.  Wow

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  • 4 months later...

Taking work breaks and a lunch break like a normal human being. Imagine that. On Adderall I wouldn't take too many breaks and the ones I did take weren't really breaks because I'd be still addied up-- cleaning or going for a walk or even trying to lay down--but always feeling hollow.

The breaks I'm taking now aren't very hard earned.... yet. But they are meaningful. They involve food, friends, dancing, and my soul. Because that's what taking a break is: being YOU for a little while.

Gosh, I can relate! I have allowed myself a lunch break in over a year! Bring on the detox!!

And those of you obsessing in emails or projects--THANK YOU for mentioning! I had never correlated that to the Adderall, but I know that's it! 

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  • 2 months later...

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