Serena

Heather- You can do this. The horrible withdrawal symptoms will last and shit will start getting clear again. Each time you go back to using it makes it harder to quit. The addiction part of us tells us that it will "be different" this time. That voice is always lying. You are doing the right thing. If you are serious about quitting you should just delete those girls numbers. It's good they aren't really hanging out friends, you could just completely stop associating with them. That might sound scary right now but you could think of it as taking care of yourself. When we use Add we stop listening to our bodies and let our mind run away like a crazy maniac. Take this time to really nurture yourself. So you slipped up, you are back on track. Note the positives and keep moving forward.

Calo- It will get better. It never feels good to throw it away and a part of you, the addict, will be screaming awful things about how you should have kept it, or to go get more. All I can say is RESIST. Distract yourself and try to do something nice for yourself. You know getting more would not be what you want. No need to beat yourself up, you actually did something good for yourself! Just take it one day at a time.

Occasional01- For people like us who have addictive tendencies/personalities there is no such thing as a "controlled relapse." I am glad you talked yourself out of it!! I can't have just one taste, I will immediately want more and more and MORE. So for me with Add and other drugs I have been addicted to, it is really black-and-white. I cannot use and need to avoid the drug at all costs. Resist is my new motto to myself in relation to cravings. I am much better off without a drug to crack me out and ultimately make me feel untrue to myself. Here's to moving forward and letting go of Add!

So I have been feeling unmotivated since getting rid of the Add on Thursday. Luckily on Friday I was distracted all day and had a good time with friends. I went for a nice hike yesterday and then went to a concert. Now I am alone and have all this work I need to do but this awful voice in my head keeps saying how "easy" it would have been if I had Add. I know that is a lie, since I am capable to do work on my own, but it is draining. I am going to set small tasks for myself and set a timer. I am still glad I got rid of the Add, I think my brain chemistry is rewriting itself after I messed it up by taking Add for 1 1/2 days...sigh. What an evil pill. I am ready to be back to not even thinking about Add!

Congrats on taking that step! It is really hard and you feel like you made a terrible mistake, but it is actually the best thing you could do for yourself. I should know, after 9+ months of being sober I had a slip yesterday and today, so this evening I flushed the pills again. It takes time to allow space for the real you to emerge, but be gentle with yourself during this time. It will get better.

Well I got rid of it. Sorry Sky, I flushed it. My friend was on the phone with me while I did it, otherwise I might not have been able to get rid of it. If I would of thrown it in the trash, who knows, tomorrow morning I would search through it and take it. Gross, but probably true. I just needed it GONE. I know I made the right choice. I feel weary but know that tomorrow will be better. Thanks for the support. This was just a slip and I plan to keep my commitment to myself: I don't need Adderall. I deserve better. I will take it one day at a time. Next time a craving comes, I will RESIST. I am back on track

I know being sober again would be well worth that money I spent. I am just working my self up to getting rid of it. I know its bad to flush it, I will dispose of it another way. I have been playing guitar and reading posts. I am waiting to talk to a friend so that I can get rid of it while I am on the phone with him. I know it's not too late to get back on track. This was just a minor slip. I am going to make a positive choice and grieve the Add again.

I am a Sagittarius (fire sign) and definitely could see a correlation between signs and addiction. I think being passionate about learning and always searching for more knowledge and higher state of consciousness, with my addictive personality, has been quite a fatal combination at times. I want to know more about addiction and signs now!

Well basically I was on here over 9 months ago when I quit Add for what I thought was for good. I posted my story on here back in June 2012. Basically I have been doing really good and after the withdrawal period of a few weeks when I first quit I haven't really had a craving. I even noted to a friend the other day that it had been almost 10 months since I quit Add. She told me how proud she was and said I had such strong willpower. Yesterday I had a doctors appointment to refill other prescriptions and I immediately knew I wanted to get Add. Just out of the blue! I even have it stated in my file that I am not to be prescribed Add because it triggers my eating disorder, and the doctor filled it. I told him that I felt really conflicted about asking but that I thought I needed a little Add to make it through the final push of the semester. He said that he was ok with it since it had been my choice to go off it and put in my file to not give it to me. He asked how many I needed and I said not many, since I was seriously feeling conflicted inside. He ended up writing a script for 15 15mg pills. I of course got it filled yesterday and took half of a pill. I felt a serious high/rush and got super focused on projects. I told myself that it was "different" this time since I had been sober for so long and could obviously do without Add. I promised myself I wouldn't take it every day and would eat every few hours. Blah, blah, the fucking pill won over. I took it again this morning and have already noticed the negative affects. I feel so guilty and as if I ruined all the time I had free from this horrible drug. I am in grad school and have been doing excellent without Add. I actually think that Add makes my work worse since I nitpick everything and get super perfectionistic. I just can't believe I made the choice to get Add again. I was conscious and I take responsibility for it but the addict part of me was in control and now I feel awful. I have been reading over past journal entries about when I quit before and I feel like if I flush the stuff now I will have only relapsed for 1 1/2 days. But the thought of flushing it is hard since I am rationalizing things away. "I spent $25 yesterday, I should at least take this for a few more days." "I will only take it recreationally." I feel very disappointed in myself. I am completely sober in all areas of my life and have struggled with other addictions and beat them and I thought I beat this one too...any advice or words of encouragement would be awesome. I know what I need to do I think I just need someone else who understands to tell me why I SHOULD get rid of the shit immediately. Thanks for reading.

I now have 17 days free from Adderall! What a relief. I am through the worst of it. Next step will be for me to tell my doctor that I can't be prescribed Adderall. Then I will really be done, for good.

Just wanted to say welcome and that you are not alone! Good job on flushing the rest of it and tearing up the script. It is hard and really sucks but it totally worth it. I recently did something very similar and I also know that I cannot ever take Adderall and be "responsible." So I hope you can continue to rebuild your life without Add. Life gets so much better, just give it a little time. Be gentle on yourself.

Congrats on day one! I wish you the best on your journey as well. Keep coming back here to hold yourself accountable! It's better to do this sort of thing with support.

Right now I am on day 5 and I feel pretty good considering how shitty I felt day 1-3. I had a fleeting thought of how much "fun" it would be to pack for a trip I am leaving on soon with Adderall and then I banished the thought immediately. I am much happier to be present and not all tweaked out while packing. Now I actually pack faster and do not obsess over every little thing. I also created a 30 day chart in my journal and for every day I am sober I put a gold star. I want 30 gold stars so I am not stopping. After 30 days I should feel strong and not need the gold stars anymore, haha.

Thanks for sharing that! It was hilarious and oh so true...oh my The part that I most identified with was when he was in the library and thinking people were really "loud" but in reality, they were probably just sitting normally. I have sensitive ears to begin with but when I was on Add, I would freak out at people's breathing, eating, any annoying habits. Biting nails...ah! Add also makes me clean obsessively. I definitely like being more present now and not constantly DOING something. What a relief!

Hey, Just wanted to say you are not alone! Two weeks is a long time to be free from Adderall, so congrats. I know how hard it is, I can really relate to most of what you said. I struggle with self-esteem, weight issues and Adderall accentuated my need to be "perfect." I have tried to stay away from Adderall but I find myself randomly going back to it, after being sober for 7 1/2 months. Before that I took it straight for 6 years. So needless to say, I know it is hard to stay away! What has helped me is to be really gentle with myself. I realized I have treated my body very harshly over the years and have always been underweight. So now I am trying to feed myself three meals a day and be nice to myself. I am my own harshest critic and judging myself about an Adderall slip does not help me. What I find helpful is to hold myself accountable to people in my real life and online. If you really know Adderall makes your life horrible, you will be able to stop. You can do well in life and school without Adderall. Adderall is evil and you do not need to rely on a pill. You are worthwhile all on your own, you just have to find yourself again; sober. You can do this! Why not try to hold yourself accountable on here? That's what I plan to do and I want to kick this addiction in the balls for good. Blessed be, Serena

Hey there, I hope that you have been able to get a plan and stop taking the Add while on your vacation. If not, don't beat yourself up for it. I can relate to what you said since I have recovered from alcohol and I also did not follow AA (have many qualms with their approach for similar reasons--full recovery is possible!) but I was never a smoker. Quitting drinking was hard but I have struggled with Adderall for years and never been able to fully bite in in the butt. Until now that is. I think it is good your son can support you, support is necessary to quit an addiction like Adderall. Whenever I get cravings I try to sit with my feelings and remind myself that they are just fleeting thoughts and emotions; they do not control me. I also made sure to get rid of all Adderall and things associated with it so I don't feel tempted. How have things been going? You can quit this!

Thanks for replying! I will keep checking in since I really want this to last. I find it helpful to hold myself accountable. I made it through the first day. My emotions were like a freaking rollercoaster but I am doing alright.

So I have struggled with Adderall on and off for many years. I started taking Adderall during my undergrad and then proceeded to get addicted to it and take it six years straight. It took over my life and I felt like I "needed" it to accomplish anything in my life. It made me feel like a slave to a little orange pill. Once I got into grad school I kept taking it but I felt really guilty about it. I have recovered from various other addictions, alcohol being the main one, but Adderall has always been around. I decided last year that I wanted to stop taking it so I went to my doctor and told him I wanted to quit. He switched me to Strattera and I thought I was good to go. I had my ex take the rest of my Adderall and hide it from me and things were okay for a few weeks. Then I freaked out and one night when he was gone and I scoured his house until I found my Add. I began to take it secretly, in addition to taking Strattera, and could not stop myself. I did that for about a month until I just couldn't take it anymore. Things with my ex were not that good, the Adderall was keeping me numb, but my subconscious could take it no longer. I felt I needed to break up with my boyfriend and I went over to do it but ended up turning the whole thing about Adderall. I told him what I had been doing and he wasn't mad, but thought it was not healthy. I told him to really take the Add away and that I wanted to be free of it. We stayed together and I stopped taking Add. It was really hard but I managed to be free from it for about 7 1/2 months. I also broke up with my boyfriend two months after quitting and my life got progressively better. I also went to my doctor and told him I didn't want to be on Strattera because I was sick of being a slave to pills. Strattera is also expensive and I felt I didn't really need a pill. I did really well in school and things were great until May of this year. At the end of the semester I had a doctor's appoint for another medication and I immediately knew I wanted to get Add. I tried to stop myself but it was already done in my head. My doctor wrote me a script for 30 but way less in mg, at least I was able to do that, and I immediately filled it. I told my best friend about it and she was kind of worried but was supportive. I tried to control it, but we all know that doesn't happen when you are addicted, and I spiraled. I took it every day for 30 days straight and told myself I would never take it again. I didn't take it for about 12 days until I had another followup doctors appointment. I got some news that was not positive and I decided I "needed" Adderall. This doctor wrote me a script for 30 and then another to have just in case. I filled it last Monday and felt so guilty. I took it for 4 days and told several people what I had done and they told me not to beat myself up for it. Last night I reached my "bottom." I kept feeling like I was going to cry and I had no reason why. A voice inside me kept saying, "It's time," and I was freaking out. I came home and started writing about it and checked out this website. I knew I really had to quit this time. So I took my pills and laid them out on my counter. I cried, screamed at them, and told them what I thought. I felt panic and fear about flushing them and almost couldn't do it, but at the last moment I flushed them down the toilet. I was sobbing that they were gone and continued to go outside and burn my other script. This morning when I woke up I started crying and my feelings have been like a rollercoaster. I know I made the right choice, but the addict part of me is so pissed that I didn't take more of my script before I threw it away. So this time I really think and hope I am done. I hate Adderall and it makes me unlike myself. I want to be true to myself. I know that it will be hard and that I will have to resist any urges, but I really mean it this time. So goodbye Adderall, I don't need you anymore. I am capable and worthwhile all on my own.