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Has adderall affected your physical health?


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  • 5 months later...

Air hunger (could never catch a full breath)

Shoulder tension

Headaches

Cracky bones

Foot cramps after running or biking

Eye muscle twitch

Dry mouth

Dry eyes/shriveled contacts

Dizziness, low blood sugar feeling

Ear popping like an elevation change

Thin, limp hair

Slow reaction times

 

The most annoying side effects for me were air hunger and having to pee every hour.

Eye muscle twitch!  Haha!  I nearly forgot about that one.  FANTASTIC.  So happy to be off this crap. 

 

I'll also add:  palms like fire hoses on full blast.  Sweaty all the time.

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  • 5 months later...

Wow I'm chiming in late but I am simply blown away. I had every one of the symptoms too. I'll add this.. I bit off my thumbnail. The whole thing. It grew back after I quit but it came in crooked. My nails were ragged and brittle.

Also I developed this throat tic that's hard to describe. Husband asked me why I did it a long time ago. Embarrassing. Like the sound you make when you're trying to suck back drainage then clearing your throat? Really sexy. I still do that when I'm alone but not every five seconds like I did on Adderall. Convinced I damaged the back of my mouth, or the flap in the esophagus somehow.

I couldn't swallow food either and almost choked a couple of times, saw above that happened to someone else. I started drinking Ensure to maintain weight but couldn't stomach it. When it was really bad I'd crush the pills and parachute them to get them down my throat.

Hallucinations, mainly auditory when I went on 3 day jags. Blotchy skin, thin skin, mystery bruises and cuts. Lots of cuts. Really cold all the time.

Low, low weight at the end. Like scary low.

Also pounded red bull when I was on it. Sure that didn't do me any favors.

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  • 4 weeks later...
  • 3 months later...

I experienced lots of side effects, including:

 

Rapid heart rate, palpitations, and chest pain (leading to several trips to the ER)

Air hunger (just found out there was a name for this)

Insomnia

Sweaty palms

Ice cold hands and feet

Hair loss

Dry mouth

Teeth grinding

Gum recession

Joint pain

Muscle tension

Dry eyes

Frequent urination

Twitching (particularly the eyelid)

Weakness/fatigue (after extended use)

Inability to regulate body temperature (too hot in summer, too cold in winter)

Appetite suppression

 

After years on Adderall, I starting thinking this was normal...

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This is such a great post with so much information. I related to pretty much everyones symptoms!

I had a lot of the air hunger, eyes twitching, overall shortness of breath. I felt like I couldn't do anything because it was hard to breathe so I chose not to walk much! It became difficult to eat, I choked on my food a lot. 

 

Thankfully, a lot of these symptoms go away once you quit. I have really good mobility and flexibilty in my muscles/joints again, I'm still working on regaining physical strength. I need to come back and reread this post time to time because this is important stuff...I don't want to ever forget what pharmaceutical pills can do to you.

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Hey I think what I have to say might help or maybe scare the people who are trying to quit... This might make you want to..

 

 

My dad was on ritalin for over 35 years... My mom and my dad divorced when I was 3, so about 20 years ago... My dad always kinda had problems growing up. and if you saw him you might think he really does have ADHD or something... He got prescribed around the time he married my mom. He had a photography business and a great life. Well he got addicted to the ritalin RIGHT away, and didn't stop for 35 years. Thats a long time! But he took so many one time that he went outside walking in 20 below weather, a HUGE ice storm and scared the living shit out of my mother and grandmother. And since that day he says his brain hasn't functioned like it used to.

 

When you talk to my dad, he is NEVER there.. His brain can't pay attention to anything more than 30-60 seconds.. He twitches a lot, moves his hands constantly, moves his jaw constantly, talks to himself a lot, has diarrhea all the time, and when he took all those pills he would take almost half the bottle of ritalin. He was prescribed to take 5 10mg of ritalin a day. He would swallow almost half of in just one night!! 

 

After seeing how my dad is.. It was the biggest wake up call I have ever experienced. I lived with him for 8 months just last year. If I had never moved in with my dad I would still be taking adderall daily. and fortunately because I lived with him, I was there when he overdosed and took him to the ER at 6 am, we were both awake still. Since that day I haven't seen my dad use. I dont know completely if he stopped for sure, but I was there when he told his doctor to stop prescribing him. So I sure hope he is doing well trying to be clean.

 

Lets just say, legal cocaine is a bitch. and well you don't want your kids to look at you and be like "really this guy is my dad"? and be embarrassed of your own father because he can't even have a full conversation because he fucked it up 30 years ago trying to get through a tough week? Yeah. lets just say... Its not worth it. Not worth the buzz. Not at all.

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  • 1 month later...

Wow. Reading this has made me realize that maybe some of the symptoms I've had the last few months or so may have been largely due to or exacerbated by Adderall.

 

Muscle cramps

aching joints

worse menstrual periods and PMS

headaches

feeling adrenal rushes and then depletion

started losing appetite and weight again

chest pains on occasion, especially when I upped my dose to

get through a work gig that lasted a week.

severe depression

anxiety and chronic worry

sleep issues

 

I have also developed left kidney pain and it will be interesting to see if it goes away when I am done with my taper.

 

I also have felt at times like I was on the verge of a complete psychotic break and I wonder if this has had to do with Adderall and depression. I think so.

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Lets just say, legal cocaine is a bitch. and well you don't want your kids to look at you and be like "really this guy is my dad"? and be embarrassed of your own father because he can't even have a full conversation because he fucked it up 30 years ago trying to get through a tough week? Yeah. lets just say... Its not worth it. Not worth the buzz. Not at all.

+10

One of my worst nightmares would be having to go back in time and be a fly on the wall, watching how horrifically brain damaged I must have looked during my binges.

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When I was on Adderall at its worse I would get soooo much anxiety and have heart palpitations which scared the living day lights out of me and I would also always panic.  Another physical symptom I would get would be ticks from time to time especially when I layed down at night.  I would twitch my  head and get zapped.  I would always be a hypochondriac about my heart when I was on it and it scared me every day.  These days Im a pretty avid runner running at least 20 miles a week because I want that natural High instead of that stimulant High.  I want to prove to myself that there is no damage done to my heart so I am very active these days.  Ive always been athletic and active but while on Adderall I hated to play sports or get my heart rate up.  Kick the drug and exercise and you will get some peace the stronger you get that you don't have any physical damage.  Running is amazing but its hard work to get into. Once you set your mind and get over the first couple of weeks of running it becomes addicting.  At least for me and when I get a runner's high I LOVE IT!!!  You know why?  Because its 100 times better then an amphetamine high and its NATURAL!!!!

 

MUCH LOVE

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  • 3 months later...

physical symptoms:

OMG  ACNE!!!!!!! horrible

Wrinkles ( at 23-24 years old)

skin-paper thin

Back pain, pain around my neck, shoulder blames,

fever, migraine

DRY mouth

couldnt breath at times

couldnt swallow

felt like I was about to die

cold sweats all the time

cold, numb fingers and toes

and more, much more

 

thinking back, WHY WOULD I, or anyone, ever continue on this horrible drug,  and yet........ I miss it, I miss the good times, but then  I'm beginning to doubt............

Were they really there or is the drug wants me to believe they were.....

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for me the answer is simple

taking it responsibly (assuming this could even happen now) was boring and took the spark or passion out of life
 

taking it in binge fashion (which would be inevitable anyway) was catastrophically damaging to my brain and body.  my back is still damaged (permanently I am now certain) from sitting with horrible posture for days on end (literally)

 

and yes it is so crazy how we kept going back to it even though all of this is not new knowledge.

 

I remember that horrifying feeling when I realized that I was just behaving like a puppet (with a demon pulling the strings) and felt like I could only watch helplessly while I destroyed myself

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Doge, 

my friend, this is so true,  the puppet-like feeling was horrifying, I never tried to put it into words, just remember crying my eyes out thinking: "this is it, I just cant turn the switch off anymore, I'm done".

I hope damage to your back isnt as severe as you now think. remember, our bodies regenerated in so many ways already. 

love

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tremors (some days could barely hold a cup of coffee without spilling)

 

hearing this makes me even more happy that you quit.

 

 

spasms (why did iIkeep taking them still?)

 

my thoughts exactly.  its only recently (and this is the first time I noticed it for real now that you brought it up) that my eye twitching has finally stopped.

it kept happening for the first few months sober (which I panicked about quite a bit), and then it devolved into the bridge of my nose which started to twitch isntead for a couple months.

 

it did eventually go away but holy crap did it ever last a long time (probably about 7 or 8 months after quitting it lasted)

 

If I realized how long it was going to take to go away I would have taken it more seriously when I first noticed it (deep into one of my binges)

 

EDIT:  actually no i wouldn't.  I knew I was killing myself but I didnt even care back then

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While I was on Adderall:

-Eating like crap because bland/sugary foods were easier on my stomach, which was often upset because of Adderall (especially when I used Tylenol to fend off the crash headache)

-MAJOR muscle aches/stiffness, especially in my upper back. It pretty much always felt like the day after a tough full-body workout... even though I wasn't working out.

-insomnia (duh)

-Never working out because of stomach aches and muscle soreness. I always planned to work out, but didn't.

 

Now that I'm off Adderall:

-Occasional heartburn

-Major, major fatigue. 90 days and I still just want to lie on the couch all the time. Which may be related to...

-Moderate depression (pre-existing condition that Adderall masked)

 

Overall, I'll take the latter over the former. The daily fatigue sucks, but not as much as the regular Adderall crashes. And while I don't feel "like myself" yet, I do feel *more* like myself than I did on drugs.

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Oh yes, and (on Adderall):

-Horribly cold toes, to the point where it would keep me from sleeping even after the mental effects had worn off

-DRY MOUTH. I got oral thrush (Google it, it's gross—basically a yeast infection in your mouth) which I am convinced was connected to dry mouth.

 

I've been having pretty bad cravings lately. Writing this all out has helped me remember why I quit, and why I will continue to abstain.

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