Need help pulling the plug...(Mike) or anyone...

[Godshairpiece]

I'm posting this to get some insight from everyone, particularly Mike. I discovered this site two days ago and I've never read anything that describes the positives and negatives of adderall in such accurate words. Mike is very good at writing about these issues, and I'm really glad to have found this site.

First I would like to tell a little bit about my story. I have always been told I was intelligent and even tested for the "gifted" program in Tennessee but school bored me. I was diagnosed with ADD at an early age and did take stimulants (dexedrine) until my family told my Doctor I was smoking marijuana, so he discontinued the prescription. Earlier in life I had a problem with all sorts of other substances. From the age of 14-15 I started experimenting with marijuana, and then on to xanax, ecstasy, LSD, methamphetamine, cocaine etc...Basically you name it and I probably tried it and if I liked it, I did it more. At age 19 I decided to make a change in my life, because that particular track I was on was going to obviously get me nowhere so I stopped. I moved 8 hours away to Florida to get away from my previous life and start new.

I stayed clean, and when I say clean I mean not even a benadryl, alcohol or any mind altering substance, for 6.5 years. During this time period one would think I had all kinds of opportunity to accomplish things but I had issues with school still. I did go to college, I would make all A's or B's one semester and then stop going the next semester. I had issues holding a job as well until I found one I actually liked, working in an inpatient acute psychiatric hospital as a tech. Don't ask me why I liked it, but it was random and interesting enough that I could make it to work everyday. I met a girl while working there and we fell in love, not a patient lol, she was working as a counselor there. We were together after 1.5 years and I decided it would be ok for me to drink again...(bad idea). I also experimented with some other things (marijuana) but didn't really go back to it full fledged because of my job.We moved in together and soon after that she was pregnant so I knew I had to pick a career and accomplish something quick. I work around alot of nurses and I had always considered being an RN as something that seemed appealing but I never thought I would be able to focus on such an intensely rigid program, going 4-5 days per week plus clinical hours.

In come the Adderall...After my first month of nursing school, I made an appointment to see a psychiatrist. My mother had already been pushing me as well to do this, believing that since I was discontinued on the dexedrine years ago I should probably get back on something. I was prescribed 20mg initially, and eventually 20mg twice per day. This drug worked miracles for me and I'm sure you all understand why. I went from being bored to death in school and often wanting to quit, which I had done in the past, to being one of the top students. I even began typing great study guides with my study partner for exams that were so well liked, that people were passing them around and would become insulted if they didn't receive a copy but there friends did. Basically, I became a great student and finished top of my class. I also got hired on at my old psychiatric job as a charge RN, in charge of the entire 30 bed unit, and I'm also being promoted as a training specialist.

I also continued to drink, all through school, and after I graduated. Because of the adderall I felt like I could cheat my body. A normal person would feel hungover or tired after drinking 3-6 beers on 4-5 hours of sleep, but not with adderall to help. I could drink beer and take some benadryl to come down from the adderall after studying, sleep, and pop right back up with a vengeance. Normally, substance abuse or alcohol abuse would show in a persons behavior at work, but not with the magic pill. I could have a little fun time at night, miss a few hours sleep, and still be a top performer at work as well. I also know this is terrible for my body long term and this concerns me.

I did quit drinking about 2 months ago because I could see I couldn't do it in moderation. I also stopped abusing the adderall and started taking it as prescribed, 20mg twice per day. I still am not happy with how I feel but I'm very worried about not taking the adderall. My main concern is what kind of person I will be when I don't take it and I know what kind of person I was before I took it. I don't want to go back to being that ultimate slacker with no drive to do anything and my family needs me now. The other concern about continuing to take it is that my fiance hates me on adderall, she likes the fact that I became driven and goal oriented but she hates my lack of personality. She met me when I was adderall free, and that's the person that she fell in love with. I was easy going, had a good sense of humour, and was generally fun to be around. On the other side of that coin, I was also lazy and unmotivated. When I take adderall I feel I lose my personality, I feel controlled and turned into some sort of drone. I can be irritable and just not fun to be around, and my sense of humour is gone. I also have began to develop some pretty bad anxiety, and its very hard for me to be in social situations. I prefer just to work and do loner activities such as read, I'm not that fun to be around anymore. On the other hand I can really excel in school and work, and can accomplish great things. I am at a point now where I don't know what to do. I want the old me back, the positive qualities, but I don't want to be lazy and get nothing done. I am considering going back for my BSN or Nurse Practitioners which would be very rigorous schooling and I don't know if it would be possible without Adderall...Hell I don't even know if I will like what I do now off adderall, but I did start there before I started taking it... Sorry I feel like I'm rambling, things for any insight.

[Mike]

Hey Godshairpiece,

I know this may sound simplistic, but have you thought about just cutting your dose in half and seeing how it goes? Right now you're choosing between extremes. You're trying to make a choice between being a warm, loving failure or a preoccupied, unfeeling success. And neither of those options sound good (understandably).

Lazy failure or top of your class. Tons of personality or none at all. Heart or mind.

When choosing between "No Adderall at all" or "lots of Adderall", these extremes are the only options possible. But what if you tried a half dose for a while?

Personality and Adderall-superfocus are inversely connected. The more you increase one, the more you decrease the other. But it works the other way too. You can cut down on your Adderall to cut UP on your personality and all the qualities your wife misses.

If you are conflicted, try just making a big dose cut first. Try it for a while and see how it suits you. Only quit completely if you have a damned good reason to and you're ready for the pain it takes to rebuild afterwards.

Note that cutting your dose in half won't be a minor change to your life. It will be like half-quitting. Your drive and motivation and focus will go down, and you'll have to build up your natural willpower to compensate. But in the gap left by the lower dose will be your heart and your personality filling back in.

Even if ultimately you can only be "somewhat near the top of your class" with a half dose (vs. very top of your class), and even if it takes more stubborn self-discipline to stay committed than you're accustomed to needing on Adderall, it may well be worth it to get back a little of that self that's taken a backseat.

You can strike a balance. I've seen it done. You're on the right track with already making your dose consistent.

[Godshairpiece]

Hmm, I guess this is worth a shot but I don't do that great with moderation. I'm a person who typically can excel really well in one area and everything else kind of goes away. This effect was amplified when I started taking adderall. I set my focus on school and everything else kind of went away, but I was a very diligent student.

Now there is no school, so I seem to have transferred that focus to work. I stay later than I probably should, do extra, and try to do more than I probably should... This has a negative effect in every other area, such as family and home life and balance is very difficult for me to achieve. I'm not saying it's impossible, but I have a tough time with it.

Example 1: For instance, as embarassing as it is a few years ago I decided to play World of Warcraft. Well, in a year's time I wasn't just playing it casually. I played all the time. I became a guild leader, ran raids and became obsessed...

Example 2: When we had our daughter I decided to buy a nice DSLR camera to take photos instead of a regular old point and shoot. Fairly soon I had spent way more money than I should on top of the line lenses, lighting and flashes, and all kinds of equipment. I also spent most of my free time reading about how to improve my photography.

Example 3: I got into playing basketball in pick up games, I used to play as a teenager and just kind of got back into it. Pretty soon I was playing 6 days per week, joined a gym just because of the indoor basketball court and bought the gear to go with it...This went on for probably over a year and then I just kind of fizzled.

Those are two examples of my hyperfocus which seems to be amplified by adderall and I'm not sure if I can use that for some good, or it's a negative...

[Godshairpiece]

P.S. Mike you said something in one of your comment replies on the blog that also made a lot of sense to me. It was centered around exercise and taking the pill for the rest of your life but I can't remember the specifics. I also used to be pretty involved with exercise and particularly distance running, even ran a half marathon. I don't foresee myself ever doing any of this on adderall because I'm pretty afraid of the cardiac/health concerns with being on the adderall. I also know that there is no way I can take this pill for the rest of my life, I can't imagine it being healthy long term. I mean we know what the effects of stimulant use has the potential to do long term. I also tend to have a terrible diet while on it, drink energy drinks, and not take good care of myself. Of course, I'm not overweight because I don't think that's possible on adderall lol...

[Mike]

Re: Your first response

I know exactly what you're talking about. It's like you hook your interest into something and then binge on it until you've gone super-overboard, then fizzle and move on to the next obsession, leaving the often-expensive artifacts of your last obsession in a corner somewhere to collect dust.

As you guessed, Adderall absolutely makes this a info-binge/obsessiveness personality quirk a thousand times more natural feeling and harder to resist. Adderall reduces your natural willpower and your ability to zoom out and see the forest for the trees --- both qualities essential in developing a balanced life.

You may be naturally obsessive (which, as you said, isn't always a bad thing), sure. But I'd be willing to bet that Adderall is catapulting that obsessiveness much higher than it would be naturally.

The good news is that you don't have to work on moderation in all areas of your life. That would be an impossible task anyway. To try to moderate yourself in each individual area would be a recipe for unearned guilt and shame and stress.

You only have to concentrate on moderating yourself on one thing: Adderall dose. If you can summon the will power to keep just that one thing in line, everything else will fall into place as a result.

Tell me: When you're not on Adderall, does your obsessiveness cause you problems? Or do you feel more abstracted and relaxed most of the time?

On Adderall, you are consumed by your work, and try to make time for the other things (wife, kids, relaxation, emotionality) mostly by guilting your self into doing so. Off Adderall, the equation reverses. All of a sudden all you want to do is feel and relax, and work is the thing you have to force yourself to make time for.

Speaking as somebody who's also been on both ends of this, if your goal is balance...that is much more easily achieved with less Adderall than with more.

Even taking a small enough dose to make work mildly unpleasant for a while...you're still going to find time to use that obsessiveness to your gain and enjoyment. That doesn't go away, Addderall or no. But you are more its master than it yours.

Re: P.S.

Oh yeah, exercise and Addderall do not mix at all. The best you can usually do in terms of running is not take Adderall on the weekends, recover on Saturday, and run on Sunday.

But then, you never feel like running much when you're on the pills all the time.

And like you said, doing healthy things makes you want keep doing healthy things. Pop pills all day and just stare at a screen...might as well eat like crap to.

When you get out and run, you start wanting to eat & drink better too so you don't have your 3 o'clock coke burping back up after a mile.

I don't think I lifted a single weight in the last 5 years that I was on Adderall. Within two years of quitting I had put on 15 pounds of muscle and was doing a sprint triathlon.

I don't know man, with the goals you've vocalized (life balance, refocus on the wife and emotion, exercise)...sounds like you're a prime candidate to try a low dose or no dose. Because you will definitely get those things back, at the expense of some work performance. But what are you working for, anyway?