Weekend warrior

[Roch248]

Everything started when I was 24. Was diagnosed with ADD and was given adderall. Obviously it worked great at first and had a lot of personal and professional success taking it daily. Started binging about a year in to getting my prescription. Usually around 80-100mg spread throughout a couple days (1-2 times a week). Little to no harm reduction to go along with it. Staying up all night, drink/eating nothing and grinding my teeth . This went on for about a year and a half.

At that point I decided to remove myself from the situation. Let my prescription lapse, moved for work, reduced contact with friends that I would binge with. I would occasionally go back and visit a couple times a year, take a low dose, buy some for the following week. But nothing close to what I was doing before.

Well, I moved back to my hometown about a year ago and started to fall back into my old habits. Although I refuse to even consider attempting to renew my prescription I have been visiting my my old friends who do binge again.

I don't use at all during the week, workout hard everyday, get plenty of sleep, and tell myself that this is the week I'm finally done. Every Friday I end up taking (30-60mg throughout the evening) and end up staying up all night. Essentially sleeping 6 nights a week.

It's hard to take myself seriously when I break my promise to myself weekly. Now with doing this somewhat frequently over the last decade, at 30 extremely concerned about latent accrued cardiovascular damage. I've done very light research and the results are terrifying with things such as hardened arteries.

This weekend was the last straw for me, as I've realized its not even something I remotely enjoy anymore. All the euphoria has turned into guilt and anxiety. Cutting contact with my friend who enables and supplies me is the only way forward. That being said...

How do you cope with worrying about possible irreversible physical damage (brain, heart, kidneys from dehydration, etc...)? I know that I will more than likely be paying for my decisions later on in life (stroke, heart attack) and the anxiety is crippling. 

Thanks for listening to my rant.

[SleepyStupid]

On 4/20/2019 at 11:21 PM, Roch248 said:

How do you cope with worrying about possible irreversible physical damage (brain, heart, kidneys from dehydration, etc...)? I know that I will more than likely be paying for my decisions later on in life (stroke, heart attack) and the anxiety is crippling. 

we've all worried about this stuff to varying degrees at some point, but i think there's actually less "irreversible" damage than you think. you mention that you're working out hard during the week and staying healthy, so you're probably more than alright. you could go see a specialist if you'd like, but from other people's experiences here it's unlikely they're going to find anything alarming (or anything at all). i know it's hard to believe given how much damage and nonsense we've put ourselves through, but the human body is surprisingly adaptive.

glad to hear that you're finally cutting the weekend binges out. that guilt and anxiety is the worst. 

 

[quit-once]

Welcome to the Forums.  I am also a former weekend warrior.  It started off just Friday and Saturday, and most Sundays.  then Monday.  But, hey, I was still not an addict because I still had my three days off in a row, right?  Hell, I even had names for those recovery days...residual Monday, Tired Tuesday, and rebound Wednesday.  My tolerance was reset as long as I had those three days in a row off of Adderall.  But, eventually it became an everyday habit which I needed to kick.  I kept up the weekend warrior thing, for a good cause, for about seven years, then it was a daily addiction for the last two years.

When I finally did quit, I considered myself incredibly lucky to have slithered out of that addiction without any known long term damage to my body.  Don't worry about that.  Just make a plan and quit the shit.  Distancing yourself from your friend is a good start, I really resisted that move but we really didn't have too much in common outside of taking drugs.  Do you have any kind of self-imposed penalty in mind in case you fail - like rehab or counseling?  Anxiety is a big part of early recovery, so if you are worrying about needless shit right now, consider that part of the mortgage payment required to be repaid for all the enjoyable moments you had on Adderall.   Give your recovery the time it needs to move on with life.  With a couple of years of complete and total abstinence, you will feel mostly recovered.  Of course, you likely know that "once a pickle, never again a cucumber" holds true with this addiction, like all others, and no amount of speed is a safe amount to take, ever again, or your addiction will surely return.