Four Months After Quitting Adderall

[Amanda]

Quitting Adderall has hands down been the most difficult experience of my life. I was prescribed 80 mg. of Adderall per day...but by the end I took more. I had been on Adderall since I was 18-years-old...I was 24 when I decided to quit. I weighed 115-120 pounds...and when I took Adderall, I never slept, yet I couldn't stop taking it. The less I slept, the more I took because I was so tired the next day. It was a vicious cycle. I needed more and more. My life was spiraling out of control. I was prescribed this by my primary care physician....but I had to go see a psychiatrist (an expensive endeavor) in order for me to come off of it. It was so hard that I don't even know how to describe it.

I tried to quit cold turkey 3 times. Each time I was so miserable that I would go back on it. I had to pay a fortune for a psychiatrist who helped to gradually wean me off of it….but even that was so hard. He knocked me down to 40 mg of Adderall a day…but I would always take my old dosage and run out early.

The second time I tried to quit cold turkey, I went to work and couldn’t even sit at my desk without going crazy. I got nothing accomplished and I couldn’t even pretend to look alert….I got fired. In part because I had just started the job and was in my “probationary periodâ€â€¦.they probably thought I was a crack-head or something. In hindsight, I should have told them what was going on, because I would have fired me too.

I was tired every single day when I finally quit. I couldn’t even keep my head up or look at a computer screen. It was so hard. I felt miserable. “Tired†doesn’t even begin to describe it…I was LETHARGIC. It hasn’t been until recently that I’ve found myself being naturally motivated again.

But what matters is that it was SO WORTH IT. I am so proud of myself right now because I even have the motivation to write in this forum WITHOUT having popped an Adderall. I feel like myself again and not some robot. My boyfriend has stuck by me throughout this, and I love him so much for it. He said he was so worried about me when I was on it. I think I would have died by the age of 40 if I wouldn’t have quit.

My psychiatrist said that Adderall was my lifeline...that I was "chasing the dragon" every day. He also said I was being prescribed way too much for somebody my size and that it made him sad that there were doctors out there who were willing to prescribe that much. My psychiatrist also said that he couldn’t believe I hadn’t been given an EKG to make sure I didn’t have a pre-existing heart condition…he said that if I would have had a pre-existing heart condition that it was just a matter of luck that I was even still alive since I was taking that much. I don’t blame my doctor though. I truly believe my primary care physician just didn’t know.

I'll never know if it was my own weakness that led me down the path of Adderall addiction...of if the pill is just plain dangerous - it's probably both. But the hard part is knowing that there are some people out there who take it and don't have the problems that I did; I guess it makes me feel weak.

What I do know is that this website has helped me SO much. To the creator of this website: THANK YOU SO MUCH. Until I found this website, I thought I was all alone in my struggle. I didn’t know other people were going through this and I thought I was just crazy (which I kind of was).

[aj.adderall]

Hey Amanda.

It’s nice to finally get that natural motivation back, isn’t it? Chasing the dragon…a term I thought was exclusively for heroin use, but it just sounds so appropriate for this substance! Heh. Good for you for quitting, really. I don’t know you, but I’m happy for you. I’m sure the other members on this site are, as well. This is an amazing site. Who knew the cracked-out weirdos like us would find others who have the same experiences? The internet is a neat thing.

I never lost a job due to adderall but I have lost friends. The adderall makes me weird, yknow? Of course you know. The sleep patterns you mentioned and the way you felt… “The less I slept, the more I took because I was so tired the next day. It was a vicious cycle. I needed more and more. My life was spiraling out of control.†It feels like I could have written that. Admittedly, I have not been taking it as long or as much – I went from 20mg/day to 100mg-ish/day and took that for about a year - but to hear my thoughts come out in another’s story is truly amazing. It helps.

Best of luck to you.

-Aj.

[Amanda]

Thank you for your reply Aj. It helps me a ton to be able to relate to someone else out there. This website is so helpful. And yes, it feels amazing to finally have my natural motivation back. That's not to say that I don't drink a latte on a daily basis, but I know I've made progress because a latte used to have absolutely no effect on me during the time I was freshly coming off of Adderall but now I can actually feel it and notice it. I also relate to what you said about Adderall making you feel weird...it made me so socially awkward sometimes. I was prescribed the Adderall because of my ADD/ADHD...but in all honesty, I think the Adderall made me even more "ADD" by the end...I couldn't sit still or even follow and hold a conversation sometimes. I was such a robot. With the amount of Adderall I was being prescribed (80 mg), my psychiatrist said you could have made me focus on a blade of grass for four hours; that part made me laugh.

If anyone out there is needing/wanting to get off of Adderall, I hope you know that you are not alone in your struggle and that this isn't happening to only you.

The first month or two were really hard, but it gets so much better so DON'T GIVE UP. Don't waste the precious years of your life. Having your authentic self back outweighs everything that Adderall has to offer.

My other advice for helpful recovery, which I found on this website, was to exercise. I absolutely despise running, but I made myself do it just so that I would have energy...and it works. The more you exercise, the faster you will get better and back to your normal self again.

My psychiatrist also recommended to me that I drink caffeine, which I found weird at first because I wondered if I would just be replacing one habit (Adderall) with another (the caffeine) - but he swore it was fine. In my first 2 months, I was at the gas station filling up sodas 2-3 times a day. The people who worked there definitely began to recognize me. Not my proudest moments. I would recommend coffee instead...I make my own Iced Lattes now...all that soda made my face break out.