Motivation_Follows_Action

THanks - useful info. And I've just signed up for science friday!

Just wanted to say that. I am trying to figure out how it started; I think it just is tiredness and trying to absorb too much. But it was hard to get going this morning and I found my mind really wondering in meetings. It was really frustrating to have such horrible brain fog. Just wanted to say that.

YES,lea; yes you DO. Krax, you look like Bob Marley?!

I'm sorry you don't feel like you did as well as you could have but honestly it sounds like just a shitty luck of the draw. Taking a nap and sleeping it off sounds like a great idea. To put it in perspective, I wonder if in 2 or 3 years time you'll even remember this shitty little exercise! Sounds like you're a good presenter, and that you know your content, and ok so maybe you need to work on doing a little more risk-taking with your creative ideas. But all in all it sounds like you did well. And you certainly tried your best so the rest is out of your hands. You're a good one, IR. You deserve a movie and some popcorn and a big sleep in this weekend.

Question: is weaning off even possible, and how long does it take? Theoretically it's possible and there are some on this site who've managed to do it. To me it's just prolonging the damage and making the withdrawal process more and more painful, I didn't have the strength to taper off. Can she still take xanax for the anxiety that comes along with quitting? I did take a reasonable amount of xanax through my recovery but I don't recommend it. 1) it's highly addictive itself; so she may be swapping one addiction out for another; 2) Depression and xanax are strange bedfellows. If she wants to sleep her way through recovery, then xanax is the way to do it; 3) the point of coming off adderall is for you (hopefully) to learn to live clean. Ideally it seems like an opportunity to live clean from all drugs. How long does the tiredness stay with someone while they are coming off of an addiction to it? I was on a similar dose to your gf. The intense exhausstion lasted about 3-4 weeks for me but the brain fog lasts for a really, really long time. You don't even realize what a clean mind is sometimes until you have a "clear day". Then you realize you haven't had all your mental sharpness for months. How many chances should I give her? Only you can answer that. You should work hard to come up with an answer though or you will find yourself in a position where not only are you angry and hurt at her addiction, you are angry and disappointed in yourself for your supposed weakness and failure handling this. It's hard to hear, but NOTHING you can do is going to make her change. You can try leaving, but be prepared for that to backfire on you. She knows that this is the reason she doesn't have a ring on her finger, and I know that kills her, but it isn't getting better. This sounds unhealthy to me, sorry but I have to say it. You can't bargain with your gf to quit drugs. She will resent you for it and who's to say she mightn't quit for a while, get engaged to you, and then as soon as she's got the ring she will go back to using again. We live together, so just not seeing her until she is off of it is not very possible. I don't know where else to turn. I wish there was something that I could do to get this horrible addiction to stop. Does anyone have some advice for what I can do or how to act? I'm sure you have suggested rehab. Tough love may work, or it may not. You won't know until you try it and that is an enormous risk to take as you may lose her forever. Then again, it sounds like the girl you're living with right now is not the girl you fell in love with so maybe you already lost her... What is the best way to be supportive but not an enabler? I am so tired of this life, but won't give up.. I don't mean to sound flippant, but she won't give up either. I commend her for trying to quit for 12 days. But unless she throws away her stash, cuts off contact with her doctors, and commits 110% to nothing else but recovery, she's putting herself at risk for relapse. Final word: you keep focusing on your girlfriend. What about you? You have your own wants and needs in this relationship and it sounds like you've put all those aside for her and her beloved adderall. What kind of relationship do you want to be in? Is she able to provide that loving, trusting, reliable, supportive friendship and companionship that I'm sure you probably want and need? Be careful in your love and care for her that you are sacrificing the identification of and claim over your own needs in a relationship. Adderall is a jealous mistress. She takes away your girlfriend's character, time, dedication, trustworthiness, care and compassion and replaces it with coldness, distance and lies. You have to decide for yourself whether you are willing to put up with this third party in your life and for how long. You do have a right; it's YOUR relationship too.

Can you compress the file or save it in a lower resolution jpg? Or take a screenshot of it and edit that (that's what I did)

Day by day is the only strategy that works, really. Celebrate that you got through all those days, but recognize you're only one pill away from relapse. We all do it, all the time!

So krax where's your pic???

Here is the link to the study: http://formularyjournal.modernmedicine.com/formulary-journal/news/clinical/clinical-pharmacology/modafinil-has-potential-abuse-and-addiction-be

Cassie, you always come through with the goods. THANK YOU!

Cassie, you're our resident researcher... could you possibly look in to whether there are any articles that can be read by the layperson about how this drug actually works? I am hearing conflicting reports - some say it enhances dopamine activity and some don't. I would like to know. I talked to my doctor about it and she wasn't v helpful.... she said it was, "adderall lite", whatever that means.

I was in a meeting today and there was a young woman there, maybe mid 20s. Man, it was so obvious she was on adderall. It was a long meeting and I literally watched her demise as she went through the highs and lows throughout the day. It made me think, do any of you think you can tell when someone else is on adderall? Here were some of the tell-tale signs: Talking extremely fast Wide eyed stare Feeling like she had to cover everything she possibly thought, and would get so lost in her train of thought she'd almost start a new project The "deliberate blink" (trying to water her dry eyes I guess) Grinding jaw Pasty look, she actually looked like she was sweating at one point Impatience with anyone else's contributions Stuck in her own train of thought Unable to really follow what was going on when we switched topics back and forth Took copious notes (like reams of paper) and then suddenly stopped taking notes altogether No lunch, of course By the middle of the afternoon, the crash was settling in. She was aggitated, on her blackberry almost all the time, completely disengaged, sighing a lot. I felt so sorry for this poor girl. Of course I could be making up all of this and correlating it back for convenience, but it was just so plain to see. It made me wonder how many times fellow adderall takers saw me in that state. Anyone else think they're good at spotting other adderall takers mid-cycle?

I guess it depends on the person and the circumstance. And how far gone in your addiction you are. E.g. Doing laundry. Off adderall = would procrastinate, therefore "hard" to get done. On adderall = no procrastination, but absolute perfection required and amount of output and effort invested would turn a simple unenjoyable task in to an almighty accompishment. On adderall, this accomplishment makes you feel worthy of a medal! "LOOK EVERYONE I DID THE LAUNDRY... PERFECTLY!" whereas without adderall you look back on an adderall-fuelled day and think, "what the fuck is so special about laundry that it took me all day", or, even worse, "I can't even do fricken laundry without having to pop a pill?" On the bigger challenges in life, to me there is a different psychology. And this is where the self confidence piece comes in to play. You never know when you're on adderall how much the drug is to blame/to thank for the outcome of the work you did while high. You never know if it was your actual brilliance that impressed everyone, or the drug was fuelling all the neurons in your prefrontal cortex at the time and it was the adderall talking. For me, this led to a terrible sense of self esteem, and a sense that I literally couldn't do anything good without adderall. And then the downward spiral begins... you feel unconfident, you take a pill. You take a pill and then you blame yourself for being addicted. You vow to quit but can't, and then you're a failure. And if you try to quit, you enter depression anyway which makes you feel even worse about yourself on top of everything.

I learned what my last name means from someone who knows the dead language from whence it originates. Loosely translated, (and allowing for poetic license given the cover of anonymity), it means sheep from the west paddock. So there you go.

I think the entire 5% of all active rats lives in New York City

Hi Ominoussilence, welcome to the forums (I see you joined today?). Would you like to tell us about your story? Are you struggling with adderall dependence or addiction? That is what this forum is about.

Yep, totally agree and whether it's in the academic arena or in the crazy world of work the same thing applies. I've been at my new job for 10 days today and have my first client presentation tomorrow!! Also was asked to propose a client solution "on the fly" because "you're the expert" today in a meeting, even though I am just starting to learn the products that this firm produces and the clients it serves. If I was on adderall I would have stayed up all night trying to cram in an entire business in to one brain, ended up completely overcomplicating it and trying to reinvent everything to make it better (even though this company has been growing 20% YOY since the 70s) and feeling terrified that I wasn't going to change the world in a day. But instead, I have done the best I can do; I have read things methodically, allowed things to absorb, and asked for help. And I will go in with a great team tomorrow and allow them to shine and know that if I can ask one smart question or contribute one small tidbit it will be a win. I don't need to be superwoman, and it's SUCH a nice feelng! That reminds me -- asking for help was something I never ever did when I was on adderall. Anyone else experience this?

Grieving is part of recovery - you haven't seen what you're to gain and you're looking at everything you've lost. But you made the right decision. And you already are getting some of your good jugment back! You ARE a powerful person and you did something that takes a TREMENDOUS amount of strength. Congratulations! You have taken a big leap forward towards becoming the person you want to be.

That's exactly what it was like for me in the pscyh ward. I looked at the Rx details later and they had me on like 3x the amount of klonopin I'd ever taken and twice the amount of wellbutrin, of course the brand name. I didn't know whether I was coming or going. It was like something out of One Flew Over the Cookoo's Next... all the clocks in the patients' rooms told the wrong time, but only by like 7 - 20 mins, so you'd show up just late or just early to mealtime or medication time or blood pressure time. Honestly there was nothing remotely supportive about it. There was a guy in there who was super smart, had published 2 novels but was beyond depressed and he was just a zombie with all the drugs they had him on. Honestly he was just there to stay alive... you could tell he didn't want to be alive. I was such an "easy" case compared to all the others in there. All I did was nap, and read, and was quiet in group therapy in case I said anything that would be used against me later. It did feel very much something out of "Crime and Punish", very Victorian. Not sure what I'm rambling on about except that the whole fog of withdrawal and the fog of depression and anxiety that accompanies withdrawal are inseparable, so of course you feel like you're going crazy. I am so glad I will never have to live that again. And QO, that you went through this numerous times to an even more exaggerated degree makes me so filled with respect for you that you are where you are now. Truly, what a journey you've come through.

That's an interesting correlation. No, I don't have trouble making friends but I am a very private person and although people invite me to hang out, after a while they give up because although I make out to be an extrovert, I am really an introvert and I like to have time alone. Also I've found that moving around so much has made me value deep friendships, so I tend to pass off acquaintences as just that when really they could develop in to friendships if I bothered. I'm sure if I was single I'd have a lot more friends.

My words of encouragement are not really meant to be so, although it's nice you interpreted them that way. I truly am impressed with your discipline to stay to a plan and see it as science rather than as psychology (which is my leaning post and sometimes it can be detrimental). There is a lot I can learn from thinking of recovery in a more scientific way. I won't bore you but to summarize: was on 60 or so mg adderall a day on and off for a few years. This ramped up with the advent of a new job and in the end was on zero sleep, no real nutrition and 90-100 mg a day. Went in to psychosis, lost my job, got suicidal and ended up in hospital. To speak to your piece about anxiety HELL YEAH did I go through that. It was so pervasive I didn't realize I was suffering from it, I was just nervous and paranoid and overthinking things as a constant. This ramped UP after the first 3 weeks and got to an all-time high around the 4-5 week mark after quitting. I took far more xanax in my first 90 days than I would like to admit. One other thing which I took a psychological perspective on which is the "linear" vs "non linear" piece. I think recovery is always non linear. So I don't know that I would correlate the going-back-to-work-breaking-of-a-nice-progress thingy in to a definite connection to working out in the morning or changing your work hours, etc. Some days you feel great and others you feel shitty. The thing that is remarkable about you is that despite how shitty you feel, you still get out of bed and haul ass to the gym and it sounds like invariably you feel better. I need to learn a bit more of this discipline!

I read that the latest update of Nike + was really bad.

I'd love to but I'm a TERRIBLE swimmer (I know, I know, Australians and all that blah blah). That is why I am starting with running and then I'll add in the bike and go for a duathlon. Sorry LILTEX, if it was a duathlon then maybe!

... and you know what's funny? All the research on adderall says that actually, the difference in actual performance on amphetamines over time with people who remain on it is only marginally different, if at all, than people not on the drug. Adderall makes us think we're better with it, makes us feel like we're performing at a higher level, but it's all in our heads. In actual fact, if we just focused and got some more balance in our lives we'd likely do just as well.

Beautiful Disaster, You've written a pretty compelling list. You've thought about it a lot. You've gotten some great advice and further questions. The only thing I'd add is that as you know, there will always, always be a reason to "pop one and get it done". Whether it's cleaning the house or job hunting or doing your taxes etc etc. In other words, the shit will go on in life. Adderall masks that fact by driving us beyond what is normal. Its NORMAL to feel a lack of energy to do tasks we don't want to do. Be sure not to confuse adderall withdrawal/recovery with just the normal rhythm of life. I did an entire extensive job search by myself while going through withdrawal. It was hard, but the feeling of accomplishment when it was productive and landed me a great job was indescribably rewarding. If I'd been on adderall that whole time I wouldn't have been able to say I did it myself, and I wouldn't feel so great about the me that's inside! It was hard, but rewarding. One thing that adderall does is it takes away the "hard", but it also takes away (after a while) the "rewarding". It's kind of like cheating. You can get away with it and win the prize but you really can't celebrate because deep down inside you know you're not worthy of the prize. Anyway, I'm ranting. Just have a think about that. Putting off quitting because life interrupts will be ever-present and pervasive because life never stops. You have to bite the bullet some time!