BeHereNow

Hey Liv, This is normal. Lots of people on here experience what you are experiencing. When I first quit, I was sleeping 3-4 hours a night for the first 3-4 months. And a LOT of people here on the boards have insomnia and anxiety stuff. It's weird, but it happens. I think it's because when I was on adderall, I was exhausting myself beyond what I had to give, every single day, and my brain chemicals were completely depleted. I think that my brain went into a kind of coma every night as a self-protective measure because I was so exhausted from adderall. Then when I quit, my brain wasn't as depleted anymore as it started healing, and I had to relearn my whole entire sleep/wakefulness cycle. I know it really sucks to be unable to sleep right now, but think of it as a part of your recovery. And never, ever get anxious about your insomnia while you are experiencing it. That starts a vicious cycle of even MORE insomnia! Have you thought of chatting w/ your dr? Maybe there are better sleep aids for you. I've taken Trazodone, Topamax, Klonopin, and Ativan to help me sleep. (Not all at once!! LOL!) Also, I don't know about you, but Melatonin gives me (and lots of people) nightmares and bad sleep. About the constipation thing, thats normal too. Make sure you're very hydrated. Eat lots of raw fresh vegetables, get some exercise, have a big strong cup of coffee, and give it TIME. You'll re-adjust. The key ingredient to all of this is TIME. Give yourself that gift, you deserve it. Keep going-- you're doing great!!

Congrats on all that you have accomplished!

Hey clinx, After one year it's totally normal to still be struggling. You'll have good days and bad days. Keep walking. I know that when I post on my major landmarks, I try to focus on the positive achievements. It's part of how I encourage myself, and part of how I try to encourage new people who are just quitting. So I would caution against comparing yourself to other people. We all have our good days and bad days. I'm at 2.5 years and still struggling with motivation, etc. Of course there are other life factors in that, like depression and a death in my family. But I know some of it is my brain recovering. You said your ED was probably part of it too. I just wanted to congratulate you on fighting through that, too. I had an ED myself for some years and I think they are one of the toughest things to recover from. You don't get to just quit eating food, unlike booze or pills. So, a big CONGRATS to you for beating two of the toughest things in existence! Listening to your post, it sounds like you're seeing your recovery through a negative lens. Focused on what you haven't done yet, or on the recovery that hasn't happened yet. I know it's frustrating. Believe me, I get it. But here's what always gets me through. What HAVE you accomplished??? What improvements can you see? Where were you a year ago compared to where you are today? How much BETTER do you feel now?!?! For me, framing my recovery in a positive light motivates me to keep moving forward.

Hi Spence, welcome! You've gotten some great advice here! I'm so happy to hear you're quitting and I am cheering you on. You CAN do this!!!!! Congrats on 77 days!!! Your brain has already done some AMAZING healing already. I think Matilda sums it up really really well here: I can't agree with this more. Your young adult years are so special-- More special than you will ever realize until those years are gone. (Wow, LOL, that makes me sound old.... I'm 32 and trying to cherish this phase of my adult life with the same approach.) Anyway. On adderall, I never felt like I was really living. I was so disconnected from everything and everyone around me. Honestly I feel like I missed out on over 5 years of my 20's because I was taking that crap. So many beautiful days with close friends and my beautiful sweet (ex) girlfriend, all the time with my amazing friends spent just goofing off, going to the beach, riding bikes, going out, whatever. For the years I was secretly taking adderall, I missed out on ALL of those experiences and I will NEVER get them back. Whether or not I was physically present, I was never mentally or emotionally there. Ya know? Adderall puts you into a zombie-like trance where you never get to experience just being YOU! You never get to experience all the fun you COULD be having just by living your LIFE!!! Trust me you WANT to live a full life and enjoy all the fun things that your 20's have to offer. This is YOUR life, and it's just the beginning! Ok here are some more concrete tips for studying: As much as college students obsess over their GPA's, most employers aren't looking at GPA's so much as the whole picture. They want someone with the right combination of skills, background, and personality to be a good fit for the organization and to get the job done well. Most adderallics are missing a piece of that puzzle. Here is your chance to develop all of that. This doesn't mean you get to just slack off and get bad grades, because a college degree shows both knowledge and endurance. You do need to keep your grades up. But don't let that stop you from quitting. Adderall is bad for memory formation. When you study on adderall, your brain's ability to form memories is decreased. Perhaps you have good short term memory on adderall (being a server), but adderall is not going to help you truly learn. Furthermore there is NOTHING wrong with writing things down and repeating them-- that's just how human memory works. (And if you were to keep up the adderall while serving, I can almost guarantee that as the drug inevitably, eventually starts working against you, you would start messing up orders.) Actually, on a side note, to be honest, I don't trust servers who don't write my order down and repeat it. You are making yourself more trustworthy! Other methods. (Browse around the threads for more tips-- there are lots.) Give yourself extra time to complete everything. Break up everything into small pieces, and complete projects step by step. Try "pomodoros" or a similar technique. Go to office hours and connect with your professors. They are not in it for the money and they want to help you. When you need extra time, or extra help, don't be afraid to ask for it. Don't skip classes. From your professor's perspective, whether or not attendance is required, they don't care if you don't want to come, but if you want good grades and if you want to learn, show up on time to every class. Be visible, make eye contact, take notes. Your attendance counts more than you even know. I quit in the middle of grad school, over winter break. It was very humbling. I went from being this overachieving, egotistical hotshot to a struggling student, having to go to office hours and ask for extra help regularly, requesting extensions, needing extra time to do my readings, learning to be OK with going to class slightly unprepared and doing my best anyway. I had to learn new methods of writing and taking notes while reading (and actually, these methods are much more effective than the kind of speed-reading I was doing before!) I'll never be who I was on adderall. And you know what? I wouldn't want to be. I don't like that version of me. I can see in your writing that you are a much better, funnier, more interesting person without it. Press on!

Congrats CarpeDiem! It's a roller coaster but hang on because it's so worth it!

Hi kam, I agree! The struggle IS real and it's more intense than anyone who hasn't been through it can understand. I've tried to convey the struggle to non-adderallics and they just can't quite fully grasp it. People on the forum can relate though! You can share your struggles and successes here. I know that I would never have gotten through the struggle without the support of my quitting adderall friends! Welcome!

Think about caffeine, and what people go through just to quit their caffeine habits. Coffee and other caffeine products give people a kind of "buzz" that they then get used to and "need" to feel awake and normal. And that's a widely accepted/consumed drug that's readily available at the nearest store in multiple forms. Let alone these EXTREMELY powerful Schedule II drugs. I think it's amazing that you stopped because you were looking forward to the next dose too much. I wish I had had the self-awareness and foresight to do that.

What you are describing is pretty much the classic adderall pattern. It feels like a miracle at first, and then it starts undermining you big time. The sleep and anxiety stuff and side effects don't tend to happen right away, they start to happen after you've been taking those pills for awhile. The thing is, it's not going to get any better. It gets worse. Then as people start raising their dosages, those unwanted effects and withdrawal symptoms get worse and worse. The longer you go, and the higher your dose goes, the closer you get to adderall rock bottom. Check out the 8 Stages of Amphetamine Use/Abuse here: http://forum.quittingadderall.com/topic/879-8-stages-of-amphetamine-useabuse/

I think I can relate to this. You're used to feeling super productive and feeling like you're accomplishing things, and now without the pills you can't do nearly as much. My suggestion is to lower your standards. You're not going to accomplish much for a little while. Enjoy the extra sleep and food and lack of productivity now while you can, because right now the ONLY thing you have to do is get better

Hi Knows_Better, You're in the right place! A lot of people around here have gone through similar binges before realizing they have to quit. Addiction usually tends to get worse if you keep using the substance. It's a brain chemistry thing. And you DO deserve support. I know you're mad at yourself right now, but you're going to have to find a way to forgive yourself and move forward. You need to stop taking adderall. Make a plan, tell your doctor you're quitting, and don't take it EVER again. You can do this! If you keep going on these binges, you're going to keep getting worse and worse and possibly cause yourself some terrible health problems! Stay close to the forums, keep eating and resting, try to accept that your relationship with adderall can now only be an abusive one. The only way out is to quit.

Hey friends, Let’s be completely honest. In some ways, quitting IS inherently a somewhat lonely process. It forces you to face and overcome some of the most challenging aspects of yourself: willpower, motivation, self-mastery, personal strength, dedication, creating a vision of the life you want to live and pursuing it. And nobody quite knows what it’s like to be in your head except for you. Very few people around you will understand exactly what quitting adderall is like…. except people who have been there. This is why a lot of us turn to the boards here. These fine folks have been key to my quitting process. But equally important have been my close loved ones. In terms of my personal life, I've explained to only the very close people in my life, and they’ve been super helpful even though they could not quite understand. A lot of people understand quitting something, cigarettes or overeating or booze or whatever, but quitting adderall is a very specific process. Nobody in my life could 100% relate. People could imagine and therefore in some ways empathize, though, either from the perspective of having tried it and/or something similiar (drug-wise) at soime point... or else from the perspective of quitting smoking, or something similar. In any case, it was and has been crucial to engage with a) people on this board, and the closest loved ones I have—whether they could or could not immediately relate. If I could have had some quitting friends in close proximity, that would have been helpful. But know that it's doable either way

Congrats Heather!! You rock! Thanks for all that you contribute here. You have helped so many others in your quitting process and I really enjoy reading your posts. For a lot of people it seems that after one year, the worst is behind you. I know that for me, things changed at around the one year mark. I was much more stable and noticed a lot of improvements at around that time. PS I love the fact that you didn't even notice your milestone!

ZK, I'm sorry I didn't see your post sooner! Congratulations on 2 years and on how much you have accomplished in that time! Quitting both adderall and cigarettes within 2 years is a major accomplishment in itself, as well as an ongoing process (like LilTex said) so I'm super proud of you for doing that! I'll be honest, I can hear you being a little hard on yourself in this post... about your weight and about not achieving more goals. I'm way too hard on myself too (I guess adderall attracts our type!) and one of the most helpful things any of my friends can do for me is to tell me when I'm being too hard on myself. My best friends are used to me being too hard on myself, and are great at telling me to cut that shit out. So I'm going to tell you that right now. Don't be so hard on yourself. You're amazing, and a huge success story. Make sure your goals are attainable, and know that if you're setting a high bar, you're bound to fall a little short-- but that's not a bad thing. You're a human being, and you're doing great! Congratulations again my friend!

Also, cutting negative people out of my life has done me a world of good.

Hi Knows_Better! I'm not judging you on your decision, in fact I have made the exact same decision countless times. But my support for you will come in the form of a tough question. Will you REALLY be able to go back to using it as prescribed? In other words, are you being honest with yourself here? Will you be able to ignore the little voice that says, "just one more won't hurt?" Usually, once someone crosses the line from use into abuse, they can't come back. It will work for a little while, but the abuse starts to slowly creep in again. It's a lot like an alcoholic trying over and over to moderate, and maybe successfully doing so here and there, but getting out of control and abusing it more often than not.

Positive attitude.

I have a family member who takes it. He has not been the same person since he started and he is definitely addicted. I am so sorry to hear you're going through this. With addiction, you can't stop them. They have to figure it out for themselves. They have to want to stop. Unfortunately sometimes that means hitting rock bottom..... I am waiting for my family member to hit rock bottom but he just keeps sinking lower...... You're not alone. It's so hard to watch. I hope for the best for you and your family.

I used to hurt myself working out on adderall too. I would overwork myself and then be SUPER hung over the next day-- felt like the worst of my college hangovers, but with no alcohol consumption! And muscle injuries, and my heart rate would be through the ROOF. And I would get chest pain, heart palpitations, and really bad anxiety during/after workouts. Took me 6 months to start back up again. When I did, I loved working out better than ever. And could do so without hangovers, injuries, compulsive workout behavior, or that weird, empty, hollow feeling adderall gives you where you can't even actually ENJOY your workout..... or anything else, really...... It hurts me now to even REMEMBER those days. I am writing to you now from a much better place and I am writing to invite you to join me and our quitting crew here You are worth it.

Hi sanjZ! It sounds like you are starting to see the "benefits" of adderall fade away. There's usually a phase where it works REALLY well, then you become dependent, then it starts working against you. And it starts working against you, increasingly, in a downward spiral. Check out the "8 stages of amphetamine use/abuse" post under "Announcements" for more info on this. I've always been pretty athletic. Running, biking, skiing, swimming, hiking, calisthenics. Then I went on adderall. It pumped me up too for awhile. I did a triathalon and got 2nd place for my age/sex category-- after training on adderall, then performing in the tri without it (didn't want to feel too much like I was cheating!) And for a couple years I felt like I couldn't work or work out without it, like you. Then the downward spiral started. I started to worry about my heart. I felt like I was having heart palpitations and chest pain when I would work out on adderall. So what did I do? Well, the addict that I was, I gradually stopped working out! I became super sedentary, gained a bunch of weight, and was in the worst shape of my life for about a year. Then I quit. I was still a sloth for 6 months. Soooo lazy. I was fine with it. Whatever it took to quit. Started running again 6 months later and it was very therapeutic for me. I joined the 12 miles a week running club on this forum and it helped! I lost 30+ lbs in 2 years and got into the best shape of my life! Actually this is a very common pattern. After quitting, a lot of people fall (back) in love with some form of working out and get into amazing shape. It's great for confidence building because you know you CAN do it without those pills!!! And working out is a great way to procrastinate from writing papers and more hardcore stuff.....lol. Honestly, it sounds to me like this might just be your time! Welcome!! And especially if you quit now while you're so young. As a lot of people on here have discussed, the younger you are when you quit, the easier your recovery is. I've quit twice-- once at 21, once at 26-- (EDIT: Make that 30! WOW did I forget my own age?! I went back ON them at 26! lol!) and it was way easier at 21. You CAN do this without these stupid pills!! And you will LOVE the life you lead without them! TRUST ME, you will be so much happier with your life and work in the long run if you quit!!!

ZK you know I remember seeing that image when I was an active adderallic, and thinking it was evidence of how much smarter adderall was making me. Now I look at it and the red brain looks terrifying! Like WAY too much is going on in there at once! I used to look at that image and think mmmmm, red. Now I look at the green parts of the yellow-green brain and think, mmmmm, green. Lol. Now I know that intelligence and learning REQUIRE rest. For the brain, some parts rest while others are active. The brain just can't function on overdrive like that. It just can't!

Survived, Good for you for not going back on antidepressants! You sound very strong in your decision, which is awesome. If you can manage to stay that way, and keep managing without them, I'd say do it. I was always that way. I was always opposed to antidepressants. The year I quit adderall, I also suffered from horrible unprecedented depression (there were life events that also affected this) and eventually it got so bad that I gave in and went on them. Now, I hate that I take them, and the withdrawals are truly debilitating. I'm still depressed and I don't think these pills are even helping anymore.

Yay!! Congrats on 3 years! You rock! You give me hope for my own future.... more growth and improvement..... which we all always need.

There are other forums for addiction but this one is the only adderall specific one. Quitting adderall is a unique beast and from what I've found, other forums like soberrecovery.com are more focused on alcohol and/or don't have enough adderallics to help with this specific issue. It's also the most supportive, insightful, and caring group around I've been on here awhile and the forum traffic sometimes ebbs and flows. It doesn't seem as active as previously for some reason but like anywhere, people come and go. But there is always an active core group, and there are also always new people coming here in need of advice. Encouraging them is key to keeping this community growing. This forum is what WE as a group make it. If you post a lot, you also encourage others to post too. If you're struggling, you will get responses.

Just followed you all! message me if you want mine

^^What LilTex said. It's important not to confuse your real self with your addict mind. Your addict mind is talking (screaming) right now. But it's not you! It sounds like you're really struggling with staying on top of work and organization. I totally relate. And these thoughts come through my head, too. I get frustrated and stressed out when I start falling off the ball. But it also sounds like you might be trying too hard to fit yourself into a mold that isn't for you. "A.D.D." is a huge lie in my opinion. For one thing, at the very least, it is NOT a "disorder." Even that word is stigmatizing. Don't let anyone tell you that there's something wrong with you, because there isn't. I am SO GLAD I have the scattered, creative, "ADD" brain that I have. I see people with micro-managing, OCD, anal retentive tendencies, and I don't envy them. No matter how much more 'efficient' they may appear. There are many forms of intelligence. But multiple intelligence theory has a long ways to go in terms of recognizing things like "A.D.D." as forms of intelligence, too. (Same goes for social anxiety "disorders," which a new study just showed are correlated with high levels of empathy. Why do they call these things "disorders?" Because by convincing people there's something wrong with them, the pharmaceuticals, psychiatrists, etc. can make more money!) Instead of trying to fit into someone else's mold, it's time to get creative. You just have to capitalize on your unique intelligence while managing for your "ADD" type tendencies. Create your own life! Choose the work strategies and systems that work for your personality. I've made some progress in coming up with systems that help me in areas of life where "ADD" is a struggle. So for example, I have a LOT of trouble staying organized. So my stay-organized system is this: Everything has a home. But don't force things into homes where they don't want to live! So I don't force myself to use a key hook because I know it won't work. My keys live where my disorganized brain tends to put them: in my coat pocket and/or thrown on the table right next to my front door. Or another example: I'm pretty cluttered and I have lots of clothing piles everywhere. So instead of trying to force myself to fold laundry and iron and stuff, I just embrace the "pile system." One laundry basket for semi-clean clothes that can be worn again, one for dirty stuff, and one for clean laundry I'm too lazy to put away just yet. And with the forgetfulness. I write things down, and I ask people to email me reminders when I know I'm likely to forget. I make fun of myself, because it's not a bad thing, it's just my personality. When I get an email, I respond to it immediately or else I'll forget. When I find out about an important event or meeting, I put it on my phone immediately with a reminder one day in advance, and one hour in advance. For my important bills, I am on auto-payments. They mess up sometimes, but they mess up less frequently than I do. And when it comes to work, it happens in short spurts. With breaks. Lots of breaks. Moving around and doing stuff, changing the scenery. I have bad insomnia and often sleep in multiple "shifts," so I'm learning to think of my day in terms of work "shifts," too. It's a challenge to learn and practice the discipline to actually spend all the time necessary, but I'm starting to remember that I'd rather do something productive than waste my time. I have trouble finishing projects, and I often have multiple projects going at once. I want to learn to use this to my advantage. Maybe I just need to keep it mixed up! Opportunities, not impairments. A little at a time. And boundaries for yourself. Be careful with your time and with what you do with your mind. We live in a world full of distractions like fakebook that make ADD worse. Instead of going to sites like that, I try to just go directly to doing some work. If I'm bored enough to go to my news feed, then I'm bored enough to do a little work, just 5 minutes' worth. Other boundaries are things like: no internet before work, no more than 2-3 drinks per week, show up 10 minutes early because otherwise I'll be 10 minutes late. Knowing yourself can help you set the right systems and boundaries to manage for your own tendencies, and then your "ADD" creativity can really flow These are just some strategies I've been figuring out over time. Because if I ever had to take and/or quit adderall again, I honestly don't think I would survive. And if I did, I know that my career, relationship, and psyche itself would not survive. Just take the adderall option off the table. What it really means is the death of your real self.