GettingOffOfIt

There is no harm in giving it a few practice runs before you are successful. It took me several tries. I would make it a few days, a week, and got all the way up to 18 days once before I decided to taper off and stay off for good.

Have I had to relearn how to work? Yes and no. That was me doing to the work on adderall, not the pill. The pill causes dopamine to be released which makes everything interesting. It makes whatever you are doing enjoyable so you can focus and enjoy unpleasant tasks. I’m still the same person so I just had to figure out how to make myself interested in what I’m doing. I figured this out because there was so much I dreaded to do after the pill, but I realized when I was playing video games, I could lock in and stay focused for hours. I didn’t need a pill. There are ways to trick yourself into getting yourself motivated to do work you don’t like and enjoy it. The trick is to break down large tasks into simple steps and start attacking the smaller ones. As you complete each one your brain will release some dopamine and you will gain momentum. You just have make yourself start. If you have trouble there, set a timer for 15 minutes. Promise yourself you will work on that task the best to your ability and will give yourself a reward like a 5 minute break after. Do that a few times an you will see that you can do this. Some days may be harder than others but this method works no matter what shape you are in. Ive gotten to the point to where I don’t have to do that any more most days. As along as I eat healthy and stay away from processed foods, exercise and sleep I can work all day and stay focused now. I tapered off and had quit alcohol when I quit over 2 years ago. I was depressed before and my depression went away when I quit. I did have some anxiety that would come and go. Not anymore. I think no alcohol was the key. Insomnia came and went for a while. I took naps in the afternoon that helped when I couldn’t sleep well at night. It was incredibly effective. Back to working, I would recommend the book What to do when there is too much to do by Laura Stack. She teaches a great method for breaking down tasks in a way that will boost productivity in half the time which is a godsend for anyone trying to work while recovering. I also recommend searching for any info in help with adhd because those are the symptoms you get when stopping the pill. I still use the app FocusAtWill for brown/pink/white noise types of sounds to help me hyper focus at work

Everything you are experiencing will pass. I wouldn’t trust any of your emotions for a while if I were you. They will be all over the place. You are through the toughest parts already. You are in competition with who you were yesterday. Just focus on beating that person everyday. You will still probably have a really bad day pop up here and there. It’s normal. Just do what you have to get by when you do and know that they will come less often the longer you get on your journey. Don’t let the bad days discourage in thinking you are going backwards. You aren’t. It is a part of healing. Just pop on Netflix when it happens and try to find something enjoyable to do. I would suggest you embrace ChatGPT while you are trying to recover. Put everything you write in there and have it critique you or make it more coherent. Have it check your work. Ask it for advice. Make it organize your tasks. Lean on it as a crutch for work and be thankful you decided to quit at a time when it is available. As for the rest just keep pushing through. You will see some big improvements soon. I’m at 26 months on my journey. best of luck

kaizen

I can’t believe it has been 2 years since my last dose already. It’s crazy how powerful the drug is. I hadn’t had a craving or even thought about the drug in months and last Friday that little voice in my head was telling me that I could take a dose and finish a task and it won’t bother me. It’s an ongoing battle but you can’t make the decision each day not to. You have to decide up front and never stray from it. Good luck to those still trying and to those who have been successful! Hope everyone has a great 2024

Get you some l-tyrosine to help your focus for a little while. I also go to 5 hour energy when I need a little extra. Also try breathing exercises they help keep your anxiety away. I have to write down each step of what I’m working on to help me focus and get in the groove when I don’t want to. Maybe some of this can help you like it did me if you are interested in trying.

I hate you are experiencing all of this. Sounds like you may need to see a real doctor (not a physiatrist) for all those symptoms.

Just realized I have made it to 1.5 years clean when I looked at my calendar. I’m also 2 years off alcohol as of July 2nd. I am proud of myself. Good luck to you all!

Gonna try it. I need an ice bath for recovery after exercise anyway sometimes

I’ve been doing great. I will post more updates tomorrow on this thread when I have more time but wanted to get this post in since today is my 16 month clean anniversary. Withdrawal wise I don’t really have any negative effects anymore. I have plenty of energy. I haven’t suffered from any depression. I’ve embraced who I am and just moved forward. I try to focus on others and making their lives or day better. I found that makes me feel great. I got a new job and have been there 3 months. I doubled my pay and make well over 6 figures now. I love my new job and I hate that adderall made me happy for so long in my crappy previous job that I hated when I got off of it. As far as withdrawals, I’ve consumed no alcohol and ate a healthy diet 70% of the time while exercising vigorously almost 100% of the time. It definitely played a role but no way tell how big. Compare to other success stories if you are interested. I drink up to a couple of cups of coffee per day. I rarely take any l-tyrosine to focus. I don’t take any l-dopa. They used to help, but I have found I don’t need it anymore. I have plenty of energy throughout the day as long as I sleep 8 hours and I do most of the time. I got through the early stages by doing whatever work I could when I could do any. I haven’t had to do things that way for a while. It’s almost like the person I used to be on adderall is just a distant memory now. I am the person I always wanted to get back to. Oh and I went outside yesterday in 88 degree heat, and I didn’t get my adderall sunburn after 5 minutes! It’s great. I didn’t get burned at all actually.

It’s normal. The cravings will improve. They usually come strong and then vanish after a few minutes. They may vary in frequency and intensity but they slowly fade away. It’s normal to feel stronger at first than where you are now because it was still in your blood stream for a few days and it took a while for your body to realize it wasn’t coming back. Now your body is re-calibrating itself to run on its own again. Let it run its course and look forward to the future. It is like letting the lawnmower run in spring to get rid of the bad gas from sitting up all winter. It should start noticeably getting better soon. It won’t be linear improvement where the next day will always be better but it will be more like ups and downs, like a roller coaster, some days will be worse than others but the bad days will fade away. I’m at almost 15 months and it I still get one bad day of energy now and then but it is very rare. I think that is normal for regular people too though.

I would recommend you go to a standard family physician instead of your psychiatrist to get help while off the meds. It would be worth a try

I would recommend that you wait a few weeks before you try to make sense of how you feel. Just know that it will pass and force yourself to do things that matter like homework, even though you don't feel like you care. You will. Your brain is like a sponge and it takes some time to dry out and work properly without the drug again. Trust the process and try to keep yourself busy doing whatever you find that can stimulate your brain during withdrawal. It will make you feel better. Movies and video games worked for me. Whatever can distract you from thinking about how you feel will help. Also think about the person you want to be when you come out on the other side. Write that down and read it everyday. Get a mental picture of that person so you can see yourself. Know that you are on a journey to get there. You can also take a selfie every day and watch yourself improve over time. I wish I had done that. Also, you can also set timers to help you with your homework. You really just need help getting started, your brain is still there and will work if you can get it going. Put a timer on for 10 minutes and force yourself to focus on one particular task and only that task for the entire 10 minutes. Then take 5 minute break. Then repeat the process until all tasks for an assignment are done. Bump up to 15 or 20 minutes when you think you can handle it. It helped me get through a lot and maybe it can help you too. Good luck.

Feels great. I've been wanting this for so many years so it feels so great to finally get to this milestone. I'm going to celebrate this weekend. I really think that weaning off the pill and not consuming any alcohol has helped accelerate my recovery. Alcohol is a depressant and will make your depression much worse. I still take some L-Tyrosine for focus on a rare occasion. I don't really take any L-Dopa for mood anymore. I drink 2-3 cups of coffee a day. I have noticed many improvements to my quality of life the longer I stay off of it. I just recently noticed that I don't have the eczema breakouts that I normally do in the winter. My knuckles are usually bleeding this time of year, even with the use of prescription topical steroids, but my skin is so much healthier that they are perfectly normal.

Quitting smoking was very tough for me. I quit almost 20 years ago after smoking for almost 8 years. I used the patch to get off of it too. I never looked back. Good luck to you! You've got this.

I started around Mid to Early November 2021. started at 60 and took a huge first step. It was rough. I think I went from 60 to 20 or something close to that (Adderall). I then stepped down to 1.25 per day by January. Then I would skip a day, then 2 day, then I stopped completely on Jan 13th and have been free from it for 11 months. Stepping down is definitely the way to go and it sounds like you are through much of the hard parts. Keep it up, you are getting close!

Hang in there!

Proud to say I've made it 11 months. I'm pretty much back to normal but I still supplement my diet with a small amount of dopa-mucuna (dopamine) to make me feel happy and great all the time as well as L-Tyrosine for focus. I drink coffee as well. I enjoy being able to enjoy things again. It is nice being myself again. I like getting my 8 hours of sleep every night and not feeling like I've been hit by a truck every morning when I roll out of bed, desperately searching for a pill to make the comedown go away. It is nice when I drive to be in the moment and not hyper-focusing on the drive. Same goes for everything else in life, being in the moment and enjoying it without hyper-focusing on something stupid and insignificant. I've also learned that I can get more done with a little planning than I could ever popping a pill. I can work out at the gym just as long and hard at the gym. I also enjoy my evening time. I used to spend it with headaches or in a rage from coming off pills. Now I get to use that time for relaxing when I have time to, like normal people do.

I weaned myself off and I stepped up a couple of times but not anywhere as much as the amount that you did so I can't completely relate to that. I stepped up from 2.5 to 7 once and from 1.25 to 5 another time. As long as you did it only once, it shouldn't set you back too badly. Think of it as your brain being like a sponge. It takes a while for it to dry up of Adderall once you quit. Weaning off makes it dry up quicker once you stop. One day of going up to 50 won't completely saturate the sponge. However, the battle will be mentally from stopping yourself from stepping up again. Use battle tested strategies for combatting general types of cravings to keep yourself from ding it again. Good Luck!

The cravings will probably be intense for you. It is no different than food cravings and other cravings though. You have to wait it out and it will go away. I always would tell myself to wait a certain length of time, maybe 2 hours or so and told myself that if I still wanted it badly at that time that I would take it. The craving would always be long gone by then. Adjust your times according to how long they last for you if you decide to try it. I'm almost at 11 months clean now and I still have 3 full bottles of prescription Adderall in my top drawer that I had leftover because I weaned myself off. I was able to survive cravings with a large supply on hand. I don't get cravings anymore. I plan on flushing them on my 1 year anniversary. Good Luck!

I was able to wean off but it took me years to get up the courage to try. I don't know about your experience weaning off but it was rough for me the first couple of step-downs but it got much easier after that. Alcohol can make it much harder if you partake in that. I quit that before weaning off. Alcohol will make you absolutely nuts if you drink much while taking Adderall anyway, and not just when you are drinking/drunk. Stopping that would probably be a priority if you are. It takes a lot of will power to quit, no matter which route you choose. If you think you can quit cold turkey then try that. I did that several times and was successfully off of it for over a year. It gets better. Don't beat yourself up for failing. It is a powerful addiction. There is no harm in trying weaning more slowly or trying cold turkey several times before being successful. Just be determined to quit and be prepared for a lot of anxiety. Quitting is the best thing I ever did. You do not need the drug to be successful. I wanted to get a new job but I wanted to quit the drug more. I was scared I couldn't do my job (software engineer) without it but if I ever wanted to get off the drug, I had to do it before I got a new job or that would be the end of me. I was determined to quit and show myself I can do it without the drug and so that motivated me to get where I am. 7.5 months later after weaning and I am better than ever. I not only function normally, but I am even better focused and have more energy. I still need L-Tyrosine from time to time. That's really just me still taking the easy way out to be honest. I still take an Alpha Brain on occasion when I want to be super sharp. I can work all day and come home and study/prep new code for job interviews all night until bed time. I can usually fall asleep within a few minutes and wake up fully refreshed, if I watch my caffeine intake. I can also change tasks easily and jump right back in to what I was doing, where I used to just hyperfocus on one thing for way too long on the pill. I have a big final job interview next week for a job that could pay me 2.5 times my current salary. If I would have quit years ago, I could have been in this position much sooner. Instead, that evil pill made me happy with my current crappy job, being very entertained by doing some really boring and dreadful work for less pay than at other places. Who knows what I could have been without it. I refuse to let my past haunt me though. I'm only focused on moving forward, not on what I lost as far as relationships, career, etc.... I'm living my best life from here on out. Hope you can join me. Its a tough journey to start but gets much easier.

I don't think you will be totally starting over. Your brain is like a sponge for the Adderall or whatever your prescription is. It gets very saturated after taking it for a while and slowly dries up over time when you stop. You should not have the same difficulty as you did 4 months ago. I was clean for over a year several years ago. It was a tough, I had been on it for many years and I quit cold turkey. When I got back on it I swore I would do so on my own terms. I tried a half of an old leftover 5mg pill (I never threw them out!) to see how it would affect me and it wasn't bad the first time. I went a week without and then decided I would go lighter and take it a couple of weeks here and there. I went on for 4+ months going on the pill for 2 weeks then off for two weeks. Then I remember I was going 30 days on to 30 days off. Then of course I was on it everyday, full doses for the last 7 years, and I am now at 7 months clean. That is the evil of it. The longer you are off of it, the easier it is to forget what got you in the position in the first place. The trick is to prepare for the cravings. Have an out plan. Tell yourself you will see what you can do without it right now and take it tomorrow if it doesn't work out. Actually, putting it off an hour or two should do the trick. Do whatever you have to do to talk yourself into postponing it. All cravings are the same. They are 100% mental. They come and if you resist they leave you pretty fast and you won't want it anymore, then you can move on about your day. They slow down the longer you are off of it and only come around on special occasions. They come a lot harder too, but they are just as easy to defeat. Don't beat yourself up for screwing up. Use the opportunity to learn from it and move forward. That's the biggest thing. MOVE FORWARD. You said it yourself so it sounds like you know what to do already. Put one foot in front of the other, focus on one day at a time, and keep a big list of what you are so very thankful for in your life. Focus on that and your plan to resist cravings when they come. If you are in a very weak moment, do what you can to put it off until the afternoon, or evening where you will be in a much stronger mental position to resist since the craving will be gone. Good luck!

I am now at 7 months. It has been going well so far. I still have a few blah days here and there but they are offset by some really good days. There are still days where I am not worth a crap but they becoming extremely rare and may just be related to living a normal life. There is something that I just recently discovered has been really eye-opening for me that I would like to share. I wear an apple watch daily and I have since June 2020. I work out regularly and always have. The apple watch tracks your VO2 max over time which is a measure of the maximum amount of oxygen your body can utilize during exercise. I guess it tells you kind of how in shape you are heart and conditioning wise in regards to intense exercise. I got a notification last January on my watch that said my VO2 max was trending much lower. I didn't think much of it because I started weaning off in November and by the time I got the notification I was off for good. I was noticeably weaker from stopping the meds so I went about my business. I didn't know much about VO2 max. Just a few weeks ago, I get the notification that it has been trending higher. I had been feeling better and more energetic during workouts. I have been alternating between the same extreme workout programs for years so I haven't done anything different in that area. I was curious so I opened the app up in my watch and looked at the chart. It was pretty telling. I started weaning off in November. My V02 max stayed around 47 From June 2020 until I started cutting my dose in November. It immediately dropped to 38. It dropped to 37 in December and 36 in January when I quit completely. Keep in mind, the same amount of working out over time. It slowly rose to 43 by May. In June it shot way up to 48 and 50 in July. It is at 53 right now. A 32-36 is an excellent score for my age but what is eye opening is this chart pretty much charted out my physical recovery from my addiction to Adderall. It is really amazing to me to pull the chart up and see that. Hopefully that will bring hope to some of you working on getting over it. You will keep getting better each month. Keep exercising and eating right and it will add up. I can feel a great deal of difference in energy each day. I don't need the coffee I needed before. I don't need pre-workout powders to get me motivated to start and finish my workouts. I feel great when I wake up ( if I get 8 hours). I'm still dealing with a little anxiety but meditation, exercise, sleep and a new app I found out about has been helping me overcome that and channel that anxious energy towards a focused task. Your prefrontal cortex is located in the front of your brain and that is what fires off when you take your Adderall. It is responsible for focusing and feeling good, critical thinking. When you are having trouble focusing you can close your eyes and slowly count backwards from 5. I like to picture things as I count. Like 5 cows, 4 dogs and so forth. Once you get to 1, you will have activated your prefrontal cortex and you can concentrate again on what you were doing. Its a neat trick and it works really well. Another one is the Focus at Will App. You find the tunes they have that work for you and turn them on. After 15-20 minutes of playing in your headphones, you can't really tell it is going any more. It activated your prefrontal cortex and gets you into that hyper-focused state you are used to being in when you were on Adderall. The only difference is you can turn this off and it isn't addictive. There are other tricks I have found but those work best. I'm always looking for other things. So to sum up this post: 1) Hang in there. Your body will recover physically from this addiction and be even better off. 2) Continue to exercise, sleep and eat healthy food. This is so crucial. Treat it like a bank account. Make big deposits daily and live off the interest. 3) Download Focus at Will and try it out. Tesla, Space X, Amazon and Apple buy this for their engineers to help them produce great work.

I weaned off and I feel like my old self after about 7 months. You can try that with your Vyvanse. I think there is an article on ADHDBoss website where the guy tells you how to dissolve your pill in water to create Vyvanse water. It has directions on how to measure it and lower the dosage to step down off of it. My advice? Vyvanse is difficult to wean off of or stop taking for me. It made me crazy in general and gave me many side effects. Adderall is much easier to wean off of because it isn't time released and your blood stream isn't used to a constant flow of the drug. It gets your body more prepared for the comedown after quitting because you experience it so often when each pill wears off. It is also easer to cut and measure. I switched to Adderall because I knew it would be easier to stop than time released versions. I'd recommend going that route and weaning. Look, the bottom line is that you can't take this forever or you will have a stroke or heart attack. It really wears down you nervous system and heart. The day is coming when you can't take it anymore. You can look at it as I'm going to do it while I'm in control of the timing and environment or you can wait until nature makes you do it by crippling you or putting you six feet under. That helped me mentally fight the battle when I chose to cut it off. I've never felt better. I just hope I can fight the damage it has done to me for 20+ years and live a long life going forward. Good luck on your journey, in whatever you decide to do.

You can do it. I have been there also. Just as you have disciplined yourself to quit adderall you can get out of debt. I was pretty deep. Almost 35k in credit card debt as well as other debts. I started in late 2018 and quickly paid it all off by 2021. The trick is to change the behavior and then divide and conquer. I paid the minimum on my higher balances and paid as much as I could on the lowest one until it was paid off. Dave Ramsey calls it the debt snowball. He says to save up $1000 as an emergency fund before you start so you won’t have to use the cards again while paying off. I saved up 5k just in case. Ive got 4 vehicles now with no car payments no credit card debt and I’ve been paying around 500-1000 extra principle on my mortgage each month to pay off my home early. I’ve saved up plenty of cash to help if something bad happened. I did this with the same income I had when I got into debt. If you can battle the behavior and discipline yourself with patience you can do it. And once you pay that first card off you will be off to the races with confidence. Good luck. It was the best thing I’ve ever done.