LILTEX41

Awe, thank you so much!!

Hello Quitting Adderall Beauties! Good morning and hope you are off to a great day! I am sitting on my couch, drinking coffee, snuggled up with my ragdoll cat Barbie, the sun is shining, and I have a couple candles lit. I have GOOD NEWS for you today! So first off, for anyone who doesn't know me, I am one of the oldest members of this site. I was the first commenter on Mike's article titled, "Your Challenge." My real name is Erin. Anyhow, I have been away for the past 2.5 years and it pains me that I lost my way and fell back down the rabbit hole. HOWEVER, I'm back!!! And I am more determined than ever to stay on track and pick up my recovery where I left off. With all that being said, it's been 9 years (November 12th, 2010) since I quit my ADDERALL PRESCRIPTION and told my doctor I was addicted to them and to never give them to me again. THIS WAS A SMART IDEA. I haven't had a prescription for 9 years now (THANK GOD) and I have barely had any adderall since then. During my last relapse, I did manage to find a couple people that had a script and sold me a minimal amount. However, because this was so short lived and I didn't get caught up in the cycle again, it wasn't a big deal to break. I actually discovered a new drug when I got sober 5 months ago called, "Kratom." And that ended up being just as detrimental as adderall, but I was lucky enough to quit cold turkey 26 days ago (suffer through 3 weeks of intense withdrawals) and I am finally back and feeling better than ever! I was scared about the kratom war at first because I had no idea what it would feel like to be off of it after I had been on for 4 months straight (like drinking it 4-6x a day). Anyhow, I am finally over the hump of withdrawals and completely CLEAN AND SOBER. The #1 thing that is keeping me GOING STRONG right now is I think back to 9 years ago HOW MUCH I STRUGGLED WITH QUITTING ADDERALL and I remember around year 3 how I had forgotten about it. It wasn't an issue anymore because my brain had healed. I had retrained myself to function without it and I was no longer feeling like a slave to it. I was FREE!!! So I know right now the best thing I can do with my kratom addiction and the tumultuous feelings that go hand in hand with quitting is to give it time and eventually I won't even remember the euphoria and what it felt like to be hooked on it. What's crazy to me right now is that I get on here and I'm reading all of your posts about trying to quit adderall and yes even though I did take a few here and there while drinking I never got trapped back in that cycle completely. My brain has been rewired to function without it and I am free today. I no longer feel like I did back when I first quit dreaming and dying inside wishing I had adderall. For me the thing that helps me the most is cardio exercise. I am a long distance runner and triathlete. I definitely have ADD though! My thoughts race about a good 90-100 mph at any given moment so the intense cardio regimen helps burn all that energy out in a positive way. I think it's the ADD that has caused my addictions to anything and everything. I get hyper focused on stuff I enjoy and will burn it to the ground and then I'm off to the next endeavor. Put any type of alcohol or drug in front of me and that's what ends up happening with all that. This struggle of knowing how to fix myself took years and years, but I know my only cure is total abstinence from all alcohol/drugs. 2.5 years ago I was just down in the dumps about my life and decided I missed partying and thought it would be fun to resume drinking. THAT WAS A HUGE MISTAKE. Take it from me and keep trucking on in your recovery. So anyhow, here I am again and my message today is to give you HOPE! This addiction you have to adderall will END when you stop ingesting it and retrain your brain to function without it. The hard part is the time in between getting to that point, but whatever you do, don't ever give up trying to quit!!! Whenever you feel like you want to use, TELL SOMEONE ABOUT IT. You will cut your problem in half the moment you tell someone else (but tell someone in recovery!). This is what I didn't do when I relapsed. I went to Denver all by myself to see if I wanted to move there (there was this cool sober group called The Phoenix) and I got discouraged, but kept all my thoughts bottled up. Of course the addictive voice grew and grew and on my last day leaving Denver I said, "F-IT" and ordered a beer at the airport bar. From that point up until 5.5 months ago when I did a 360 on the highway, slammed into a highway wall, and got hit by a semi-truck my addictions were back and I was spiraling out of control!! I should be dead right now, but here I am and I am so grateful I have a second chance at life. These past 5.5 months have been ROUGH. But I am finally completely sober again and feeling like my old self. I read something really awesome this morning (see below) from another site I'm on and wanted to share with you all. AF = alcohol free, but we can just change that to adderall free. Have a blessed day and no matter where you're at in your quit, keep moving forward. It will get better!! It only gets worse if you go backwards. I see a lot of people here who talk about another Day 1 or the shame and disappointment in that fact that they drank (OR TOOK ADDERALL) last night or over the weekend. That was me! I was there many times and felt many of those same feelings. If you are coming here and you are posting on this site and reading the book and listening to AF podcasts, all of those things are strengthening your AF muscles and you are going to get there. We did not learn how to ride a bike or learn to play an instrument in a day. We fell off our bike and got frustrated with ourselves for messing up again but we kept at it. None of us are experts in quitting drinking so we have to practice and stay positive and most importantly forgive ourselves. The path to freedom from alcohol has many pitfalls and booby traps along the way, this time of year especially. If we stumble off the path when we encounter one of these things along the way, that is OK. The most important thing that we can do is forgive ourselves and get right back on the path.

Addforone, Have you heard of Smart Recovery? It's an alternative to AA. Might be a thought. If something isn't working for you, then keep searching until you find your answers and don't lose hope. There are many roads to recovery. You just have to find what works for you. I'd be happy to share my experience with Smart. I feel like I shouldn't be posting because I did relapse, but I have been in and out of AA since I was 14. Smart has been the program that kept me going strong starting back in 2010. I was clean for over 6 years with Smart. Message me if you want to chat. You got this!

Hi Sleepy. Sending you LOTS of good vibes. (((hugs)))) As much as I hated I coming back here to admit I relapsed, I am just so happy to have so many of you still around. What I love about Smart Recovery is that they never say you are back to day 1. I have decided I am simply starting back to where I left off from a lifetime of on/off sobriety. I counted all mine up from the time I was 18 because it seemed kind of silly starting from 14 and came up with 7 years and 5 months. This was pretty helpful because it made me realize I spent about 14.5 years drinking/using. That was a comforting thought because it made me realize that my brain is 2x as wired for drugs/alcohol as it is for sobriety if that makes sense. I think until I have spent more of my adult life sober than using, then maybe it won't be such a struggle. Anyhow, hope you get grounded back in your recovery again quickly. Feel free to message me if you need to chat! Glad you came back to the site.

Hi Quit Once, It started out on just alcohol of course. And then pretty much whatever popped up. In the end I found someone who sold me adds so yeah, I did end taking them here and there, but I was too scared to ever try to ask for a prescription since I'd admitted everything to my doctor in the past. Yes, I still love Smart. I am an advocate of Smart, This Naked Mind, and go to AA meetings here and there more or less for social support. I have 5 months today. Good to see you still on here!

Hey all. It's been a long time and I've missed you all! I'm almost 5 months totally clean and sober again here in a week. My relapse happened about 2.5 years ago and it has been quite a journey back to where I am now, but I am so grateful to be alive today and more determined than ever to stay on the right path. If you are contemplating adderall is a good idea, believe me it's not. Get clean, stay clean, and live a happy joyous free life again. It's worth it no matter how long it takes you to get there. Just don't give up and remember this path is so much easier than the alternative if you were or are an addict like me. Much love, LT

OMG, that is so awesome!!! I can't believe you live in the middle east!! Good on ya! Getting ready to post..makes me so happy to see you "old timers" still here and back again!

OMG, I can't believe you're back!!! I think I might've messaged you a few times? Just to let you know, I am back too!! So my story is a little different, but I will explain it all soon. Soooooo good to have you back and soooo glad you're okay!!! You can do this!!

33!

That's awesome!! So happy for you! Hopefully, that will make things a lot easier than previously.

How's it going Dopeymean??

That's exciting it's not wicked expensive! I thought for sure it would be. Well, I will definitely recommend it to anyone I know of looking for another alternative and possibly myself if ever needed. Thank you so much for sharing this with us. It's so great to have yet another option as you said!

That really is absolutely incredible and awesome. Is the medication expensive? I’m already 23 days sober though so probably wouldn’t get it now. But if I drink again would definitely consider it.

So when you go out now to socialize with other friends who are drinking do you still have a drink or two? And if you decide to not drink at all do you feel comfortable going out and being the only one not drinking because you no longer want it?

Nicole, Thank you so much for all the great info! So I was wondering though..you mentioned the goal of the Sinclair Method as being abstinence, but how does that work if the reason you wanted to drink again was for social reasons? Is abstinence your ultimate goal and if so do you feel comfortable going out now because you no longer want it? Or are you just going to carry on taking the pills for as long as needed?

Awesome! So glad you're back and doing amazing.

That sounds amazing but so scary at the same time. When you drank before did it make you want Adderall? So the pill just kills off the high? Would it be comparable to having a non-alcoholic beer? How long has the medication been around and does it cause any side effects?

I think your post is going to help inspire so many people! And I love love love that you persevered through the hard times and look at you now! Even though I might've drifted backwards in my recovery in the past year or so it is still heart warming to see people recover on this site and know that everyone here had an integral part of your success. I think of where I should and could be now had I not have slid backwards, but what I always tell myself no matter what happens and my advice to anyone with addiction is just never ever give up. Fall off, get right back on track. And even though it's a hit to the ego to come back and admit it to everyone, at least you're back on the right path and will have a bright future again. I think what happened to me is I got caught up with too many drinking friends and got disconnected from my support groups. Peer influence is so critical. Your post has and is going to generate so much positivity on this site so I hope we can reignite it once again and get more traffic. We all have something to offer one another here and it is only by sharing our experience can we be helpful to someone else. Success stories like yours are the glue that keeps people coming back and offering them hope. I hope that by my experience, others that have taken two steps back will come forward with me and get back on track. It's never too late to pick up where you left off and live in a way that makes you proud of yourself and happy. Thank you for sharing all of your successes with us and I hope you continue to do so in the future. You're an inspiration! <3 LT

That is amazing!!! I remember when you first came around. Can't believe 2 years have gone by already! Way to go!!! What kind of job did you get by the way? That's a pretty remarkable salary for just getting done with college? Congratulations!

13!

Hi Nater, I cannot emphasize enough that all you need to do is keep moving forward. That's it. Stay clean and NEVER EVER even for one second contemplate that your life would be better on that crap. It takes a long time to get over this mind fk of a drug, but I am telling you if you stay the course and start getting used to your life without it, one day you will look back and forget what it was like. One day after years of being clean you will no longer think about it anymore. It'll be easy and you won't be comparing all the mundane chores and work of life to what it used to be like on adderall. It WILL GET BETTER. I have not had a prescription since November of 2010. I am almost at 8 years. I was 100% clean from this and another substance (same crap, but worse) for almost 5 years (everything including alcohol) and then I relapsed on alcohol 5 years in and started popping a pill once in a blue moon if I came across one while drinking. I then went totally sober for 18 months. Relapsed on alcohol again last year and drank 11 months straight. Was sober again 4 months and then relapsed for a month. I only popped a few pills during here and there during this relapse, but it was enough to scare me badly. I am on day 12 today of total sobriety again and extremely grateful. I cannot explain how quickly things got out of hand when I relapsed nor how badly my old neural pathways lit up for stimulants again and took over my rational state of mind. I had a recent run in with this junk again and it has scared the shit out of me. I forgot just how incredibly powerful these drugs are and what they did to me for so long. They make life so easy and then absolutely awful when they wear off. And then you are HOOKED all over again and a total freaking slave to this shit. I am here to tell you, I've been where you are and PLEASE WHATEVER YOU DO, STAY CLEAN. IT WILL KEEP GETTING EASIER. Yes, you are going to still be in a slump 1-2 years after you quit because the memory of what life was like with it is still so fresh. But I can promise you, as the years go by you will one day forget and you will learn how to function without it. NOTHING is as painful as being hooked on this crap and dealing with all the side effects and consequences of using it. Eat healthy, exercise, stay clean and keep doing positive things for yourself. Take baby steps towards productivity. And be grateful for each and every day you are clean. As far as the "will I be happy when" question you posted above...a friend of mine sent this really cool post from Richard Branson the other day and I have to share it. This one really got me thinking and has been helping me since i read it. Here you go... Dear Stranger, You don’t know me but I hear you are going through a tough time, and I would like to help you. I want to be open and honest with you, and let you know that happiness isn’t something just afforded to a special few. It can be yours, if you take the time to let it grow. It’s OK to be stressed, scared and sad, I certainly have been throughout my life. I’ve confronted my biggest fears time and time again. I’ve cheated death on many adventures, seen loved ones pass away, failed in business, minced my words in front of tough audiences, and had my heart broken. I know I’m fortunate to live an extraordinary life, and that most people would assume my business success, and the wealth that comes with it, have brought me happiness. But they haven’t; in fact it’s the reverse. I am successful, wealthy and connected because I am happy. So many people get caught up in doing what they think will make them happy but, in my opinion, this is where they fail. Happiness is not about doing, it’s about being. In order to be happy, you need to think consciously about it. Don’t forget the to-do list, but remember to write a to-be list too. Kids are often asked: ‘What do you want to be when you grow up?’ The world expects grandiose aspirations: ‘I want to be a writer, a doctor, the prime minister.’ They’re told: go to school, go to college, get a job, get married, and then you’ll be happy. But that’s all about doing, not being – and while doing will bring you moments of joy, it won’t necessarily reward you with lasting happiness. Stop and breathe. Be healthy. Be around your friends and family. Be there for someone, and let someone be there for you. Be bold. Just be for a minute. If you allow yourself to be in the moment, and appreciate the moment, happiness will follow. I speak from experience. We’ve built a business empire, joined conversations about the future of our planet, attended many memorable parties and met many unforgettable people. And while these things have brought me great joy, it’s the moments that I stopped just to be, rather than do, that have given me true happiness. Why? Because allowing yourself just to be, puts things into perspective. Try it. Be still. Be present. For me, it’s watching the flamingos fly across Necker Island at dusk. It’s holding my new grandchildren’s tiny hands. It’s looking up at the stars and dreaming of seeing them up close one day. It’s listening to my family’s dinner-time debates. It’s the smile on a stranger’s face, the smell of rain, the ripple of a wave, the wind across the sand. It’s the first snow fall of winter, and the last storm of summer. There’s a reason we’re called human beings and not human doings. As human beings we have the ability to think, move and communicate in a heightened way. We can cooperate, understand, reconcile and love, that’s what sets us apart from most other species. Don’t waste your human talents by stressing about nominal things, or that which you cannot change. If you take the time simply to be and appreciate the fruits of life, your stresses will begin to dissolve, and you will be happier. But don’t just seek happiness when you’re down. Happiness shouldn’t be a goal, it should be a habit. Take the focus off doing, and start being every day. Be loving, be grateful, be helpful, and be a spectator to your own thoughts. Allow yourself to be in the moment, and appreciate the moment. Take the focus off everything you think you need to do, and start being I promise you, happiness will follow. Happy regards, Richard Branson

Motivated

No freaking way!!! That is crazy!!! Are you getting a bike???? Congrats btw!!!

Passed..... Motorcycle test today...just learned how to ride one in the past 48 hours. OMG. Excited to get a bike! 4 months today too since quitting EVERYTHING.

Congratulations!! That has to feel great!!