Greg

These last couple weeks have been so interesting for me. I am observing myself at work trying to see what I'm good at..what the real me is good at. How the real me performa at work, If only anyone at work knew how big of a step or momentous this was for me, but they have no clue about my past I am definitely seeing work through an entirely different lens without adderall. I'm still trying to get my thoughts together about how I've changed. ive been getting lots of great feedback which is very encouraging. o havent been late yet either. Reading your posts has been really helpful. For one thing, I can say I can get 100x as much done because I'm not running out for a smoke breaks every hour for 20 minutes of each hour. Adderall caused a lot of smoke breaks and a lot of wasted time. Not going into psychosis at work is another plus, lol.

I think Cassie wins for funniest Adderall dream, which she shared a couple posts back...something about Adderall on her salad, lol.

Yes. I've found them everywhere too in the months following. Under the bed. Random places. My reaction is the same as if I saw an insect in the house. I get a tissue grab at it and flush it down the toilet.

I am finally doing the whole 9-5 thing without adderall. I feel just like a totally different person. Im still trying to figure it all out, as ive never worked without adderall before now... I was curious how you all think you've changed at work without the adderall?

Id just get back on the horse right away. it seems like you still have a stash of concerta. Get rid of it and focus on your recovery. I had serious addiction problems with concerta before adderall.actually, i felt concerta was a little bit more addictive. anyway, just get back on the horse.

Yes, that is a very tough situation and I've had to deal with that. When you run into someone, you dont say..'welll my life fell apart to adderall and now im recovering' '.. When I run into people, my heart stops. I usually am really vague and just don't offer much info about what ive been up to, am so blatantly vague and then they usually don't really press me for information or anything, lol. On job applications and stuff like that I explained my period of not working as a family health issue that has since passed. Lol. This is a tough one. It would be great to hear everyone's feedback on this, and hear how they've dealt.

I don't know if alcohol triggered your psychosis. For sure you were still suffering psychosis from when you first broke down. When I first broke down, the same thing happened to me. I said all these lies about myself and I believed they were true. And I sort of blacked out about all of it. But partially because I really didn't want to remember what had happened. I had to let everyone around me absorb what happened. Before that friends and family didn't know about my addiction. After my public psychosis breakdown, they all Knew something was wrong with me, they mostly thought i was mentally ill. they , nor I, knew anything about adderall induced paychosis at the time.it wasn't u til I read books like the amphetamine debate and on speed that I began learning about psychosis. by the way, I don't know if you are dealing with friends or family or whatnot. You can try to explain it, and i also think you have to let them absorb what has happened to you. They will be so happy and relieved to know you are getting help.

Quit once, WHY are you getting stoned all the time??????? You don't need that stuff...doing that is not good for your health. If u google memory loss and smoking pot, you will find tons of articles. Here is one from science daily. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/03/120301143424.htm

Thanks, that was helpful. You know..I just can't imagine how I would have faced that application with adderall! Probably would still be working on it instead of getting it done in a couple hours. And gosh what you said about not asking for help was really nice. I've been helped so much by you guys but you're right I don't usually start off a post asking a question, which I'm going to do more often now that I think about it. Thanks everyone for your feedback on this issue. I guess the general sentiment here is coffee and adderall are simply incomparable.

Quit once, it's happened to me many times and is indeed frustrating. This last time it happened to me I just didn't have the energy to rewrite it. But on several occasions I've just restyled as much as I could remember from the deleted post.

If you continued abusing it and going into psychosis there's a good chance you'd begin to hear voices. Thats a commonly reported symptom of amphetamine induced paychosis.There was a period when I was hearing voices in a prolonged state of psychosis that lasted like 1 or 2 years (I know) ) then there was a period of time where I was in psychosis but not hearing voices. Anyway, the intricacies of psychosis is really a minute point. bottom line is psychosis is when your functioning as a person nosedives. And obviously there will be slight differences in how it impacts the person. Maybe you take on different personalities, maybe another person hears voices. But there are common symptoms shared by everyone in adderall induced psychosis. And you will see on this site there have been many many stories of adderall addicts who have gone into psychosis. And I have read them and taken comfort that I wasn't alone. I don't think adderall induced psychosis causes permanent psychosis. But I've heard of it lasting long after the person stops taking adderall. For me, the psychosis pretty much stopped during the first month after quitting. During the first month I felt myself becoming more and more levelheaded and was finally able to begin trusting the words coming out of my mouth. One of the biggest benefits of the first month off adderall was beginning to feel like a sane and normal person again. For anyone wondering what comes before adderall psychosis? I'd say an increasing level of paranoia. By the way, you mentioned you started taking adderall in investment banking.my first job out of college was as an analyst in investment banking. With those crazy hours, that was the job that pushed me from abuser to full blown addict. ( But i dont blame the job wholly, if it wasnt investment banking it would have been something else) If you were able to handle that industry for years fine without adderall. That is quite an accomplishment. You just don't need it and never did. Stay strong.

There are two movies in theater I saw dealing with addiction and alcoholism. I think any of you all will like both of them because you'll be able to relate with the characters. The first one is FLIGHT with Denzel Washington and e other is an indie movie called SMASHED. When I went to the theater to see flight, the row sitting in front of me was a group of NA people who took a trip to see it. They were being so obnoxious during the film, clapping and hooting and hollering when he was going to AA meetings,etc etc. it's like. they wanted everyone on the theater to know they were recovering addicts and damn proud of it.. Anyway, go see those movies, they are movies for addicts about addicts and really good. here are the trailers. They didn't really market the movie Flight like movie about addiction. But trust me, the whole movie is about addiction. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uv48b4cpLCA

I have photos of myself totally tweaked out on adderall. Photos and videos because I was in a YouTube video blogging type phase during the last 6 months before I quit. I have looked back at these pictures a few times and i just...can't believe what I'm seeing. My addiction is so apparent in my tweaked out face..I also have photos of myself of when the adderall is wearing off and I'm starting to feel withdrawal. The agony and discomfort I'm feeling from the adderall wearing off is so apparent looking at these pictures. In these photos I see I am crinkling my forehead in discomfort, trying to prolong the Time inbetween adderall dosages. So my medication can last as long as possible. I look as bad on the outside as I feel on the inside. Walking around like that...it must have been so noticeable to people around me...that is something I didn't realize. I thought my addiction was my little secret. But I was wearing my secret on my face all in plain sight.

I dont know if you ever saw this..but on that show desperate housewives, one of them gets addicted ADHD medication http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vLXDZ15uNt8 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dYhmiAnr6f8

lol, just one of the best moments in television... who will ever forget the danger of caffeine pills? This is totally off topic, but someday i have to read this..

thanks all...it is true. you dont usually hear about people's lives falling apart because of coffee, lol. caffeine pills maybe, but not coffee. I suppose Starbucks would go bankrupt if that was the case.

I just wanted to add, that from what I read and what ive experienced first hand, adderall-induced psychosis is hardly distinguishable from paranoid schizophrenia. Except maybe, someone in adderall induced psychosis tend to be more vocal about what's going on in their head. Also, after you experience psychosis for the first time, it becomes easier and easier to go into amphetamine-induced psychosis. I never mentioned this on the site before. But in my final month on adderall, pretty much every time i took a single adderall pill i would go into a state of psychosis. Prior to that i had to take more than a single adderall pill to go into psychosis. Usually I would be fine in tbe beginning of the day and by the end of the day i was in some state of psychosis, tough times. (So for those of you who are only in the stage of the addiction where it makes you anxious and paranoid...this psychosis state is where that road will eventually lead you to)

Thanks all, and i really cant believe its been two years!!!

I think adderall addiction causes depression. So it makes sense to take an antidepressant when you quit. I am also back on antidepressants. effexor specifically. I agree with Ashley. But some people here believe - and i totally understand what they are saying - its better to just be clean from all pills.

I guess I felt guilty because drinking coffee to get something done, reminded me of the way i thought when i was popping pills. Pop a pill, get something done. pop a pill, get more stuff done. today it was drink coffee, get things done. was too eerily similar if you know what i mean.

You went into psychosis. or amphetamine-induced psychosis. Too much dopamine swimming around in your brain for too long. Same thing happened to me. The first time I went into psychosis I said a lot of crazy stuff to my coworkers and boss and was fired and he told me i needed to get help. Of course I ended up hospitalized. It took me several more years of trying to control my adderall and relapsing before i finally gave it up for good two years ago. I couldn't abandon that invincible feeling of being able to do and achieve anything BLAH BLAH.I knew i was going into psychosis, but I couldn't stop it still. I lived in and out of psychosis for years before enough was enough.. congratulations on taking the first steps and you have tons to learn in your recovery and congratulations on reaching out for support.

Goldman, I did not feel like working out when I quit. You're going through the rite of passage to adderall sobriety. All of us know how awful it is. But it's the only way out of the addiction. Adderall withdrawal is so awful in such a unique way, only adderall addicts could understand it.

Gettolt, thanks for those words of wisdom. I never experienced the work life without adderall. So I am observing myself and learning about myself, trying to see what I'm good at what im like ec etc. today my boss and coworkers mentioned I was good on the phone, and so I made a mental note to myself to put that possibly in my strengths box. I feel like a newborn.

I actually wrote a whole post on how adderall makes a person worse at work (even when we think it makes us better) and I deleted it by accident. So maybe Ill rewrite a later time! Pushing myself to do things i dont want to do is my biggest challenge right now. My motivation muscle needs to be repaired. And suddenly I have things going on in life again. Today I had fill out a six page application for something really important.I had to address all my employment gaps caused by my adderall addiction. Facing all this and sorting it out on paper was super stressful and I found myself chugging coffee in a similar manner to popping adderall. I felt like i NEEDED coffee to start this task. Then halfway through I took a break and was like 'ok, im going to grab another coffee and then push through the rest of this thing" So that's what I did. Should i feel guilty about doing that? That is what I did with adderall. Any thoughts? By the way, I finally got everything done and am relieved now. Every time i get through things that seem hard without adderall, it makes me stronger.

I missed all you guys a lot!!