Jump to content
QuittingAdderall.com Forums

Freedom's Wings

Members
 View Profile  See their activity

  • Posts

    424

  • Joined

  • Last visited

  • Days Won

    5

 Content Type 

Posts posted by Freedom's Wings

    • Popular Post
    • Popular Post

    " THE 30 DAY CHALLENGE RELOADED" WELCOME ALL!!

    in Tell your story

    Posted

    Q1,

    Rehab was different than I expected, I wasnt able to stay the whole 28 days but I still learned a lot about addiction. The challenge now is applying what I learned to real world situations. Wish me luck, my friend. I have been in limbo lately,still trying to figure this whole thing out.

    Thx for checking on me!

    Day 17: Clean!

    • Like 6

  9. I want my life back.

    in Tell your story

    Posted

    This is Day 1 for me. My story is similar to many of the others I've read on here in that I'm not sure how this happened or how I let my adderall abuse get to this point. I've always been a sociable, outgoing, and lively person. Always the fun, down to earth one that people genuinely enjoyed being around. A good student - excellent even. Graduated from college with honors and everything. The strangest thing to me about all of this is I had taken adderall occasionally in college for stuff like all-nighters and never got addicted or had the urge to take it unless I really needed it. I took it maybe 3 - 4 times throughout an entire semester and only a small dose when I did - 20mg tops, XR or IR. I would get them from friends and if a friend gave me 2 or 3 and I only needed one, the others would sit in my room for months on end and I wouldn't even think about them. Sometimes I forgot they were even there. 

     

    I didn't use adderall at all for about a year and a half after graduation - I didn't really have access to it anymore and never was addicted in college so it didn't bother me not to have it. I wasn't about to go searching for it. At work I had to do projects that took hours on end - in addition to cold-calling - I had a lot of responsibility, long hours, etc. so it was very high-stress. I felt like I didn't have enough hours in the day. One day last February I was with a friend who was prescribed adderall and asked her for one to finish my latest project. She gave me a 20XR and the next day was one of the most productive and profitable days since I had started at the company - no surprise there.

     

    I started to get them from my friend regularly because she didn't take them everyday either. I would only take it once a week at first, then twice a week, then even more frequently than that until I decided to get my own script so I would have more available to me, "just in case". 10mg IR twice a day. I thought to myself such a tiny dosage - where's the shame in that? But I was embarrassed to fill it every month - I knew I didn't really need it when there are people out there who really do and also felt guilty and weak for using it as crutch when I've gotten by just fine all these years. So I would fill it every 2 to 3 months and continue to get more from friends - I had expanded my network at this point to make sure I had a few different friends I could get them from. I think in a twisted kind of way the fact that I wasn't filling my own script every month made me believe I wasn't truly addicted. I don't know when the "light switch" was flipped (in my mind I always try to pinpoint when exactly the addiction started), but I found myself starting to think about it consciously and A LOT on days I wouldn't take it. In retrospect I think that came before the physical dependency in terms of fatigue, depression, etc. I would get to work and perform just fine, but all I would think about was the fact that I didn't take one, that maybe I should have, and that if I did a good job I would reward myself by taking one tomorrow.

     

    Long story short, my life started to revolve around the adderall. It made me feel happy and productive, and due to my over-achiever/workaholic nature I found myself perfectly content with popping an adderall (or 2 at this point) and spending an entire weekend working on stuff for work or random projects, even if it meant canceling on friends and not doing things I used to love, like exercising, shopping, or listening to music. 

     

    My abuse just continued to get worse and worse until I found myself here, at this point. I've lost 20 pounds since I first started using when I was thin to begin with and have no desire to do anything I used to enjoy. The past couple months I noticed it's been worse than ever - I feel extremely depressed and disconnected from my friends and family, cry for no reason, etc. I used to be able to fake it and fool everyone by putting on a happy face and blaming the bags under my eyes and the sunken cheeks on stress from my long hours at work and the demanding nature of my job, but lately I can't or don't even care to. A couple weeks ago my favorite song came on the radio and it didn't stir a single feeling in me, not even a little bit, and when I realized that it struck something in me and I began to cry and cry. I'm so numb and emotionless that I find myself questioning my role in this world and the purpose of working, choosing the career that I did, etc. I'm not questioning whether or not I should be here on this earth, but rather why I'm here and what I'm meant to accomplish. My thoughts are not suicidal in any way, shape, or form - but whereas in the past I would move through life with force and direction and passion, I feel like now I'm just going through the motions with no real meaning behind anything I do.

     

    I tried to quit two times in the past - the first was in December. I realized I wanted to FEEL. I wanted to experience life without adderall numbing it away. I lasted 10 days. The second time was about a month ago, when I lasted another 11 days.

     

    Yesterday I took 80mg. Three days ago I took 60mg and didn't feel anything, so the next day I took 70mg and felt a TINY jolt of a high that I hadn't experienced in months. That's why I took 80mg yesterday, but instead of making me feel that jolt again it just made me feel like an overly-focused zombie who hadn't slept in days. Last night I looked over at my boyfriend of 5 years who I love more than anything and who had fallen asleep on the couch waiting for me to come watch our favorite tv show, which yet again hadn't happened because I had lost track of time and didn't really want to "waste" my adderall on doing something "unproductive". This description doesn't even scratch the surface of the physical and emotional toll this drug has taken on me, but I think many of you know what I'm experiencing and how much of my life it has consumed.

     

    I woke up this morning feeling awful, which I deserve, and of course the only thing I want to do right now is pop an adderall to get through the day. The last two times I quit I found I was able to fight through the physical part, but once that passed and I felt stronger and healthier due to more sleep and better nutrition the mental addiction kicked in and I would think about how much BETTER I would feel with some adderall in my system. It would probably give me the same high I used to get when I first started taking it AND I wouldn't get addicted because I was able to stop for 11 whole days, right? Wrong.

     

    Anyway, sorry for the long post, but I've never talked about it before and I guess I had a lot to get off my chest. I stumbled across this website around 4am when I was up and couldn't sleep last night due to the horrible comedown. It seemed like a really supportive, nonjudgmental forum, so after reading through post after post I decided today would be the day I quit. Thank you all for that. I'm determined to find the "old me" that I hope and pray is still somewhere inside me, buried underneath the dopamine deficiency, malnutrition, depression, and anxiety. I want my life back.

    Sorry to hear you're in such a low place. I, We, totally "get it." You are at home here. If you are interested there is a 30 day challenge thread that might be of some assistance getting through this first 30 days, then 60. Be Well!!

     

    FW

    • Like 3

  11. " THE 30 DAY CHALLENGE RELOADED" WELCOME ALL!!

    in Tell your story

    Posted

    Topic: BACK SO SOON??

     

    As the creator of this challenge, I would like to say it has served me well. It is a very helpful strategy that works. With that said, I am a bit embarrassed to admit this but I feel that It must be done. Since accepting my own challenge, I have fallen off of the wagon several times. Thus, this time around I have decided to go to inpatient rehab. Although, I haven't had any adderall within the last few weeks until today anyway, which I have not abused, as of April 17, 2014, I will be entering a 5 day detox followed by a 21 day inpatient rehab stay. After that I will be taking " The 30 Day Challenge!" on here once again.

     

    One of my main issues is that I was diagnosed by 3 doctors on 3 separate occasions with narcolepsy and without some kind of stimulant most times life feels just dreadful. I am exhausted all of the time, except at night for some odd reason. But even then I rarely have any motivation to do something constructive or remotely productive. Honestly, I didn't even receive this diagnoses until after my long stint on addy, so it begs me to wonder if a false positive for the illness is possible. I don't have sleeping spells, but I do have what I call the dazefaze ie. I fall into a state where I feel not tired but as if my actual brain is extremely exhausted and I must go to sleep immediately. And, I've also experienced the sleep paralysis associated with narcolepsy. In fact, the longest I've actually stayed off of addy was a few months and this "dazefaze" never got any better. Still, I wish to live a stimulant free lifestyle. So, yet again, I'm willing to endure the hell that is the withdrawal of addy, which shouldn't be bad since I haven't really taken much, but  just to see if there truly is life after adderall. I would like to give myself at least 6 months to be free of addy, then take the sleep test again, and see if this issue improves at all. 

     

    Oh boy! Anxiety and depression is a whole other animal but since I've been free from adderall these issues have calmed considerably and I believe it will continue to quell the more I am able to make better lifestyle decisions eg. taking yoga, meditating. So I wont touch on that much in this post. besides asking if anyone on here has some good tips, besides meds, for quieting depression and especially anxiety?? Please help!  :ph34r:  :P

     

    Well, I just wanted to give an update on my progress since having undertaken the challenges. Wish me luck and may you all be well on your journey back to a healthy, happy lifestyle. 

     

    P.S. Look for me to retake "The 30 Day Challenge!" after my rehab stay, most likely the end of May or the beginning of June. Thank you to everyone who has supported me and that continues to support me on this journey. I can only hope  that I may serve someone else as an inspiration as well. Til Next time, Be Well! :D

     

    -FW

    • Like 2

  12. " THE 30 DAY CHALLENGE RELOADED" WELCOME ALL!!

    in Tell your story

    Posted

    I would just like to take a moment to congratulate everyone who has accepted "The 30 Challenge!" This is no easy feat. Sometimes just getting away from the drug for that first 30 days though is exactly what is needed to help push you through toward the ultimate goal line of living a healthy, happy, productive, and active lifestyle OFF of this wretched drug, or Baderall, as I read it called in another post. So, I just wanted to shoot some encouragement your way and say YOU CAN do it! Keep it simple and keep up the good work! 

     

    -FW

    • Like 3
×
×
  • Create New...