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To me, being on the meds makes me feel… weird? Slightly hollowed out? I can’t find the best words for it, but the whole chorus of sensory input and thoughts and impulses that I’m used to off-meds somewhat quiets down and my head feels a lot emptier.
On the other hand, it has the significant advantage that there is more space for the things I do want to focus on, and I’ve figured out I can sort of fill the void with music. It creates a padding, further suppresses distractions, and I can filter it out quite well if I need to focus more intensely. It slightly depends on how well I know the music, but that’s not a hard-and-fast rule either.
So I admit it’s useful for being productive during the day and by extension good for my self-esteem and mental health if I know I can get stuff done, but I also enjoy when it wears off in the evenings and I sink back into the familiar bustle.
The side effects like heart rate, blood pressure, occasional feeling of anxiety and nervosity out of nowhere and increased sweating suck though. I could really do without them.
When starting these meds, Euphoria is a common side effect.
It can still make a huge difference in your life, but the euphoria isn’t permanent.
I felt like the euphoria was from being able to focus and retain details about uninterrsting things for more tha a few minutes, and after a few weeks the novelty wore off.
That’s why it’s not prescribed willy nilly. If you can improve sustainably with coping mechanism, that’s always healthier in the long term. It’s always preferable to depend as least as possible on the meds.
There’s also usually a ramp up period with a lot of medication. It takes time before it really starts working so there’s a very real chance this is more of a placebo effect
I think it depends on the meds there to some extent. Anecdotal, and certainly not immune to my own placebo effects, but Adderall always feels pretty good at giving me laser eyes – even when being a bit on/off with it.
I have tried 4 or 5 meds for ADHD and nothing seems to work, or help at all :(
I’ve just been raw dogging it for my whole life
Let’s see if Vyvanse is the magic bullet.
Well there’s your problem. You only need 1 medicine. If you eat more than they fight each other in your system and don’t work because they die in battle. 4 or 5 is like a world War.
They likely tried them one after the other… Makes more sense before you assume they just down 4 different meds at the same time. Still possible of course.
Been off them since childhood since back then I never felt a difference between me taking them and not. Been considering trying them nowadays tho, you all reccon its worth a shot?
I gotta get back on the dose again. Lost insurance when I aged out of my folk’s. Took closer to a decade to get a proper job & earn it back. Of course, now I’ve had proper job over a year – yet to make a single appointment because, well, still raw-dogging reality without meds.
Tomorrow’s a dayyy awayyyyy 🎶
It’ll be fun if you try, hope you’re not good at your job because then you’re clearly just looking for drugs /s
That’s kind of how I felt getting on some anti anxiety meds in my 40s. I have had “butterflies in my stomach” everyday since I was a kid, now they’re pretty much gone.
I was 33 when I finally asked about a prescription; and I felt kinda dumb that I had been “just dealing with it” my whole life, when suddenly breathing had become much easier with ant-anxiety meds.
I guess I was worried about becoming addicted or would lose coping skills and become dependent on it in order to function. But nope. I was wasting so much mental energy before, just trying to wake up and feeling like the sun was screaming at me. I can taper down my dose when my anxiety is more controlled, sometimes I forget that I didn’t take it. Sometimes I wake up and pretty much immediately take it.
It helped me to begin understanding my anxiety on a much different level than simply, “I’m just having a bad day”. It was a game changer
I hear ya. I kind of just have always had a distrust of pharma generally and psych drugs specifically. What made me go for it ultimately was conversations with family members who had the same symptoms telling me how much it helped them. I was like damn, this shit is genetic, and maybe I don’t just deserve it for not exercising or some shit.
I used to be on ADHD stimulant meds up until I just tried living without them. Was on them as far back as I can remember, and then one day, I had no appetite, so I stopped and realized that the anxiety they gave me was hurting me more than I thought. Now, I’m on anxiety medication that sometimes makes it hard to focus, and I’m not entirely sure how to find that balance of being productive and not having panic attacks daily. Has anyone else experienced this?
I ran out of Vyvanse three weeks back. It’s been months my rather low dose didn’t do its full effect anymore, I just didn’t go back to see my doc to get it adjusted. However, looking at how much of a disorganized mess I am these last couple of weeks, I guess it was still doing something - holy shit am I not getting much done, like, at all 😬
Yeah, I’ve felt a bit of the same. My meds don’t seem to do much until I miss a dose then I’m like… Whelp, I’m fucking useless today.
At first the drugs have a kind of amplified effect, as that simmers down, the effects are still there, it’s just, not as pronounced and noticable.
And to be clear to anyone who isn’t ADHD and on meds, they’re not magic. The ADHD is still definitely there, all the medication does is dim the effects to a more manageable level. Before medication, trying to get something done that my brain wasn’t super interested in, would be like trying to nail jello to a wall. It just wouldn’t happen. Now I can actually get myself off the couch, put down my phone and do a thing without feeling like I’m dragging my corpse along for the ride.
Must be nice. The only one that works for me is Vyvanse which is literally just cocaine, and the max dose of 70mg causes my heart rate to hit 120 while sitting down and doing nothing but watching YouTube for two hours.
Why do you think it’s cocaine?
It’s just another amphetamine derivateBecause I’ve been told by my pharmacy tech wife and my doctor that it is. Or close enough, anyway.
EDIT: It turns out my ignorance of chemistry is enough to get me downvoted. In any case, thank you to the kind souls that have educated me on the matter.
It’s funny to think that previous generations were medicating themselves too without admitting it. 1930s-70s amphetamines are all the rage until it’s declared an epidemic from the incredible amount of usage.
Then hard pivot to cocaine use to replace the amphetamines, which ends up not being better (and maybe destroying some countries in the process)
And now here we are back to amphetamine usage and far surpassing the levels of the epidemic of the late 60s-70s.
So remember if your grandparents say they never had to medicate themselves back in the day just ask them how much powder they sniffed up their noses. Apparently everyone feels good with a bit of stimulation.
Grandma had coke in her soda.
Great grandma did. They changed the formula before my grandmothers were born, and I know I’m older than a fair portion of you, being 43
man your bones must be turning into dust. shouldn’t you be chatting with your friends at the retirement home by now instead of being on lemmy, grandpa? smh geezers
It’s never too late for the people that had parents that said “my kid isn’t crazy” and grew up unmedicated and without support. I was a giant fuckup until 35 when I went and got a diagnosis and support. Graduated top of my class at 38, bought a house, got married, and now working on my masters degree.
Although… my meds have been on back order for the past two months…
How… do you go about getting diagnoses as an adult? I am 38 years old and relatively well adjusted, I think?. Career, home, family, degrees. But I always just thought I was just, idk, wierd, but I have learned to occasionally point my hyperfixation in a constructive direction. It is always fixated somewhere, getting through school, my job, but whatever I am fixated on, it is the only thing that matters in the whole world. I graduated at the top of my class with a 4.0 and all the awards and accolades possible. I am a high level supervisor at my work, etc. Like, I am doing OK, but other times I will get distracted, and for a month my fixation will be a video game, or my fish tank and my work will suffer. Once I lose interest I would rather put my head through a fucking wall than deal with the details of something I no longer care about. Even if other people depend on me to finish something it is pulling teeth for me to finish it. All it gets is a superficial level of attention. None of the passion. My life is a series of rabbit holes and half finished projects. For me I am fine, but the people around me that get neglected when I am on to something else… if I am focused on my job, it consumes me, every waking second I am either at work, talking about work, working on stuff for work, getting another certification for work, and I am terrified if I try to refocus to try to maintain some sort of work life balance I will lose any reasonable interest in work and everything I have done will be for nothing.
Writing it out I feel far less “adjusted” than I thought… my wife has pointed it out for years how it actually affects me, (and her, and the kids) more than I realize. Sometimes I get in the threads in this sub and I have a “Oh, shit…” moment where I realize so many of my own patters relate to the comments in here and wonder what life would be like if I actually took care of it. I was diagnosed when I was like 7 but it was never followed through with or treated. IDK. 🤷♂️
Are you me?
They help but the side effects sometimes suck. Sweats/chills, lower blood pressure, etc. Worth it for the clarity I get though.
My problem now is that I’m burnt out, which no drug is going to fix.
Edit: it raises blood pressure and lowers your urination pressure. I mixed them up.
ADHD meds are lowering your blood pressure?
I forget what it’s called but there is one medication that doesn’t act as a stimulant and is closer to that of an antidepressant
Could be Bupropion or Atomoxetine. I’ve been on the former, but it didn’t do a lot for my ADHD. It did give me a wonderful few weeks filled with panic attacks and having my mind convinced that every little ache I felt must be because I was dying of something. Of course everybody responds differently, so don’t let that deter you if it is prescribed, but for me I never want to touch that stuff again.
I’m on Buproprion SR now for my recent ADHD diagnosis. That said, I absolutely know what you mean about the anxiety that it can give you! When I was younger, I was prescribed it for a different reason and it remains the only time in my life that I experienced actual panic attacks. I’m so relieved it hasn’t been my experience with it as an adult. I’m very fortunate to have a doctor that was taking my concerns serious and supportive as I adjusted to it - still is, we meet again in May. I’m not sure I’ll stay on it because it doesn’t do enough I feel like. Plus, while it doesn’t give me anything even close to panic attacks, it still makes me feel more anxious that usual I think…
Eli5. Isn’t it just microdosing amphetamine?
Yeah, more or less. Stimulants tend to have a contradictory calming and/or focusing effect on the ADHD brain. I don’t remember why exactly but it probably has to do with dopamine regulation, which our brains crave like a zombie does brains.
My diagnosis kind of explained why I can drink inordinate amounts of coffee or energy drinks (don’t do this) and sleep like a log 30min later lol
Some brain cells make dopamine to reinforce behaviors. Dopamine slots into receptor, you get that feeling of satisfaction. A protein in the brain cell wall vacuums up excess dopamine so it doesn’t just flood the brain forever, constantly triggering the receptors.
ADHD brain cell dopamine vacuums are just always on max speed all the time.
Methylphenidate slows the vacuums down so the dopamine doesn’t get sucked right back down, meaning it actually has a chance to reach the receptors and do its job.It’s not quite that our brains crave dopamine, it’s that our brains are too good at tidying it up, kinda like someone following around behind you as you set the table, putting all the clean dinnerware straight into the dishwasher unused.
