[HN Gopher] Me and ADHD
___________________________________________________________________
Me and ADHD
Author : rbanffy
Score : 110 points
Date : 2021-02-01 19:16 UTC (3 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.linkedin.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.linkedin.com)
| 0xb0565e486 wrote:
| Am I the only one who feels a bit discredited when someone blames
| their ADHD for their shortcomings?
|
| To me, all the ADHD symptoms listed in this article sounds like
| nothing more but normal human traits.
|
| Also, author hasn't been diagnosed with ADHD, and the tips can be
| helpful to everyone.
| jeffnv wrote:
| You're not the only one that feels this way. Just like you're
| not the only one that probably feels like alcoholics should
| just learn to handle their liquor, bulimics should accept their
| body image, people with cardiovascular issues should just
| exercise more, stutterers should just stop stuttering,
| asthmatics should just breath better, etc. What you have is a
| lack of empathy and understanding for people that genuinely
| suffer from a condition that you don't suffer from, and yes
| lots of people are in the same boat as you.
| jonathankoren wrote:
| I don't think this is a fair characterization of what he was
| saying. Many of people that post these stories are self
| diagnosed, which should give you pause. Maybe they are. Maybe
| they aren't. No one -- including the poster -- knows.
|
| If they're not actually ADHD, then they're just using this
| self diagnosis as excuse. You see the same thing with people
| declaring that they're "on the spectrum", when called out for
| bad behavior. As one diagnosed autistic friend put it,
| "They're not autistic. They're just an asshole."
| 0xb0565e486 wrote:
| As far as I can tell, empathy goes both ways, and I think
| it's a bit unfair of you to call me unempathetic for simply
| expressing how I'm feeling.
|
| I also don't think the examples you give are great analogues
| to the situation (although highly related) as I've not meet a
| lot of people using alcoholism, bulimia and asthma as a way
| to avoid everyday tasks in contrast to ADHD.
| renewiltord wrote:
| I think you've misunderstood, which is natural considering
| feedback like this can be easily perceived as an attack,
| but GP's response was actually well-worded. You have a lack
| of empathy _for_ the conditions these people have. That
| doesn 't mean _you_ are unempathetic. It means your
| behaviour to these people exhibits a lack of empathy for
| their condition. That is objectively true.
|
| And it's worthwhile to remember, sometimes people have
| debilitating conditions that make them worthless for tasks.
| It is sad that some people are paraplegic. Those people
| cannot be wildfire firefighters. It's not an excuse or
| anything. I would not want to pay that person to be a
| wildfire firefighter because they cannot fight wildfires.
| If I were paying someone to be a wildfire firefighter, and
| then they lost all their limbs, I cannot indefinitely
| employ them as a wildfire firefighter anymore. If they were
| to say "It's not my fault I don't have limbs", I'd have to
| say "No, it isn't, but also, you can't fight fires. So I'll
| fulfill my responsibilities to you, but I can't employ you
| in this capacity any more".
|
| If someone has ADHD and they can't do a job, then they
| can't do the job. Any general requirements you have as an
| employer are to make "reasonable accommodations", not to
| sit there as your employee sits there on their fourth year
| of doing nothing because they "have ADHD".
| 0xb0565e486 wrote:
| Yup, thanks for pointing that out. I did interpret it as
| "you are an unempathetic person" while that wasn't the
| case.
| jacques_chester wrote:
| You should just produce more insulin! You should just not get
| cancer! Deaf? Just listen harder!
| tmashb wrote:
| They are human traits when they are relatively easy to
| overcome, not easy at all with ADHD.
| mbgerring wrote:
| I had the opposite experience -- for a very, very long time I
| assumed that a bunch of harmful, chronic behaviors were just a
| result of some unspecified personal or moral failing on my
| part. I would beat myself up about it and tell myself to "do
| better," without a path forward for how to do that.
|
| 2 years ago a friend who was diagnosed with ADHD started
| describing some of her symptoms and I realized it sounded
| exactly like what I experience. I started seeking treatment a
| few months ago (currently therapy, and undergoing screening for
| medication), and just reading through the list of symptoms
| while I was filling out a questionnaire recently was like
| suddenly being able to see color for the first time.
|
| Knowing that what I experience is not just "normal human
| traits" and is in fact an identifiable disorder with concrete
| causes and solutions has totally reoriented how I think about
| some issues I face and has enabled me to actually address them
| in a way that wasn't possible before.
| forgotmypw17 wrote:
| i don,t think it is either, but an environment way more
| demanding than what we previously lived in trying to squeeze
| every last drop of productivity out of ,,the stock,, and
| calling anyone who falls short disordered.
| mbgerring wrote:
| I think that our culture definitely demands more
| productivity out of people than is reasonable, but that's
| not really the issue I'm referring to. I'm referring to
| things like not being able to take my focus away from, for
| example, reading social media posts, in order to make an
| appointment or social event on time. Not being able to
| correctly conceptualize how long it will take me to get
| ready, leave my house and travel to where I need to be, no
| matter how many times I've done it. Doing this so often
| that it hurts friends, family, and work.
|
| I think there is an argument that western medicine
| sometimes pathologizes people having normal responses to
| the insane demands of our society and economy. In my case,
| I have been struggling with my healthcare provider's
| bureaucracy to get a diagnosis because I really, really
| need help.
| thevagrant wrote:
| A doctor I know explained (when treating adults) that not only
| do they look at symptoms, they look at how the symptoms have
| affected life outcomes. Being unfocused or late to work
| sometimes barely scrapes the surface in describing what
| untreated ADHD can lead to over time.
| afarrell wrote:
| > the tips can be helpful to everyone
|
| https://medium.com/@mosaicofminds/the-curb-cut-effect-how-ma...
| 0xb0565e486 wrote:
| That was an interesting read. Thanks!
| pipe2devnull wrote:
| I have been diagnosed with ADHD and to me it really has been
| great getting treatment. I think it's unfair to blame
| everything on ADHD and not take responsibility for anything but
| for me where I think it's different from someone who doesn't
| have it is that I was unable to pay attention during lectures
| for example. Like I really wanted to and the information was
| still interesting but I still couldn't get myself to pay
| attention and that caused a lot of anxiety and severely
| effected my self esteem since I was blaming myself and saying
| "well you just didn't try hard enough" and things like that.
| Like most things, ADHD is a spectrum so there is likely a lot
| of it that goes undiagnosed. A lot of the symptoms are pretty
| normal human traits but I think how much those traits are
| present is the big thing.
| busrf wrote:
| Frequency and severity of those symptoms are considered for the
| diagnosis. Everyone shows symptoms of depression sometimes; not
| everyone has depression.
| commandlinefan wrote:
| > hard time focusing on things that I don't like or want to do
|
| Not trying to be insensitive, but doesn't that describe
| everybody? At what point does difficulty motivating yourself to
| do something unpleasant become an actual pathology? I identify
| with a lot of the symptoms he lists, but I've never thought that
| meant there was anything "wrong" with me, I thought everybody
| felt that way. Are there really people out there who can
| cheerfully do things they don't want to do?
| JHonaker wrote:
| I didn't get diagnosed until my late 20s, so I feel like I can
| articulate some of the differences. One of the things that
| contributed to that is that I am incredibly lucky in that math,
| statistics, and computer science are the things that most
| capture my interest. It never really manifested itself in my
| school work until now, graduate school, where things become a
| lot more open-ended and self-driven. I need incremental goals
| or I start to flounder.
|
| I went to the doctor for depression, but she said that it
| seemed a lot like diagnosed ADHD (which often manifests itself
| as depression because of dissatisfaction with many aspects of
| your behavior). Before I start that I'd like to say something
| that the psychologist that evaluated me told me. The key aspect
| to ADHD is the dysfunction it causes. I'm not a psychologist or
| a doctor, but basically the thing that clearly signifies ADHD
| is the severity of the negative impacts in different aspects of
| your life.
|
| For me some things that I always hated about myself and
| frustrated the hell out of other people:
|
| She would ask me to do things and I'd completely forget about
| them after she left for the day. She'd call on her way home and
| it would immediately trigger my list of things I was supposed
| to do. I'd stress out and rush to do them before she got home.
| It wasn't that I didn't want to do them, or that I didn't care
| enough to do them. It was that they literally never entered my
| mind without an external trigger. I tried writing todo lists,
| and I would just not look at the todo list.
|
| On the opposite end of the spectrum, if something is
| interesting, I can literally sit in my chair for 20 hours
| without eating or drinking. If someone tries to talk to me, I
| literally do not hear them. I don't ignore them, I just don't
| hear it. This was a lot worse when I lived by myself. I would
| regularly sit down in the morning to do something and find that
| I'd completely forgotten to go to class, eat, drink anything,
| and that it was now 7 in the evening. If I was lucky, then the
| original task would be complete or almost complete. If I wasn't
| then I'd spent the last 10 hours weighing the pros and cons of
| various ways to properly install python on a fresh computer
| (venv, virtualenv with or without virtualenvwrapper, etc.). For
| my uses, it literally does not matter, but I've still done this
| multiple times. I've spent way too much time responding, in
| excruciating detail, to Reddit/HN comments when all I'm going
| to get out of it is, "Cool. Thanks."
|
| I know this can sound like standard procrastination, but I
| absolutely don't want to do these things. I have been in so
| many arguments about forgotten obligations or accusations of
| ignoring someone. It's so frustrating. You start to see
| yourself as someone that's unreliable and incorporate being
| forgetful and flighty into your own self image.
|
| I and my wife were pretty skeptical at first, but, after my
| first month on medication, I took care of so many important
| things that I just hadn't done for years (like applying for the
| master's degree that I earned as part of my PhD) and got more
| done on my dissertation than I had in the last four. It's still
| not easy, but it makes it _easier_ for me. I can actually
| remember to look at all the lists I make now, and I can stop
| myself after 10 minutes of an obsessive rabbit hole now instead
| of after 10 hours when my bladder is bursting.
|
| It's not about cheerfully being able to do things we don't want
| to do. It's about actually remembering to do them. ADHD isn't
| about not being able to pay attention to anything. It's about
| not being able to regulate the things you pay attention to.
| It's about being able to even out the deeply obsessive
| blessing/curse attention black hole that is your natural state.
| username90 wrote:
| > Are there really people out there who can cheerfully do
| things they don't want to do?
|
| It isn't about cheerfully doing it, it is about most menial
| tasks being impossible to do without days or even weeks of
| mental preparation and/or lifestyle changes. Imagine filling
| out a paper form causing as much anxiety as proposing to the
| love of your life and you understand better what ADHD feels
| like. You can learn to live with that, but if you have it you
| are pretty sure not everyone feels like that all the time.
| tmashb wrote:
| > I thought everybody felt that way.
|
| Does it incur any impact on your life? Was it a thought or a
| challenge?
| renewiltord wrote:
| The same as with anything else: when it becomes debilitating.
| Observe other problems that are similar:
|
| * Everyone encounters back pain at some point. It's only an
| illness when acute or chronic.
|
| * Most people have some desire for ordered patterns so lots of
| people will do things like avoid cracks in tiles because it is
| satisfying. Not a disorder until you absolutely must not step
| on a crack or it will cause you to need to go through some
| ritual.
| ZephyrBlu wrote:
| To me this makes more sense in conjunction with hyperfocus.
|
| I find it hard to focus on things unless I'm hyperfocused,
| partly because I'm distracted by the thing I'm hyperfocused on.
|
| I also tend to always be hyperfocused on one thing at a time
| for a while and then switch over to a new thing.
|
| Things that I may not like or want to do kind of melt away when
| I'm hyperfocused on something, and feel like they're amplified
| when I'm not.
| rejectfinite wrote:
| Fuck you
| tudelo wrote:
| I'm not gonna lie, OP seemed pretty reasonable here. Why do
| you feel so angry about his comments? They seemed to come
| from a place of curiosity and understanding...
| username90 wrote:
| I think many with ADHD have been mentally abused by people
| thinking that they were just lazy. I was diagnosed with
| depression most of my life due to people like that, then
| suddenly medication magically fixed almost all of those
| problems and I haven't been that depressed since I got
| diagnosed and got the medicine.
|
| I'm not saying that we should attack people like that, I'm
| just explaining why it would induce anger in some so you'd
| understand better where he comes from.
| Karawebnetwork wrote:
| Do your motivation problems keep recurring, causing real
| problems at work/school, at home or in your personal
| relationships in a way that is beyond your control and that has
| persisted for more than six months?
|
| If you answer yes to this, I would recommend talking to a
| professional. No one can diagnose you online (with the
| exception of professionals offering remote sessions).
| kokey wrote:
| It's actually a good question. I think the best insight I got
| on the topic was reading an article once about how to tell the
| difference between a child being gifted or having ADHD or being
| both. This is difficult since they often have similar traits,
| especially having a hard time completing certain menial tasks.
| The difference is that a gifted child without ADHD can complete
| these tasks if he likes the teacher giving him the task, while
| the one with ADHD will still struggle to complete it despite
| really wanting to do so.
| chickenpotpie wrote:
| "Depression, isn't that a fancy word for just feeling 'bummed
| out?'"
|
| But seriously, a lot of conditions are just universal human
| experiences that are severe enough to impact your daily life.
| We all get depressed, but we all don't have depression
| brazzledazzle wrote:
| There's a clinical psychologist that describes it as a disorder
| in large part characterized by a lack of executive function. In
| other words, you can't necessarily make yourself do what you're
| supposed to unless you have a desire to do it. So your desires
| tend to take priority or distract from your wants or needs. And
| obviously like all disorders it has to be debilitating to some
| degree-usually interference with two or more areas in your life
| (home, professional, school, etc.).
| sudosysgen wrote:
| There are, of course, levels. For me the difference is between
| spending 15 hours non-stop programming, or spending two months
| unable to open a ticket because it's menial, being unable to
| start important schoolwork that is too menial until 1h before
| the due date, and so on.
|
| I've been like this since I remember, and I really can't do
| anything to fix it. It has a large negative effect on my life.
| But of course, it's not just that, for example often I
| literally cannot pay attention to a direct interlocutor, or
| can't keep myself focused during final exams.
| cryptnotic wrote:
| If you're in university, then you're probably in a place that
| has resources that can help. Take advantage of them. For
| example, you may have access to an occupational therapist who
| can help you improve how you organize and schedule your work,
| create effective workplace, avoid distractions, etc.
| Medication may also help, but it works best in conjunction
| with active behavioral changes.
| username90 wrote:
| There is no substitute for medication. For me a life
| without medication is a life of hating myself for not being
| able to do trivial things.
|
| I tried all of those things you mentioned for over a decade
| and was often driven to tears trying to do simple things. I
| never did assignments for courses etc, causing some of my
| grades to stay bad even though I did great on the tests
| since tests kicks up your adrenaline making it easier to
| focus. Not because I didn't care about the grades but
| because I simply couldn't do the assignments. Then I got
| medication and suddenly everything in college and later
| work just became trivial. I stay on the lowest dosage and
| that is still enough for me to stay at normal levels of
| focus where I can program for a few hours a day when I need
| to do it to keep my job and earn money.
|
| So, since medication has been so life changing for me I
| really hate when people say that you can manage ADHD
| symptoms just with lifestyle changes. Maybe in some cases,
| but many people absolutely need medication and discouraging
| such people from receiving it will ruin lives.
| jayonsoftware1 wrote:
| I am very good at creating detail To-Do list and I am on Adderall
| thus I can concentrate but my biggest issue is doing the most
| important tasks on the To Do list. These tasks may be things I do
| not like to do but I have to to do. The feeling is like an
| invisible rope has tied my hands. Been suffering with this for a
| long time, has affected my life a lot and still cant find a
| solution.
| saisundar wrote:
| I usually schedule these on my calendar as small self-contained
| chunks, scoped to 25 minutes (recursively break the next
| actionable step into it)
|
| That has helped me a bit in making progress on things that are
| important, but not really exciting, such as documentation.
|
| Mandatory Note, this does not work, if you have a lot of such
| things to do,in which a team or role change would help.
| O_H_E wrote:
| Anybody else here thinks their ADHD influences some hoarding
| tendencies or fear-of-missing-out? I am basically a tab-opening
| machine. Whenever I come across any link that I _feel might_ be
| helpful in some point in the future, I open it in the background
| knowing full well that I don 't have time to look at it soon.
|
| Thank god for TheGreatSuspender, and SessionBuddy extentions.
| Karawebnetwork wrote:
| > TheGreatSuspender
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25846504
| hmottestad wrote:
| FYI. Something something something the great suspender stealing
| all your data.
| philsnow wrote:
| not just the great suspender, but any browser extension that
| both 1. asks for permissions like "Read and
| change all your data on the websites that you visit" / "Read
| and change your browsing history", and 2. either
| a. auto-updates, or b. includes by reference code
| that isn't contained in the extension bundle (so it could
| change day to day)
|
| "any extension" because popular extension developers
| regularly get offers to include extra code in their
| extensions, see e.g. https://old.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1
| vjj51/i_am_one_of_th...
| renewiltord wrote:
| Possible, but here's an n=1 counterexample, I have a positive
| diagnosis and whether on medication or off it I strongly desire
| fewer tabs. Sometimes I'll over-close and have to Ctrl-Shift-T.
| aidenn0 wrote:
| My personal thoughts are that it's a learned behavior; you know
| that you won't ever _remember_ to check out that link later
| (like someone without ADHD might), so you open the tab as a
| defense against forgetting.
| rejectfinite wrote:
| I am not diagnosed with ADHD. I do however have 400 tabs open
| in Firefox and about 30 in Edge.
| devmunchies wrote:
| Yes. I'm an information hoarder. Tabs and books. I have a long
| running daily log i keep for tasks and thoughts where I'll
| paste links so I don't have to keep the browser open. I can't
| bookmark because I never see them again.
| chewxy wrote:
| Getting chemically treated for ADHD is one of the life-changing
| moments for me. I spent most of my teen years learning "good
| habits" thru counseling and all that jazz. It wasn't until I
| started Vyvanse that all those "good habits" that was taught to
| me actually made sense. All the meditation practice actually got
| put to good use when it comes to controlling anger.
|
| I do wish I hadn't waited 15+ years between diagnosis and
| medication, because it is life changing. I can now read HN/reddit
| without getting sucked into a vortex of endlessness. Pomodoro
| actually works. And the inner chatter, they still exist. The TVs
| in the head are still on with all the channels going at once. But
| you now have a remote control with a mute key and you get to
| choose which channel you wanna focus on.
|
| p/s if you're Aussie, Vyvanse is now on PBS so you no longer need
| to pay $100+ a month - rather it's now $6 to $40 depending on
| your cirumstances.
| I_AM_A_SMURF wrote:
| Yep same here. Medication finally made me understand the anger
| issues that I have due to ADHD.
| [deleted]
| incomplete wrote:
| full blown ADHDer here... diagnosed and on meds from 2-6th grade,
| and then started again in my early 40s and on them now.
|
| some comments about this article:
|
| 1) i fsking HATE when people self-diagnose and then trumpet to
| the world that they're almost certain they have ADHD. if you
| think you've got it, go find a clinical psychologist and get
| tested.
|
| 2) he's done a great job of regimenting his life. this is really,
| really important for me to do and helps a lot (until something
| distracts me, like a squirrel)
|
| 3) removing distractions is SUPER important. i was a musician for
| large portions of my life, and i can't listen to anything when
| i'm working.
|
| 4) meds can help, a lot. they help me. a lot. i use them daily,
| but take 'breaks' when i'm sick, on vacation, etc. i'm one of the
| 'usual' people that doesn't have side effects and i definitely
| don't get a 'high' feeling.
|
| anyways, i liked the article, and he has some really great points
| and routines. but i still wish he'd gotten tested before posting.
| :)
| xyzzy_plugh wrote:
| A lot of comments here are warning about the addictive properties
| of stimulant medications.
|
| For folks without ADHD, you should know that stimulants, like
| Ritalin and Adderall, do not _usually_ cause the same response as
| in non-ADHD people. I 've spoken with many people on stimulants,
| and none of them enjoy taking the medication, beyond what it has
| done to improve their lives. Furthermore, most ADHD people
| develop tolerance to medication over long periods of time --
| eventually the drug does little-to-nothing itself. For myself,
| taking even high doses of a Adderall regularly produces no result
| -- might as well be taking sugar pills. I have to take them
| periodically (a few times a week at most) to get any sort of
| benefit.
|
| The proper medication and dosage should not make you feel "high"
| -- if anything it's almost the opposite. You get some clarity, an
| ability to direct your focus without a thousand distractions a
| minute, and perhaps even a sense of time.
|
| I let some non-ADHD friends try a low dose of Ritalin when I had
| switched off of it and had some left over, and they were bouncing
| off the fucking walls -- I would strongly not recommend taking
| stimulants unless medically necessary.
|
| For people with ADHD, they can be truly life saving. For
| recreational use, avoid.
| hnick wrote:
| Do doctors suggest some kind of cycling regime? I'd imagine I
| would probably take it on weekdays, then skip it on weekends
| and holidays. Not sure if that would be enough though.
| cwkoss wrote:
| I believe 'weekends off' is a common suggestion from doctors
| prescribing these types of medications for ADHD
| bootstrapping wrote:
| I'll echo this; I'm a serial founder who was diagnosed with
| ADHD in his mid-forties. The stimulant medications do not make
| me "high", do not provide any kind of buzz. Rather, they have a
| moderating effect. Explaining this requires correcting the
| misunderstandings in the public realm of how adult ADHD
| presents, but in nutshell:
|
| * The (largely mental) hyperactivity is controllable, that is,
| I retain my creative ideas generation and interest in new
| things, but I am no longer governed by it, and
|
| * The rarely discussed _hyperfocus_ behaviour (which I frankly
| regard as a superpower) is more easily snapped out of.
|
| To the uninformed, the most paradoxical outcome is that I can
| take a powerful stimulant medication, lie down in bed, and fall
| asleep easily, when normally I'd be staring at the ceiling
| pondering anything from CSS to soldering and unable to sleep
| for the rush of ideas.
|
| This response to medication is not diagnostic, but it is
| indicative that the medication I have is correct. Moreover it
| allows me to both retain the two traits that have made me a
| successful systems maker, but permits a less chaotic engagement
| with the neurotypical-oriented processes of modern human
| society, so for example I renew my passport before it expires.
|
| I self-medicated with a variety of over-the-counter substances
| for decades, including nicotine, sugar, and coffee. I am super
| grateful for the medication since I have now dropped the
| nicotine and sugar.
|
| My psychiatrist believes the condition is a) misnamed, and
| would be better titled "Attention Difference Disorder", and b)
| points out that the twin traits of rapid ideas switching and
| hyperfocus are only a problem in some aspects of engagement
| with modern society and that in an pre-agrarian society they'd
| be excellent traits for a hunter.
| incomplete wrote:
| i generally hate short, banal replies, but here we go:
|
| this. all of this. yes. :)
| ADHDthrow2323 wrote:
| I second that.
| ehwhyreally wrote:
| For me, Ritalin works as it should, just focusing.
| dextroamphetamine on the other hand gets me all hyped up.
| AnthonBerg wrote:
| The difference between people is so subtle and so profound.
| For me, dextroamphetamine brings a still and composed
| calmness upon the world. Not euphora, just a calmness.
| Diederich wrote:
| I have ADHD, and I've been treating it with meds for over 15
| years now.
|
| > dosage should not make you feel "high" -- if anything it's
| almost the opposite
|
| Even when I was young and fit, many years before I started
| taking any meds, my blood pressure and pulse rate were
| consistently on the high side. I've always had what could be
| called somewhat of a 'jittery' or 'high strung' personality.
|
| In my 30s, I started taking a low dose of Ritalin, and it made
| a hell of a difference. For the first time in my life, I was
| actually, fundamentally calm. I gathered some pretty detailed
| data over a pretty long period of time, and there was an iron-
| clad correlation: when the Ritalin was in my blood stream, my
| blood pressure and heart rate were lower.
|
| > most ADHD people develop tolerance to medication over long
| periods of time
|
| From the beginning, in order to defend against this
| possibility, I always took the meds sparingly, only on work
| days, and not all of them. For a number of years, I organized
| my schedule around taking the meds three days a week. On those
| three days, I did most of my deeper, focused software
| development. On the other work days, I'd focus more on
| meetings, digging into operational issues, troubleshooting,
| basically everything except deep focused software development.
|
| Prior to starting the meds, I had many successful years in
| technology at various organizations. That continued after the
| meds, but with one big difference: while I was able to sit down
| and focus before the meds, it took an enormous amount of effort
| and energy. I'd come home from work and immediately nap for an
| hour before waking up with enough mental energy to go about the
| rest of my evening.
|
| On the meds, my total ability to focus was roughly the same,
| but it didn't take nearly as much energy. A 9 hour day at work
| would not leave me drained.
|
| I've always had the fortune of having the prescribing docs
| break up my maximum daily meds into many small dosed tablets,
| which gave me a lot of flexibility.
|
| Thankfully, after all this time, the meds still work very well
| for me.
| xyzzy_plugh wrote:
| I'll add that the first doctor I went to see about my issues
| made it clear that he was willing to prescribe me stimulants
| without a strong diagnosis, which frankly disturbed me greatly.
|
| I had to make it clear I was interested in pursuing a proper
| diagnosis, and that I wasn't just looking for some help to
| "cram" for a test or something, which apparently would have
| been good enough for a prescription.
|
| Getting a proper diagnosis is a royal pain in the ass, but
| worth it. You shouldn't be screwing around with these drugs for
| fun.
| renewiltord wrote:
| Yeah, my first adderall came from a friend who uses it to
| party. I can't see how. It makes me much quieter. Partying on
| it is something I can't even imagine.
| xyzzy_plugh wrote:
| No kidding. I don't even mix it with caffeine because it
| makes me feel terrible. Alcohol is tolerable, but I still try
| to avoid mixing stuff. Luckily most of it's out of my system
| by the evenings anyways.
| [deleted]
| throwaway713 wrote:
| > Minimizing menial tasks. Menial tasks really suck. I know
| everyone must hate doing these, but to put it into perspective, I
| would rather do 20 hours of really really hard work on a tough
| project than do 5 hours of menial tasks
|
| Interesting. I have ADHD (inattentive subtype) and am quite the
| opposite. My apartment is never cleaner than when I have an
| extremely important, open-ended project with multiple
| stakeholders to address. Seriously, I end up dusting the screws
| that hold up the door frames.
| I_AM_A_SMURF wrote:
| My completely ignorant theory is that it's still about "can
| only do the things I really like to do" part of ADHD. I also
| like to clean up my place because of the sense of
| accomplishment that it gives me (especially when at work I
| don't feel like I'm making progress because I spent all day
| coaching/meetings/etc) but not everyone might feel like that, I
| can definitely think of someone with ADHD that doesn't like to
| clean up the same way I don't like plan my meals (please don't
| make me do it).
| rootsudo wrote:
| That's exactly why menial tasks suck, they are a
| procrastination enabler vs unable to get into "flow" to
| accomplish more interesting/complicated tasks.
| jrowley wrote:
| I think the parent commenter would say that open ended nature
| of the task makes it not menial - so they procrastinate
| because it's very hard to get started. Its discrete, not a
| single ticket that's easier to focus on and get info flow
| state with.
| ardy42 wrote:
| I'm like the OP. The distinction I make is:
|
| 1) A tough project can be engrossing. Getting started is always
| tough, but after that it's relatively easy to keep up momentum.
|
| 2) Menial tasks are not engrossing and are usually quick, so
| they require a level of attention control to stay focused on
| them that I'm just not capable of. It's like "getting started"
| over and over.
| athorax wrote:
| For me, it is the "open-ended" part of a project that really
| ends up screwing me. If I don't have a definitive task/goal to
| work towards that is when I start to procrastinate
| hi_hello wrote:
| So much. Open-ended or poorly defined projects can really
| spiral into attentive dysphoria for me. Productive
| procrastination - room cleaning and the like - is
| particularly appealing in that state, just to feel like I'm
| making progress on something.
| xyzzy_plugh wrote:
| The best manager I ever had set it up like so, he'd go:
|
| Here's a large, open-ended problem I want you to solve this
| quarter. I'll secretly wait while you fix a thousand other
| unrelated problems that make our business better despite
| making no visible progress on the open-ended problem. Then
| I'll reframe your work to show management that the thousand
| other things you improved are more valuable than the open-
| ended problem, and get you promoted.
|
| I miss that guy.
| heroHACK17 wrote:
| Man, I am the same way. How have you coped with this? I work
| in a pretty open-ended environment without a lot of
| processes, so you can imagine it has been a struggle for me.
| I have tried to create tickets for myself but I seem to also
| struggle with defining the "done" state.
| renewiltord wrote:
| Not super related, but a friend of mine recently said "If
| you're the kind of person who is satisfied by a large task
| list, you shouldn't make todos. If you're the kind of
| person who hates them, you should."
|
| It seems obvious after it being mentioned, but I noticed a
| useful corollary: a list of done tasks actually makes me
| unhappy. So I avoid todo pages where a done list is
| visible. Hiding done tasks (i.e. archiving done cards on
| Trello, deleting a row on your todo list instead of
| strikethrough), etc. has led me to use it better.
|
| This isn't your problem, clearly, but just wanted to share
| a useful tip.
| hnick wrote:
| Maybe the concept of the "wall of awful" will help you
| understand it more. I struggle with it too though.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uo08uS904Rg
| JohnBooty wrote:
| Same boat. It's not a magic cure, but my semi-okay-coping
| mechanism is to make daily to-do lists.
|
| The key though, is not just "making to-do lists".... it's
| right-sizing the items on them.
|
| Every task should have a finite end state and (this is
| crucial) shouldn't be longer than 15-20 minutes or so. If
| they are longer than that, it almost certainly needs to be
| broken down into constituent tasks.
|
| So even something like "clean my office" probably needs to
| be broken down a little more -- when I'm on my game I break
| it down into "vac office", "dust office", "organize desk
| drawer", etc.
|
| This pairs nicely with the "Pomodoro method" if you've ever
| tried it.
| delecti wrote:
| My only strategy for that problem is to break things down
| as much as possible into subtasks. That helps because I'm
| at least more likely to get _something_ done if there 's a
| list of things I can weigh the terribleness of. As the GP
| comment said that they'd clean their apartment rather than
| get work done, I'll do the tasks with more clarity to
| procrastinate doing the tasks with more ambiguity.
| Eventually, doing the tasks with clarity help clear up the
| ambiguity in the others.
| devoutsalsa wrote:
| I struggle when there isn't enough work to do, and when I do
| scrounge up work, it ends up being non-meaningful work.
| dmarchand90 wrote:
| For me the worst part is when I have a combination of short
| urgent tasks and an open ended one. The open ended task
| always ends up being pushed aside
| athorax wrote:
| My support request queue has been routinely emptied this
| week exactly because of that haha
| jasonlotito wrote:
| Oh, I know this problem. Happens quite often.
|
| A technique I use is to break down the project into smaller
| pieces. What's the smallest well-defined task/goal I can work
| toward. Even if it's just setting up the repo, or writing out
| a README. It's amazing how often this little step can help
| kick things off.
| athorax wrote:
| Definitely. It is one of the reasons I enjoy working in a 2
| week sprint setting (all other reasons aside). It forces me
| to really break tasks down to actionable items
| curiousllama wrote:
| I'm 100% the same - I once accidentally trained for a marathon.
| 01100011 wrote:
| Yeah I feel like I hide in those tasks to achieve a sense of
| accomplishment while also avoiding the uncomfortable task I
| should be working on. Then again, those tasks help me pass the
| time until the deadline for the important task is close enough
| to generate the fear/anxiety necessary for me to work on it.
| madamelic wrote:
| Fellow ADHD person:
|
| Get diagnosed and get a low-dose of meds. It helps _a lot_. You
| will likely hate the feeling they give you for the first week
| (you will genuinely feel high even on 10mg Adderall XR), along
| with nightmares and night sweats but after a few weeks, you'll
| suddenly be productive at a very normal level.
|
| I don't feel strung out nor is it some addiction. Ignore the
| people screaming about Adderall being "literal meth" and how it
| will certainly kill you. Even with an addictive personality, it's
| very easy to avoid over-doing it (hint: only take it as
| prescribed).
|
| Medication is intended as a stop-gap to build a system so you
| won't need high doses forever. If you go into thinking meds are
| all that needs to be done, you are going about it wrong. You need
| to build a system and reflect on how to improve your baseline
| productivity and keep yourself on rails (planners, calendars,
| checking your work, reviewing work with a fresh mind before
| sending out, etc).
|
| Additionally, it does help if you like what you are doing. I'd
| imagine ADHD is much easier to maintain if you are self-employed
| or have a large leeway to define how work gets done or what work
| gets done. If you are in a command-and-control / top-down power
| structure, you need to leave; you'll never thrive there and will
| ultimately get tossed out.
|
| Lastly, caffeine does help from my testing, especially caffeine
| combined with L-Theanine. I used to take 100mg of HVMN "Sprint"
| pills as a test whether I had ADHD; it helped quite a bit. It
| didn't make me jittery and it let me focus much better.
| renewiltord wrote:
| How strange. My initial dose made me feel almost sleepy. I'm
| usually high-energy at night time, but now I go to bed before
| midnight.
| krrrh wrote:
| > caffeine does help from my testing, especially caffeine
| combined with L-Theanine.
|
| One thing that made me look into adderall was finding out I was
| a slow metabolizer of caffeine via 23andme, and was consuming
| an unhealthy level of caffeine. I did some research and
| determined that the health risks of low doses of adderall were
| smaller than those of high doses of caffeine.
|
| Scott Alexander's review of the research on Adderall are also
| worth reading:
|
| https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/12/28/adderall-risks-much-mo...
| madamelic wrote:
| >the health risks of low doses of adderall were smaller than
| those of high doses of caffeine.
|
| I hadn't seen that before, so thank you!
|
| I ran into this same thing accidentally, I was regularly
| 'overdosing' on caffeine by drinking 300 - 400mg of caffeine
| per day in college.
|
| The safe dosage is ~200mg for an adult if I recall, but I can
| only do about 100 - 125mg absolute max or my heart starts
| pounding. I am not sure if this lowered limit is due to
| 'abuse' or if I also have different caffeine metabolization.
| I will have to take a look at my data.
| rejectfinite wrote:
| >The safe dosage is ~200mg for an adult if I recall
|
| No? It is 400mg
|
| https://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/nutrition-
| and-h...
| krrrh wrote:
| Yeah, without diving back into it myself right now, the
| health effects of caffeine are quite different depending on
| a single SNP. For fast metabolizers some doses of caffeine
| above 300mg/day can actually have net positive effects on
| cardiac health, while the opposite is true for slow
| metabolizers. I got into a habit of 400mg+ doses per day
| and the cumulative effect that had on sleep quality alone
| was a good reason to find an alternative.
|
| I completely agree with your comments about looking for
| opportunities to use medication to bootstrap into better
| habits around exercise, mindfulness, and building better
| systems and habits.
| disabled wrote:
| > Lastly, caffeine does help from my testing, especially
| caffeine combined with L-Theanine. I used to take 100mg of HVMN
| "Sprint" pills as a test whether I had ADHD; it helped quite a
| bit. It didn't make me jittery and it let me focus much better.
|
| Caffeine is an adenosine A2A receptor antagonist.
|
| See:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adenosine_A2A_receptor_antagon...
|
| You may want to check out this paper, Adenosine A2Areceptor as
| potential therapeutic target in neuropsychiatric disorders:
| https://scihubtw.tw/10.1016/j.phrs.2019.104338
|
| Caffeine has a problem though:
|
| > Moreover, considering that caffeine has a half-life of
| 2.5-4.5 hours [137]the once-a-day schedule of administration
| used in clinical trials in ADHD patients could be insufficient
| to antagonize A2AR throughout the day; thus, in future trials
| different administration schedules should be used or, as an
| alternative, selective A2AR antagonists could be tested in
| animal models of ADHD. In particular, it would be interesting
| to test the efficacy of the A2AR antagonist istradefylline in
| view of its approval for the treatment of Parkinson's disease
| in Japan [138].
|
| Ironically, I just started taking Nourianz (istradefylline)
| (link: https://www.nourianz.com/) as a last-resort drug for my
| severe restless legs syndrome, which has been going
| phenomenally well. I also have ADHD combined type (inattention
| and hyperactivity), and fairly severely.
|
| Anyways, I have been taking the the istradefylline for a week
| now, and it has made a tremendous difference in many of my ADHD
| symptoms. In addition, it greatly increased my sense of
| wellbeing within 1-2 hours of initially taking it, and it has
| been sustained for the entire week.
|
| I hope you find this interesting! I take Vyvanse for my ADHD.
|
| Thanks to istradefylline I can now focus seamlessly and without
| effort. I can just "lock in" to whatever I want to do. Before,
| it would require some static force ("friction") to be able to
| "lock in" my concentration to do the task. I can also just
| focus, without hyperfocusing. It now comes naturally to me. I
| also no longer find myself pacing around the house aimlessly. I
| also do not randomly get up from my seat or fidget hardcore. I
| can also lock back into a flow state without effort if I am
| disrupted.
| schoolornot wrote:
| I'm still not sold on the medication and prefer to follow
| strict routines + good diet + exercise. To me, it's obvious who
| is taking ADHD pills. People are almost zombie like or they
| space out, or even on low-doses they almost can't "keep up" in
| conversation or meetings. Not being drugged and finding coping
| mechanisms has allowed me to plow through multiple degrees and
| find career success, albeit at the cost of "other things",
| relationships, social skills, health, etc. I'm not going to
| risk my livelihood when life is good-enough atm.
| jdgoesmarching wrote:
| You prefer to do the exact things that people with ADHD
| struggle with. This is like saying "for depression I prefer
| to just not be sad."
|
| It wasn't until after I was diagnosed and medicated that I
| finished my undergrad after almost a decade, started my
| career, and started grad school. You do you, but don't be
| sanctimonious about mental health treatment based on your
| anecdotes.
| knowhy wrote:
| I got diagnosed with ADHD age 15. Methylphenidate gave me
| these zombie like spacing out symptoms. I later switched to
| Amphetamine and didn't feel the negative side effects of
| Methylphenidate.
|
| Methylphenidate is the only authorized substance for ADHD
| treatment here in Germany. I had to pay for my Amphetamine
| treatment by myself. I had the impression that the
| pharmaceutical industry doesn't have an interest in getting
| an authorization for amphetamines as that substance can be
| produced by a local pharmacy on site. Even thou I can confirm
| that the side effects are much less with amphetamines.
|
| Now age 35 I haven't taken any medications for ADHD for 8 or
| 9 years. It was good to help me with school and university
| but now I don't need to put myself into a position where
| medication could be helpful. Still wouldn't want to work in
| an open floor plan office. Not sure if that is an medical
| condition.
| adhsdeutschland wrote:
| Amphetamine got authorised in Germany a year ago in the
| form of Lisdexamphetamine under the name of Elvanse:
| https://www.adhspedia.de/wiki/Elvanse_Adult
|
| I got it from my doctor and have been taking it for a year
| after trying Methylphenidate which did not show any
| positive effect on me.
| madamelic wrote:
| Good for you, I am glad you have found something that works
| for you.
|
| It is inappropriate and rude to assume what others need. I am
| the complete opposite of what you assume on Adderall, I am
| more verbose, my thoughts are more coherent and I can keep up
| with meetings because I can actually pay attention to them.
| The first time my spouse heard me conduct an interview after
| medications, he told me how much more cohesive, steady and
| assured my speaking was.
|
| It helps no one, not even yourself, to tear down someone else
| because they are using a different solution than you.
| q3k wrote:
| > People are almost zombie like or they space out, or even on
| low-doses they almost can't "keep up" in conversation or
| meetings.
|
| What you describe sounds more like symptoms of untreated ADHD
| rather than treated ADHD.
| novok wrote:
| Or sleep deprivation...
| aidenn0 wrote:
| People who are sleep deprived will actually have many of
| the symptoms of ADHD; poor subjective sense of time,
| difficulty focusing, &c.
| borski wrote:
| This is exactly what I was thinking.
| xyzzy_plugh wrote:
| This comment strikes me as full of ignorance.
|
| Strict routines? Good diet? Exercise???
|
| Good luck doing any of these if you have even moderate ADHD.
| It's hard enough getting out of bed.
|
| As a sibling mentions, your description of people who are
| "drugged" sounds more like people who have undiagnosed-ADHD
| and are not medicated.
|
| The drugs don't make you drugged -- that's sorta the default
| state. The drugs make you functional enough to try and
| develop coping mechanisms in the first place.
| borski wrote:
| ADHD medication has different effects on people, and you'll
| know very quickly what it's effect is on you. Furthermore, it
| does not make me spaced out or zombie like, nor does it make
| me strung out. It simply calms my brain down so I can
| actually focus on the problem at hand, rather than the
| opposite of that, with my brain flitting back and forth with
| other thoughts.
|
| I don't take it on a day when I'm being creative or
| brainstorming, because the lateral thinking required does
| that is actually something ADD _helps_ , but I take it when I
| _have to get something done_.
|
| Take it from a guy who has had ample coping mechanisms, got a
| CS degree from MIT, founded and sold a security startup,
| etc.; all of those coping mechanisms worked, but got much
| easier once I accepted the ADD and found the right meds. It
| only made me more productive and a better contributing member
| of the team.
|
| YMMV, but I suspect your assumptions about how it affects
| people are very wrong.
| bpye wrote:
| > they space out, or even on low-doses they almost can't
| "keep up" in conversation or meetings
|
| For some of us this is the experience without any medication.
| I still get this now with medication, but it's definitely
| less frequent.
| imesh wrote:
| > I don't feel strung out nor is it some addiction. Ignore the
| people screaming about Adderall being "literal meth" and how it
| will certainly kill you. Even with an addictive personality,
| it's very easy to avoid over-doing it (hint: only take it as
| prescribed).
|
| Low dose meth does work pretty similar to Adderall. Everyone
| who does meth does not become a meth addict. Most don't. But
| the people who become meth addicts are the same people who end
| up using adderall like methheads.
|
| Which is why I personally don't have an Adderall prescription.
| Because if I have a bottle of Adderall I'm going to attempt a
| prescribed dose on day one and start snorting it by day three.
| sudosysgen wrote:
| Low dose meth has a lot of similarities but quite a few,
| significant, differences to Adderall. The biggest are tropism
| and release.
|
| Statistically, because of the addictive effects of untreated
| ADHD, the likelihood of substance addiction with or without
| amphetamine treatment is almost equal. There is of course a
| risk of getting addicted to Adderall, but amphetamines with
| long releases are not very addictive as far as drugs go and
| the risk of getting addicted to other things is drastically
| reduced.
|
| Methamphetamine as used illegally is a lot more addictive
| than Adderall because it is generally consumed in ways that
| lead to much more immediate effects and not orally, and even
| when orally it is generally formulated to be released more
| quickly. More rapid effects seriously increase addiction
| potential.
|
| The doses are also much smaller for Adderall than meth in 99%
| of cases.
|
| Because of these factors, methamphetamine is much more
| addictive than pharmaceutical amphetamine salts.
| falcolas wrote:
| To paraphrase, "I think adderall is kinda like meth, so it's
| obviously addictive."
|
| The fuck?
|
| Adderall is one of _many_ medical options for treating ADHD.
| Not all of which are stimulants. And some of which are
| chemically designed so they _can 't_ be abused (like
| Vyvance).
|
| EDIT: The OP pulled the "in my opinion" phrasing from their
| post, but I'm going leave mine as-is. There's a lot of
| anecdote based FUD about ADHD meds going on in these threads,
| and it makes me mad. My above thoughts stand.
| driverdan wrote:
| Adderall is 100% addictive and is like meth but with less
| bio-availability and neurotoxicity.
|
| All stimulants are addictive and you will have physical
| side effects from discontinuing use.
| ryandrake wrote:
| This is a super-edge-case but if you happen to want to be a
| pilot (either small planes all the way up to airlines), the FAA
| considers ADHD and other attention-deficit conditions to be
| disqualifying. If you're taking medication for ADHD or similar
| conditions and want to be a pilot, you're dead in the water
| until you get off them and can show that you don't have some
| kind of attention difficulty. FYI!
| madamelic wrote:
| Almost any medical condition disqualifies you. Almost any
| medication taken regularly does too.
|
| I am interested in getting my private pilot's license and I
| _should_ be able to get a Class 3 Medical from what I've
| seen, but that will be a bit away so I have time.
|
| What I've seen and heard from others is to just lie. Seems
| like many have gotten to the point of realizing trying to do
| it right is only going to put you in months of bureaucracy
| and spend thousands proving your viability.
|
| The FAA needs to figure out how to either commission studies
| to reduce their list of disqualifications or streamline the
| process of appealing your medical certification.
| jacques_chester wrote:
| Personally, as a person with ADHD, I am fine with that
| restriction.
| renewiltord wrote:
| Fascinating, but appears to make sense. Hopefully, some day
| we will be able to quantify the difference so that people
| like me (who do worry that they can't stay on top of all the
| details in a plane) are excluded from flying1 while other
| people who have a similar condition to mine but are capable
| of flying are allowed to do so.
|
| 1 As much as I want to.
| falcolas wrote:
| > caffeine does help from my testing
|
| My doctor put it this way: Caffeine triggers a useful dopamine
| response, but the side effects are strong at "useful" levels.
|
| Ritalin and Adderall provide a stronger dopamine response with
| fewer side effects at "useful" levels.
|
| They're all stimulants, but the magnitude of the useful vs.
| non-useful effects differs.
| sneak wrote:
| Counter-anecdata here: meds aren't always the best option for
| people. Don't bias toward taking amphetamines as the parent
| comment instructs you to do.
|
| There are serious negative long-term effects from taking
| amphetamines regularly. Such advice as above is very one-size-
| fits-all, and in my view is thus really bad advice.
|
| > _Ignore the people screaming about Adderall being "literal
| meth" and how it will certainly kill you._
|
| You can ignore those people because they're wrong, amphetamine
| is not methamphetamine. But do not ignore the people who tell
| you that even normal amphetamines (adderall) are not harmless.
| They cause harm, even at low doses.
|
| The harm they cause may be mitigated by the benefit they bring;
| it may also be extremely difficult to estimate their harm in
| advance. Ceasing regular use of amphetamines for some people
| can result in subsequent YEARS of oversleeping, lethargy, and
| depression from dopamine receptor downregulation.
|
| > _I don 't feel strung out nor is it some addiction._
|
| Amphetamines are a highly addictive substance, if you are
| taking them every day it is likely that your body has developed
| at least _some_ physical dependence upon them. Addiction doesn
| 't make itself known until you stop.
| madamelic wrote:
| I do agree that it can cause harm long term. It's the same
| with all medications, that's why I pay doctors to prescribe
| medication and monitor my health while taking it. I already
| have physicals every six months because of another condition.
| With the Adderall, I get blood pressure taken monthly and an
| EKG every three months.
|
| The goal of almost any medication is to create a stop gap to
| create or find non-medication solutions. Without Adderall, I
| can't focus on creating systems and tools to help me stay on
| track.
|
| Demonizing Adderall isn't helping anyone. No one should be
| afraid of taking a medication that will change their life for
| the better. If someone goes through normal channels and gets
| properly prescribed it, they should be treated no different
| than any other ailment.
| sneak wrote:
| I didn't demonize anything, and if you think I did, you
| should probably re-read my comment dispassionately and stop
| trying to do battle on the internet.
|
| Your comment opens with:
|
| > _Get diagnosed and get a low-dose of meds._
|
| Immediately suggesting that someone seek a somewhat
| dangerous medication as a solution, without qualification,
| is an extreme and dangerous view. "You have ADD so you
| should try low doses of speed!" is not wisdom. There is a
| reason that these are prescribed by doctors, and monitored.
| madamelic wrote:
| One requires getting diagnosed to get medication. I am
| not advocating buying Adderall from a dealer. I am
| encouraging people not to be afraid to pursue the
| medication route because it is so demonized.
|
| Medication helps a lot. You could struggle with no
| medication, trying to build a system to help yourself,
| possibly fail and never be who you can be or you can seek
| out professional help (potentially with medication) and
| begin building support today and have a good shot.
|
| ---
|
| Would you say the same if I encouraged a depressed person
| to do their best to get diagnosed and get on 'anti-
| depressants'? I am doubtful.
|
| We have invented medication for a reason. People go to
| decades of med school for a reason. Medical professionals
| know what they are doing and are very upfront about it
| not being a panacea and needing to still work on non-
| medication solutions (as with any medication).
|
| I will admit my first sentence ("Get diagnosed and get a
| low-dose of meds") was too strong to start with.
| sneak wrote:
| > _Would you say the same if I encouraged a depressed
| person to do their best to get diagnosed and get on
| 'anti-depressants'? I am doubtful._
|
| Don't be: many studies have shown CBT to be equally as
| effective for depression (for most people) as medication.
| If you are equally likely to cure your issues with a book
| on CBT versus a pill, that is something you should
| consider, even if you do end up deciding for the pill.
|
| I encourage people to evaluate the costs and benefits of
| ALL their options before seeking any specific treatment
| for issues that involve neurochemistry. My entire thrust
| is "medication is not a panacea and you should not bias
| toward using it, over any other option, as a solution".
|
| For some it may be the best choice. For many it is not.
| Don't bias toward it (as you advocate). Evaluate, don't
| just go get pills because some random person on the
| internet said it worked for them that one time.
|
| If you put the wrong thing in your body, you can fuck
| yourself up for a very long time. I am speaking from
| direct personal experience.
| falcolas wrote:
| > Don't bias toward taking amphetamines as the parent comment
| instructs you to do.
|
| What's the alternative? CBT is not sufficient when your brain
| doesn't want to work. Executive function disorder is a huge
| part of being ADHD.
|
| > There are serious negative long-term effects from taking
| amphetamines regularly
|
| Citation needed for therapeutic dosages.
|
| > They cause harm, even at low doses.
|
| Citation definitely needed for therapeutic dosages.
|
| > Ceasing regular [...] subsequent YEARS of oversleeping,
| lethargy, and depression
|
| Citation really really needed here for therapeutic dosages.
|
| Anecdotal advice like this is exceptionally harmful to those
| who need these meds to just reach "functional adult" levels
| of normal.
| sneak wrote:
| What's harmful is telling people without qualification that
| they should seek dangerous and addictive medication without
| a careful cost/benefit analysis.
|
| My comment isn't saying that you shouldn't, it's saying
| that there are downsides that are not apparent that must be
| weighed against the upsides--same as any medication. Even
| ibuprofen can fuck up your stomach, each remedy must be
| evaluated on its risks and merits.
|
| I speak from extreme personal experience. Same team!
| falcolas wrote:
| > that they should seek dangerous and addictive
| medication
|
| We're not telling folks to go on a meth binge. We're
| telling folks that this _doctor prescribed medication_
| actually works, and can help improve their lives.
|
| To use your own ibuprofin example - what your parent
| statement is proposing equals: "Don't use ibuprofin for
| your chronic inflammation, _even though your doctor
| prescribed it for you._ "
|
| EDIT: If COVID has taught me anything, it's that we as
| human beings are poorly equipped to make appropriate
| cost/benefit analysis when it comes to medical advice.
| _Especially_ when it comes to anecdotal experiences. And
| doubally especially when you 're already suffering from
| untreated ADHD.
| jacques_chester wrote:
| Adderall is not the only medication. Other stimulants are
| from different families and all of them come in a variety of
| formulations / dose releasing mechanisms.
|
| There is at least one non-stimulant drug that can be
| prescribed (atomoxetine), but it doesn't work for a lot of
| people (including me).
| petercooper wrote:
| I found atomoxetine only mildly useful and the side effects
| (slight increase in blood pressure) to bother me enough to
| stop using it.
|
| However, I want to mention modafinil (particularly as no-
| one else has mentioned it in this discussion). It has
| worked for me and there is evidence to its effectiveness as
| a non-stimulant medication for ADHD -
| https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/11191692/ - although it's
| technically an off-label use.
| R0b0t1 wrote:
| People medicated for ADHD with stimulants tend to live 7-9
| years longer on average.
| birdyrooster wrote:
| Kidney damage? What effects?
| hombre_fatal wrote:
| We're talking about ADHD though, not someone looking to just
| pull some all-nighters or cram on a Sunday night.
|
| When I realized there was a low dose medication that could
| basically cure me of ADHD (thus cure me of underperformance,
| procrastinating my ambitions, low professional self-esteem),
| the choice was obvious. Know what also does harm?
| Underperformance, procrastinating my ambitions, low
| professional self-esteem. Far worse than any side-effect from
| amphetamine. And I'd take on much worse harms if they would
| cure my ADHD like amphetamine does.
|
| Edit: lol, when I started my reply to you, your comment was
| two sentences long. Take it easy.
|
| Btw, I'm in my mid-30s and I've been taking amphetamine since
| I was 18. Perfect bill of health. Though, granted, there's
| plenty of life left.
| sneak wrote:
| Stimulant addictions are one of the most common functional
| addictions.
|
| I don't think most people would consider someone servicing
| an active physical dependency to have a "perfect bill of
| health", even if you are totally free from disease.
| [deleted]
| sudosysgen wrote:
| Mental disease is a disease too. The options are either
| to have ADHD, which is a potentially very destructive
| disease, or to have a low-grade dependency on stimulants
| with few side-effects that can be severed in a week or
| two.
|
| Of course, many medications that aren't psychotropic fit
| the bill. Corticosteroids, for a common example, lead to
| physical dependency too. Most medications lead to some
| kind of physical dependency after prolonged use, it's
| just sometimes of very low grade.
|
| The second option is much better from any pathological
| point of view.
|
| To note, perfect health doesn't exist. We're all broken
| in some way :)
| q3k wrote:
| > someone servicing an active physical dependency to have
| a "perfect bill of health"
|
| Is taking immunosuppressants also a physical dependency
| or a functional addiction?
| vharuck wrote:
| I take ADHD meds, and I will admit I have a dependency.
| When I go without my meds, I'm in a really bad mood the
| first day and get much worse the following days. That
| said, I don't have an addiction _disorder_ , because it
| doesn't impair my ability to work, maintain
| relationships, pursue goals, or remain healthy. In fact,
| it does the opposite. That's why my doctor prescribes
| them.
|
| (As an aside, the reason I've gone days without meds is
| because my insurance company has a harmful policy of
| requiring "prior authorization" from the same doctor who
| prescribes the pills, and more than once I've found out
| it needed renewed from a pharmacist who was only allowed
| to try filling it the day I took my last pill. I'm tired
| of this incredibly helpful medication, and the people who
| depend on it, being thought less of.)
| borski wrote:
| You are making assumptions the parent did not imply. You
| can be on ADHD meds and not be addicted to them, ffs. I
| am on low-dose adderall xr _on days that I need it_ and I
| have never had an issue. Everyone is different, but to
| imply that the adderall has caused an "active physical
| dependency" is no different from stating that too many
| people drink caffeine (except that because I only take it
| as needed it's not even a fair comparison).
|
| You'd be right, but it does not do significant harm,
| especially given how therapeutic the right drug can be in
| the right doses.
|
| _Can_ it do significant harm? Sure. So can Ibuprofen.
| birdyrooster wrote:
| Seconded on L-Theanine, definitely helps if I get jitters. I
| usually avoid caffeine bc of this, since the adderall at a
| correct dose seems to work great but socially it's hard to
| avoid caffeine.
| rejectfinite wrote:
| L-Theanine is sadly not sold in Sweden in tablets. I have
| tried to find. As Tea really has a very calming effect on me.
| madamelic wrote:
| I love soda too much to kick caffeine entirely. Never got on
| the coffee train thankfully.
|
| I've tried to kick caffeine multiple times but always fall
| back during stress. I just can't find another (cheap) drink I
| enjoy sipping on.
|
| My harm reduction is a Soda Stream, which at least lowers my
| overall sugar intake. I don't understand sparkling water,
| I've tried it and it is less enticing than plain water.
| justasidenote2 wrote:
| I'm working on ADHD diagnosis now and my doctor was kind enough
| to let me begin taking Ritalin and then switch to Vyvanse.
| Medication is literally, demonstrably changing my life for the
| better.
|
| I used to drink multiple cups of coffee a day and felt like it
| was almost baseline requirement just to attempt to focus.
| Actual ADHD medication makes coffee almost obsolete. The first
| time I took Ritalin it was almost scary to realize how chaotic
| my mind was minute-to-minute, every day without fail. Suddenly
| the noise all went away.
|
| It feels like I can actually create coherent sentences. I stop
| getting overwhelmed by asynchronous communications (Slack,
| email). The "volume" of every single distraction that used to
| monopolize my attention gets turned way down. Yeah, I still get
| distracted -- but now it's a conscious choice to either let
| that distraction take precedent or to re-focus to the task at
| hand.
|
| The day to day benefits are great, but the big picture / life-
| style benefits are the most appreciated. In general my anxiety
| and stress management is honestly 10x better. I've gone from
| being stressed over my career choice every week to finally
| feeling like I can thrive. I stop getting irritated by the most
| innocuous things someone might say or do. I stop waking up
| anxious every weekend trying to process the million things I
| need to get done just to exist and make forward progress in my
| life. I could go on and on and on about how "real" ADHD is,
| without even having a formal diagnosis yet.
|
| I'm sure the discussions in this thread regarding the utility
| and risks of these medications sounds intriguing if you don't
| have ADHD and already know how to sit still and focus _at
| will_. But anyone who doesn 't have our experience should
| understand this shit is honestly helping people live their
| lives for the better. My only regret is I didn't know sooner.
| madamelic wrote:
| >My only regret is I didn't know sooner.
|
| Yep!
|
| Always scored 90th percentile in standardized tests (how? no
| clue.), curious, the lot... just couldn't care about homework
| or listening in class.
|
| I struggled through 5.5 years of college then years later
| snapped out of the mindset of "just having to try harder". My
| parents knew... they had me diagnosed as a kid, but were
| scared off of stimulants by their church.
|
| I try not to think about what my life could've been.
| aidenn0 wrote:
| > Get diagnosed and get a low-dose of meds. It helps _a lot_.
| You will likely hate the feeling they give you for the first
| week (you will genuinely feel high even on 10mg Adderall XR),
| along with nightmares and night sweats but after a few weeks,
| you'll suddenly be productive at a very normal level.
|
| I wonder if I could have persisted long enough with Adderall to
| find a theraputic effect if it had been during lockdown. 10mg
| of Adderall made me unsafe to drive to work (I would suddenly
| get the subjective sense that my car was completely still and
| instead all the parked cars on the side of the road were
| hurtling at me at 25 mph).
|
| My doctor actually started me on a higher dose (15 or 20mg
| maybe?) because I needed such a high dose of Ritalin to get a
| theraputic effect (and at that high of a dose it greatly
| impacted my sleep). I took it exactly once and I didn't feel
| tired for 36 hours and was completely non-productive. For the
| first time I finally understood what all that clinical language
| describing the symptoms of a manic episode were all about.
|
| Vyvanse did not feel nearly as bad subjectively, but my wife
| insisted I change meds because I was (in her words) "an
| asshole" while on it.
|
| Finally settled in on 20-30mg of Focalin a day. The year of
| titrating the doses of each medication was hell. And then when
| we finally figured it out, my company switched insurers I had
| to change the pill sizes (not total quantity) to get it covered
| with the new insurance.
|
| The one thing I'd like to add is that diet for me made a _huge_
| difference. I might as well not be taking the meds if I have a
| carb-heavy breakfast. Prior to taking the meds I had quit
| eating breakfast altogether because I felt like such crap
| around lunchtime if I ate breakfast. Obviously taking
| stimulants on an empty stomach is not a great idea, and my
| psychiatrist helped me out to go for a breakfast that doesn 't
| provoke such a strong insulin response.
| madamelic wrote:
| > (swapping meds for a year)
|
| Definitely feel you there. It's the worst part about
| psychiatric drugs and why I've bailed on almost everyone I've
| ever been on. It's that initial hump and having to struggle
| through ~two weeks of hell.
|
| My partner has run the gamut so he constantly assured me it
| was normal and that I'd be fine.
|
| >The one thing I'd like to add is that diet for me made a
| huge difference. I might as well not be taking the meds if I
| have a carb-heavy breakfast. Prior to taking the meds I had
| quit eating breakfast altogether because I felt like such
| crap around lunchtime if I ate breakfast. Obviously taking
| stimulants on an empty stomach is not a great idea, and my
| psychiatrist helped me out to go for a breakfast that doesn't
| provoke such a strong insulin response.
|
| Diet is my next interest but haven't gotten tools perfected
| to track the variables that I think will be affected
| (productivity, happiness, energy and sleep).
|
| I am vaguely on the train of diet affecting productivity but
| my daily lunch is a McDouble and large caffeine-free soda to
| sip on so... non-conclusive currently. I also skip breakfast
| because of the same reasons (too heavy + no good breakfast
| foods, even 30-in-30 always slows me down)
|
| I have found that many 'healthy' foods make me feel sick or
| worsen productivity so I am tentatively sticking to my weird
| diet for now. I have suspicions I may have food allergies and
| that could be causing it.
| aidenn0 wrote:
| My theory is I get a bit hypoglycemic with the typical
| American breakfast of pastry/bagel/cereal, but I kind-of
| don't care why.
|
| Bacon is my go-to breakfast food; can cook up a bunch at a
| time and heat up what I need in the morning. I make some
| eggs to go with it if I have the time. The great thing
| about bacon for me is that it's so salty that I cannot
| overeat on it.
| RankingMember wrote:
| > Last one -- I have no idea if this is a placebo effect. But
| caffeine seems to really help.
|
| Yep. As has been mentioned, in this context you're basically
| using it like Adderall. Unfortunately, the body will build up a
| tolerance quickly, so I find myself needing to use them
| sparingly, Adderall especially, otherwise end up feeling the
| withdrawal symptoms (excessive irritability, more trouble
| focusing than before medicating).
| bpye wrote:
| Caffeine dependence isn't much fun either - whilst I don't know
| of any long term health impacts, the severe headache when you
| miss a caffeinated drink in the morning sucks.
| moftz wrote:
| I'll only drink coffee if I know I have a busy morning and want
| to power through it. I miss taking Adderall daily but the
| effect from coffee is almost the same. I don't drink it that
| often mostly because I don't want a tolerance. Drinking coffee
| on my less busy mornings just leads me to getting dragged into
| some low priority task and spending all morning on it when I
| could be working other things. Sometimes I'll just grab a 300mg
| energy drink at the store or take a couple Excedrin on an empty
| stomach if that's all I got.
| madamelic wrote:
| >Sometimes I'll just grab a 300mg energy drink at the store
| or take a couple Excedrin on an empty stomach if that's all I
| got.
|
| Not suggesting medication or that you take something you
| shouldn't; absolutely do your own research!
|
| Look into HVMN Sprint. Pretty long shelf-life, well-
| controlled dosage and focused on focus rather just ENERGY TO
| THE MAX.
|
| I loved Monster back in the day but its taste makes me sick
| just thinking about it.
| RankingMember wrote:
| Same, if possible I try to plan my stimulant intake based on
| anticipated workload, i.e. I don't want to be using my focus
| energy if there's nothing requiring it going on. I have
| noticed that simply changing up the delivery substance can
| "fake out" the tolerance sometimes, e.g. drinking a cup of
| coffee might have no effect due to tolerance but drinking a
| cup of green tea gets my brain going despite the core drug
| being caffeine for both.
| zwkrt wrote:
| I have undiagnosed ADD. I know partially because I observe my own
| behavior, but also because once at a party I took adderall and
| while everyone else frantically danced themselves into a heavy
| sweat, I was compelled to go into the kitchen and do all the
| dishes and reorganize my closet.
|
| I don't like how stimulants make me feel, even though I know they
| might make it easier to fit into society. It is probably hard to
| describe how they make me feel to someone who does not have the
| underlying condition, like trying to describe how it feels to get
| a prosthetic arm to someone who has never lost their arm to begin
| with.
|
| Compared with other people, my internal experience/world seems
| frantic. If I sit for more than 30 seconds alone without my phone
| I will have wild daydreams---my mind works kind of like the old
| website StumbleUpon. Or like being in a crowded restaurant and
| trying to follow everyone's conversations. My favorite quote
| regarding ADHD: "my brain never takes the same route twice".
|
| But I don't think that stimulants make me have a "normal"
| experience like "normal" people do. Yes, on one hand the
| increased dopamine means that I am actually able to maintain a
| mental checklist for more than 5 minutes. I'm sure I would be the
| best employee ever, and the yessiest of yes-men. There is an
| element of taking stimulants that feels just like putting on
| noise-cancelling headphones and produces the same focusing
| effect.
|
| But there is also a dark side. I can't relax. I feel absolutely
| driven to accomplish things. The outside world impinges so much
| more heavily on my mind. My access to my intuition and creativity
| are diminished. My jaw is clenched. Instead of forgetting to eat
| like normal I am just not hungry, my stomach is churning. It
| makes me feel like a golem. There is a chance that minus the
| physical side effects normal people do feel this way mentally,
| but it is so much more sterile. It's like trading the lush forest
| of imagination for a cubicle farm of execution.
|
| My personal theory is that ADHD is just at the far end of the
| normal distribution of personality and that it is a trait that is
| very useful for raising children. In a real way there is a
| childish wonder that I have never lost, even as I see those
| around me "grow up" (i.e., become rigid). I have heard other
| theories regarding it being adaptive for hunting. Either way, I
| enjoy my existence as a space cadet. My whole life is shining
| with such a rich and imaginative inner experience and I don't
| think I owe it to anyone to dim that brightness just so I can fit
| into their terribly boring, rigid, and repetitive world more
| easily.
| jasonlotito wrote:
| I found out I had ADHD and OCD at 33. I even gave a talk on
| it[1]. I would highly recommend you get officially diagnosed. Not
| to suggest your partner is wrong, but rather it will open up
| possibilities you might not otherwise have.
|
| For myself, I say a therapist regarding my OCD, and it really
| helped me come to grips and understand my OCD. It really helped
| answer questions I didn't know I had, and helped me better get a
| handle on both ADHD and OCD.
|
| Thank you for sharing. =)
|
| 1. https://www.slideshare.net/jasonlotito/getting-things-
| done-4...
| 29athrowaway wrote:
| GABA supplements can help alleviate the symptoms of ADHD, if the
| source of it is anxiety.
| rejectfinite wrote:
| Oh I'm sure benzos help for anxiety lmao good one dude. Of
| course they do.
| Spivak wrote:
| Getting tested & treated for my ADHD was genuinely life-changing
| for me. It's one of those insidious disorders that doesn't let
| you know how bad you actually have it until you experience what
| it's like without it for the first time. The inattentive type is
| _nothing_ like the stereotypes.
|
| One of my favorite signs you might have ADHD. Caffeine doesn't do
| anything for you and/or makes you sleepy. You've never know what
| other people talk about when they describe being "wired" after
| drinking an energy drink. Bonus points if despite "doing nothing"
| you still intake lots of caffeine. Congrats! You might be self-
| medicating without knowing it.
|
| Everyone will recommend the book The Disorganized Mind for lots
| of good non-medication strategies and I'm no different. It's
| fantastic.
| disabled wrote:
| > One of my favorite signs you might have ADHD. Caffeine
| doesn't do anything for you and/or makes you sleepy.
|
| Caffeine is an adenosine A2A antagonist, which has therapeutic
| potential in ADHD, except the half-like makes it an improbable
| candidate.
|
| Ironically, I just started taking an adenosine a2a antagonist,
| known as Nourianz (istradefylline) (link:
| https://www.nourianz.com/), as a last-resort drug for my severe
| restless legs syndrome, which has been going phenomenally well.
| I also have ADHD combined type (inattention and hyperactivity),
| and fairly severely. I take Vyvanse for my ADHD.
|
| Anyways, I have been taking the the istradefylline for a week
| now, and it has made a tremendous difference in many of my ADHD
| symptoms. Additionally, it greatly increased my sense of
| wellbeing within 1-2 hours of initially taking it, and it has
| been sustained for the entire week.
|
| Thanks to istradefylline I can now focus seamlessly and without
| effort. I can just "lock in" to whatever I want to do. Before,
| it would require some static force ("friction") to be able to
| "lock in" my concentration to do the task. I can also now just
| focus, without hyperfocusing. It now comes naturally to me. I
| also no longer find myself pacing around the house aimlessly. I
| also do not randomly get up from my seat or fidget hardcore. I
| can also lock back into a flow state without effort if I am
| disrupted.
|
| I hope you find this interesting! The adenosine a2a antagonist
| made a huge difference in both my restless legs syndrome and
| ADHD symptoms. I cannot imagine NOT being on this medication
| for my ADHD.
| borski wrote:
| 100% this. I was diagnosed last year (at 33), and it changed my
| life for the better; specifically, it allowed me to stop being
| _angry_ at myself every time I did something that was, in fact,
| a symptom of ADD. Now I had a reason and could work to modify
| behaviors, as opposed to just feeling guilty and undisciplined.
|
| Mark Suster's posts were what set me on this track of self-
| realization (along with my best friend and fiancee telling me
| to consider it), so I'll leave them here in case they help
| anyone else too:
|
| [1] https://bothsidesofthetable.com/how-to-know-if-you-have-
| add-...
|
| [2] https://bothsidesofthetable.com/why-add-might-actually-
| benef...
|
| [3] https://bothsidesofthetable.com/developing-an-action-plan-
| fo...
| tstrimple wrote:
| I drink lots and lots of caffeine during the week. I mostly
| like hot drinks when I have to sit down and work throughout the
| day. I definitely cannot relate to that caffeine buzz. I
| consume almost no caffeine on the weekends and I cannot really
| tell a difference from an alertness standpoint. There are
| nights I cannot sleep at all and toss and turn until the wee
| hours of the morning, and there are nights I fall asleep within
| 5 minutes and sleep throughout the night. Neither seems to have
| anything to do with the amount of caffeine I'm consuming.
| moftz wrote:
| I limit myself to one mug in the morning and another around
| lunch if I need the help on the days I do drink coffee. I try
| not to build up a caffeine tolerance since it's the next best
| thing to ADHD drugs for me. If you just like coffee, switch
| to decaf and only drink caffeinated for when you need it.
| athorax wrote:
| I very much identify with this. Both from an ADHD and anxiety
| perspective. I really had no idea how bad it had gotten until I
| was able to experience what not having constant anxiety felt
| like. Medication was a huge step forward in helping me "reset"
| and gave me a way to target actual life events that triggered
| my anxiety
| ThrustVectoring wrote:
| Not surprised at all that caffeine helps. ADHD is, bar none,
| _the_ mental health diagnosis most amenable to medication.
| Specifically, stimulant therapy. There 's no principled
| distinction between self-medicating and prescriptions here, other
| than various legal risks, costs, and side effect profiles.
| Caffeine is particularly poorly suited to this due to adaptation
| and anxiety, but it's certainly _something_ , especially if you
| aren't a regular user. Amphetamine is the first-line treatment
| choice for a reason, and it makes a night-and-day difference tbh.
| logicslave wrote:
| Yes, but in the long run amphetamines will do significant
| damage to your health.
| jdgoesmarching wrote:
| [Citation needed]
| InitialLastName wrote:
| Why would they cite when they can just as easily insinuate?
| borski wrote:
| Only if abused at high doses. I was recently diagnosed with
| ADD and the adderall XR is incredibly helpful, and at my 10mg
| dose on an "as needed" basis (since I don't need productivity
| _every_ day) I'm not concerned at all.
| devmunchies wrote:
| I do 3-5mg IR so it has minimum impact on health but take
| on an empty stomach so its effective. My goal is to feel it
| just enough to get a little help.
| logicslave wrote:
| How long have you been taking it? The cracks will show
| years down the road, not initially.
| renewiltord wrote:
| This is not evidence-based.
| sudosysgen wrote:
| Long term studies on ADHD patients do not support this
| hypothesis.
| specialjack wrote:
| Curious if you have any sources for this? I have heard
| this before and struggled to find data that backs it up.
| tudelo wrote:
| I have heard it can be bad for oral health due to
| dehydration. Not sure how much of that ends up being a
| feeling versus physically needing water, and how
| dehydration affects oral health, or exactly how I would
| connect all of the dots there (or if I even should
| attempt it), but it seems reasonable.
| devmunchies wrote:
| > Not sure how much of that ends up being a feeling
| versus physically needing water
|
| it does dry out your oral/nasal cavity. It can cause your
| body to produce mucus to compensate. I commonly feel like
| swallowing is slow as if there is a thin layer of mucus
| lining my throat. Even had yellow mucus drip out of my
| nose as if it were a nose bleed (happened 3-4 occasions),
| which comes from having a sinus infection.
|
| This is one of the reasons I switch to micro-dosing on an
| empty stomach and supplementing with coffee to limit
| exposure to amphetamines.
| elliekelly wrote:
| Leaving ADHD untreated can do significant damage to your
| health, too.
| ThrustVectoring wrote:
| I am not professionally employable without ADHD medication.
| I'm willing to that risk for roughly $3m in career earnings.
| schneidmaster wrote:
| Coffee consumption was actually one of the questions that I was
| asked when my therapist first suspected that I had ADHD. I used
| to drink 5+ cups per day (especially workdays) while feeling
| fairly little effect from it. I'm now on medication which works
| an order of magnitude better for managing my symptoms, and I
| rarely drink more than 1 cup of coffee per day.
|
| It's also worth noting that ADHD often comes with other mental
| health comorbidities; in my case, it exacerbated my depression.
| I would often fall into a spiral of inability to focus ->
| feeling bad about myself for not completing work that I was
| generally more than capable of doing -> even less ability to
| focus. I still have depression, but starting on ADHD medication
| all-but-removed my most frequent trigger.
| devmunchies wrote:
| I would down an energy drink when needing to do long drives
| and would have a calm, almost euphoric, feeling. Definitely
| not stimulating.
|
| Similar to the feeling (although much weaker) hydrocodone
| gave me after I had oral surgery.
| madamelic wrote:
| > I would often fall into a spiral of inability to focus ->
| feeling bad about myself for not completing work that I was
| generally more than capable of doing -> even less ability to
| focus. I still have depression, but starting on ADHD
| medication all-but-removed my most frequent trigger.
|
| I had the same issue!
|
| I told my prescribing doctor this same thing and she trusted
| me enough to try out Adderall before SSRIs again. Turns out
| my hypothesis of my depression + anxiety largely being tied
| to my sense of productivity was right.
|
| After going in for an EKG check-up on orders of the
| prescribing doctor, I found a fairly benign heart issue that
| the cardiologist believes may be the cause of my "panic
| attacks" (eg: my attacks may be heart racing -> panic, not
| panic -> heart racing!)
|
| All of that from just treating "I feel bad because I get
| nothing done".
| TurkishPoptart wrote:
| is it normal to get an EKG in relation to ADHD medication?
| I'm in your boat too. I've tried antidepressants with no
| results so I'm going to see a doctor about ADHD this time.
| ardy42 wrote:
| > Coffee consumption was actually one of the questions that I
| was asked when my therapist first suspected that I had ADHD.
| I used to drink 5+ cups per day (especially workdays) while
| feeling fairly little effect from it.
|
| Did you get a big boost when you first started with it that
| reduced as you developed tolerance with habitual use?
|
| I've always been pretty careful with caffeine consumption in
| order to avoid tolerance, because I didn't want to get into a
| state where all it did was boost me back to my "normal" (i.e.
| feeling crappy until I got my coffee, and having to use
| increasing amounts to get past my baseline).
| schneidmaster wrote:
| Not really. Even when I first started drinking coffee
| (around high school) I never got much of a boost from it. I
| think your caution makes sense for folks with neurotypical
| brains, but even now (drinking 0-1 cups per day) I drink it
| for the flavor and/or social aspects, not because it does
| much for my energy or productivity.
| 99_00 wrote:
| I'm in my 40s and have suffered with undiagnosed ADHD my entire
| life.
|
| Two days after I suspected I had it I saw my doctor. One month
| later I was on medication. A few more months and I am in weekly
| counselling. For me personally, the positive changes from
| medication and counseling have been dramatic and immediate.
|
| After only 4 months, my coworkers impression of me is starting to
| shift for the better.
|
| ADHD is a serious mental illness. I'm so thankful that the help
| I'm getting is working.
|
| "Taking Charge of Adult ADHD" by Barkley, helped me understand
| ADHD and how I should deal with it.
| TurkishPoptart wrote:
| >My 5 AM morning workout is probably the most important part of
| the routine since it helps with focus and letting out some
| energy.
|
| Damn, if you have the mental fortitude to get out of bed at that
| time, you're probably fine. Every time I wake up before my alarm,
| especially now when it's super cold, I instantly think of this
| Calvin and Hobbes single-panel classic:
| https://www.pinterest.com/pin/316729786269578409/
| thejellypen wrote:
| Feels like its easy to have a false positive diagnoses for
| amphetamines, particularly in high stress & productivity roles
| such as tech.
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