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How L.A. Got Hooked on Adderall

38 points by danso 5y ago

kayodelycaon 5y ago
"Or work-at-home ADHD." That is not what ADHD is... ADHD is not lack of focus, it's lack of control over focus. It's issues with regulating emotion. Issues with impulsiveness. etc.
- Spivak 5y ago
  Trying to be charitable I think what they mean to say is “people with medically untreated ADHD who have been managing their symptoms with structure and routine finding their strategies failing in a new environment they have less control over.”
  - q_andrew 5y ago
    Given the context, it also might be a sarcastic illustration of people's misunderstanding of ADHD as a sporadic condition instead of a neurological disorder.
  - kayodelycaon 5y ago
    The article makes no attempt to define ADHD or even say it's a valid diagnosis in adults. In fact, it implies otherwise.
- ajkjk 5y ago
  No, but it can make ADHD / ADHD tendencies a lot harder to deal with.
unixhero 5y ago
Adderall isn't particularly addictive.
- veonik 5y ago
  Methamphetamine isn't addictive? I realize that the war on drugs really skews perspectives, so maybe I'm way out of touch, but I'm _pretty_ sure it is extremely addictive. Can you provide some citations please?
  - jokowueu 5y ago
    Adderall isn't meth . You are thinking of desoxyn
  - renewiltord 5y ago
    Can you provide some citations that methamphetamine is in Adderall?
  - srean 5y ago
    My dad used to take non-prescription meth during his student days for better focus (this was way before Adderall). He did not have any addiction problem with it and used it only as a performance enhancer, like before exams. He could and did discontinue at will. Our family life was and is as normal and balanced as it gets. He turned out to be a decorated scientist. He is in his 80s now and has no known health issues related to meth. Just an anecdote, but there it is. I suspect much of the harm caused by meth is not by the meth itself but the impurities and contaminants that result from synthesizing them at under-equipped (both in terms of know-how and physical equipment) home labs.
- pastrami_panda 5y ago
  I just googled it and every source I saw indicates otherwise.
  - jokowueu 5y ago
    i can provide a comparison of sorts . cigs are harder to quit than adderall but caffiene is easier to quit than adderall . obviously im talking about prescribed doses.
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  - kayodelycaon 5y ago
    Adderall is not dangerously addictive at therapeutic levels. It's no worse than caffeine.
    - dwaltrip 5y ago
      Caffeine is decently addictive? I can’t remember the last day I didn’t have a cup.
      - kayodelycaon 5y ago
        The withdrawal period is less than a month: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caffeine_dependence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caffeine_dependence
        maxlamb 5y ago
        But isn’t a month a long time? The detox period for heroin is around a week as far as I know
        bladegash 5y ago
        It’s not quite the same kind of withdrawal. I routinely take weeks long breaks from Adderall and while I am a bit more tired and definitely less productive, it’s not like you get physically ill. There really isn’t much in the way of withdrawal and anecdotally, what symptoms there may be don’t last longer than two weeks.
- MrMan 5y ago
  having never taken it, I agree, I dont crave it. you know who cant kick it? my many former co-workers and boss who were addicted to it
renewiltord 5y ago
You can use an online service to get these these days. I think if we roll back COVID online prescription allowances it’ll be an interesting lock-in mechanism for current users. Big fan of easing access to pharma without standard gatekeeping.
- Spivak 5y ago
  Yeah it’s kinda a weird situation where we moralize stimulants and only prescribe them to people when it’s medically necessary despite it actually being safe for basically everyone when monitored by your doctor. Like this gatekeeping makes is an absolute PITA for me because I do have ADHD and have to jump through so many hoops just to maintain my prescription because the war on drugs or something. Like we don’t make some guy prove that their ED is debilitating and get psychologists notes and make them get blood tests constantly to make sure they’re taking it to get viagra, the only standard is “can you take it without messing up your health.” If you made this stuff accessible to anyone who wants it there would suddenly be no reason to worry that ADHD patients are selling it on the side.
  - krapht 5y ago
    I don't think it was just "muh War on Drugs" Stimulants, especially crack cocaine, caused loads of crime in the 80s. I mean, it even does today - addicts crush and snort Adderall all the time for the high. It's the 5% of the population with addictive personalities that ruins it for everyone else.
    - netizen-936824 5y ago
      >Stimulants, especially crack cocaine, caused loads of crime in the 80s. I mean, it even does today This is just more false reasoning pulled directly from the war on drugs
    - freeone3000 5y ago
      The only reason it "caused crime" was because the drugs were illegal. Most of the negative effects of criminal drug use are the criminal aspect, not the abuse aspect. Alcoholism is terrible, but, banning alcohol made the problems much much worse, and affect many more people, and resulted in an infamous amount of organized crime. That's where drugs are today. When you could get cocaine over the counter, and opium on the street corner, the addicts needed help, but it harmed society as a whole less -- and banning the substances did not reduce the number of addicts, simply interfered with their ability to get help.
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dncornholio 5y ago
> Before the pandemic, America was already gobbling up 83.1 percent of the global supply. But in December 2020, prescriptions for Adderall skyrocketed. So it was high before, but now even became higher? Something tells me when 1 country accounts for more than 80%, there is already something going very, very wrong. This has nothing to do with ADHD, this is a culture problem.
- krapht 5y ago
  Is it wrong? I don't think anyone is up in arms over coffee and cigarettes, and my personal experience is that Adderall is just caffeine without so many side-effects. Incidentally, coffee and cigarettes is how I managed before getting a prescription.
  - dncornholio 5y ago
    It's amphetamines.. It's doing way more to your body than some caffeine I can spot someone on adderal from miles, it's not much different from people on speed.
    - rimunroe 5y ago
      > I can spot someone on adderal from miles That sounds like quite the superpower. How exactly can you tell?
      - erdos4d 5y ago
        In university I ran into a lot of people who did this stuff to get grades. Many straight up acted like tweakers. Super fast speech, tiny pupils, twitchy, sweaty, etc. I didn't realize it was so popular until like 30% of my classmates would be like this during exams.
        dncornholio 5y ago
        Exactly, I can spot it immediately in the way they talk. You have to experienced it yourself before you be able to notice it with others. After I had a night full of amphetamines, the world opened up
gonehome 5y ago
I suspect everyone just performs better on amphetamines adhd or not. This was basically what erdos argued too iirc. I’ve been curious about it since I’ve never tried it but many people I know have. I’d be curious how much better I would be able to focus/think with it.
- BuckRogers 5y ago
  Significantly. Though I'd argue you could come close or match it with sufficient willpower and conditioning your mind. It's just easy mode. I will say coming down off of it is twice as bad as the boost you gain from using it. Not worth it for that reason alone.
- praptak 5y ago
  The only reason I'm not taking it are reports from the users I know. The recurring theme is "soon you are unable to get up in the morning without your dose of speed".
  - smabie 5y ago
    It's certainly addictive, but it's overblown imo. Like if you stop taking it after regular use you'll feel tired and have an adjustment period for a week or two, but it's not like it's gonna ruin you forever.
    - CSSer 5y ago
      You’re not generally wrong but I think it’s worth keeping in mind that this is going to depend on a combination of all sorts of factors in your personal health profile and the dosage you’ve been taking. It’s not just the addiction that is problematic. It’s the long-term consequences of the chronic side effects. We all know you need to sleep and to eat. This medication makes it harder to do both of those activities if not managed properly and thoroughly. Combine a failure to do that with long-term usage (abuse) and you've got a recipe for permanent damage on your hands that can cyclically reinforce that dependence. Here’s an anecdote. I did a group project with a guy in college who I got to talking with about it. He had one of these nightmare stories. He said he had to stop taking it because he was absolutely strung out. I asked him about his dosage and he told me he had been taking 80mg XR/day. I was unaware they even made dosages that high. He said that he didn’t realize it at the time but he just kept chasing the initial feeling (seems he didn’t understand the concept of tolerance), and his doctor responded by repeatedly titrating up his dosage. He was at that max dosage for about a year and a half. He said when he stopped he went through a months long phase of extreme depression and physical discomfort like he has never experienced in his life before. He shared some pretty brutal stuff with me. He said that it had been a year and he still didn’t feel like his old self. He said it was like his attention span was even shorter than before the medication and at this point he wasn’t sure if it would ever be the same.
999900000999 5y ago
If you want performance enhancing drugs, just admit it, and we can move to having it over the counter. I personally don't feel a need to take dangerous performance enhancing drugs, but I respect the rights of adults to make their choices. Legalize everything for those 21 or older.
- renewiltord 5y ago
  > … just admit it, and we can move to having it over the counter. Literally the worst strategy. There is one successful drug deregulation strategy in America: publish nonsense studies pointing at good healthcare outcomes then use that to wedge the drug into legality. “Just admitting it” would lead to a ban on it. Literally would be the dumbest thing to do.
- rdtwo 5y ago
  I don’t want it so available that everyone feels they have to use it to keep up with their coworkers
- throwaway684936 5y ago
  It's not mentally performance-enhancing in any significant way if don't have ADHD. If you have a "normal" brain, you get a psychological illusion of increased productivity.
  - qgin 5y ago
    If the test of who has ADHD is checking who is more productive and focused after they take stimulants… then a very, very large percent of the population would quality.
    - throwaway684936 5y ago
      https://www.healthline.com/health-news/adderall-wont-give-your-brain-a-boost-if-you-dont-have-adhd#The-appeal-of-ADHD-drugs https://www.healthline.com/health-news/adderall-wont-give-yo... >New research finds ADHD medications like Adderall don’t improve cognition in healthy college students and may even impair the memory of those who abuse the drugs. ... >But how do these drugs respond differently to the brains of people with and without ADHD? Weyandt said that she believes the human brain might need to be at a deficit of some kind for drugs like these to work. If not, they could have a detrimental effect. >She said that neuroimaging research with people who have ADHD has found reduced activity — think blood flow — in parts of the brain associated with the condition’s symptoms when off medication. >Once given the proper medication, the activity increases in these regions of the brain, and ADHD symptoms go down. So a person with ADHD has an improved ability to pay attention, and shows improved memory, planning, and response inhibition, she said. >“Since we found the drug did not improve neurocognition and may negatively influence working memory, this may suggest a deficit is needed to benefit from the medication,” she added. “Furthermore, we have found in other studies that students who report significant ADHD symptoms are more likely to misuse stimulants.”
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q_andrew 5y ago
This is a good time to mention some things that should be more common knowledge: -Recreational use of prescription meds makes it vastly more difficult for people who actually need them. Especially when their condition causes an inability to schedule and coordinate. -Psychiatrically, recent studies are showing that neurotypical brains don't actually benefit much from stimulant medications (but the illusion of productivity can be a good placebo) https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0376871617302983 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S03768...
- renewiltord 5y ago
  Literally the easiest thing to get online. You can get a diagnosis, a prescription, and the drug in no time. There are so many providers. I put it off for ages but when I finally got around to it there was no shortage or whatever. This drug is easy to make; there’s lots of quantities; and we could make it less scarce really easily. There is no inherent law making it hard like there is one making colonizing another planet hard. It’s literally just regulation.
throwaway81523 5y ago
Scott Alexander had an interesting article about Adderall: https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/12/28/adderall-risks-much-more-than-you-wanted-to-know/ https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/12/28/adderall-risks-much-mo...
bdcravens 5y ago
A freelancing client, wanting me to work faster, offered me Adderall. Needless to say things soured quickly (that wasn't the only reason) and I gave them all their money back.
philg_jr 5y ago
Just like the majority of things in life, moderation is the important part. I was diagnosed with ADHD as a teen, and took adderall to deal with it and get through school. In my 30s, I continue with taking it in reasonable doses, with breaks occasionally. It helps me focus when I want, and I have no known side effects except for a lack of appetite after taking it. 10mg still gives me the same effect as it did when I was a kid. Amphetamines are useful when applied correctly in the correct dosages. Like the majority of drugs out there. Step aside doctors, let the pharmacists do their jobs.
frazbin 5y ago
I'm told that microdosing Adderall isn't a bad idea-- just take between 5 and 20 of the little balls in there. Amphetamine's effects are super non linear, and this cuts the side effects.
- trafficante 5y ago
  This is my experience as well. I’ve been taking it for the better part of 20 years - dabbling in various dosages of XR and Ritalin in an attempt to nail down an optimal therapeutic dose - and my conclusion has been that (for me) nothing works nearly as well as frequent microdosing of IR. As an aside: One aspect of Adderall that doesn’t get nearly enough attention outside forums/subreddits is that the generics seem to have wildly different effects/potency depending on the manufacturer. I highly recommend others with ADHD that are prescribed to Adderall IR try to experiment switching around generics if possible.
eyelidlessness 5y ago
I had to stop reading the article. Even if it might have some redeeming content further on, the title and first few paragraphs are preposterous. I got an ADHD diagnosis as an adult, albeit before the pandemic. The diagnosis itself has been a huge revelation about many aspects of my life, my mind, several things I would never have understood as connected… and it saved my life. I’m not “hooked” on adderall—at least not in the sense of a drug seeking addict. Nor am I “crazy”. I’m fucking chemically imbalanced. And no one who isn’t is going to feel calmed or feel their anxiety relieved by amphetamines.
- to1y 5y ago
  >no one who isn’t(crazy) is going to feel calmed or feel their anxiety relieved by amphetamines. This is false. Pretty much all people will experience a higher level of focus, calmer(less racing thoughts) on amphetamines.
  - eyelidlessness 5y ago
    I have a hard time reading this “correction” as intended in good faith, you would have to have misread every aspect of what you’re responding to. But I’ll respond in good faith because it’s important to me that people are not misled on this, intentionally or otherwise. First of all, I did not mean ‘no one who isn’t(crazy)’, I meant no one who is not chemically imbalanced such that they will benefit from an amphetamine prescription. Second of all, none of my comment had anything to do with the benefits for focus or racing thoughts. When I mentioned feeling calmed and anxiety relief, those were speaking to the same benefit for ADHD patients. Amphetamines are stimulants. Heightened energy and anxiety are generally their most common side effects, just as with caffeine. People with ADHD typically (but not always) experience the opposite effect, at least up to their optimal dosage. More to the point, and I hope this will help clarify the overall scope of my comment: ADHD—despite the name, reputation, and many diagnostic criteria—is far more than either a deficit of attention or hyperactivity. When I say my diagnosis and treatment saved my life, I mean from the effects of traumatically crippling anxiety. I had never even wondered if I had the stereotypical ADHD symptoms. I had to work with my psychiatrists to translate the diagnostic criteria into relevant experiences with intense sensory overload, hyperfocus/hyperfixation, anxiety and depression, social problems. If it weren’t for me making the connection to sensory overload, I never would have even had the conversation with a doctor in the first place. I’d be trying—and likely failing—to find the right combination of SSRI and benzo. This is a very common story for a lot of people diagnosed with ADHD as adults, mine just happened to be fairly extreme because I was drinking myself to death to self medicate the anxiety. Which… self medicating is another common outcome for undiagnosed adults. Anyway. All of that is to say, you’re not wrong that amphetamines tend to have a similar effect on focus for most people, at least to a point. But lacking “focus” in that productivity sense is really more of a clue than a primary symptom of ADHD. This misunderstanding is mostly rooted in the diagnostic criteria being oriented around adult descriptions of children’s behavior. Not the actual patient’s experience in their own words. If you ask people diagnosed as adults, or even children who haven’t internally stigmatized their own experiences, what ADHD is like… it often more closely lines up with a lot of experiences expressed by a lot of people with autism. And it’s not that trouble focusing is a complete red herring, it’s that why we have trouble focusing isn’t a part of the discussion. So yeah. People abuse Adderall to focus. Common trope, no argument here. Those people abusing it, unless they’re unaware they’re undiagnosed, generally feel like they’ve taken an upper. Because they have! People with ADHD often feel the opposite even at an optimal dose, and generally should expect to be able to sleep while it’s still active and noticeably effective. Many of us even get sleepy especially on lower doses. I spent months while I was stepping up in dosage where I would need a nap about an hour after taking my morning meds. That is not how people react without the chemical imbalance Adderall treats.
jbirer 5y ago
Because of the ignorance and paranoia of some people I have to source 4F-MPH from shady sources in order to self-medicate my ADHD. Thankfully I can get my work done now but I wish I could just get it safely from the pharmacy.
chrsig 5y ago
> It’s so weird. I’m not seeing that people are having a hard time getting benzos at CVS Probably because benzos are schedule IV, where as adderall is schedule II -- it's much more tightly controlled. > “Kids were staying home without a routine. It was easier to call a pediatrician and say, ‘Joey can’t focus on the computer with remote learning. Can you help?’ ” And the pediatrician would refer to a clinical psychologist to do a thorough evaluation, including looking at things like report cards, statements from parents about behavior, and quasi-empirical tests to gauge attention span. > Adderall is prescribed for ADHD, which was once diagnosed only in the prepubescent. Now adults are discovering they have ADHD. Or occasional ADHD. Or work-at-home ADHD. ...No, people are getting diagnosed with adhd. as far as I'm aware, diagnosis as an adult still requires that there was a manifestation before age 12, but adults need fewer criteria to meet a diagnosis. They're not discovering that they have adhd, they're being diagnosed with adhd by qualified professionals. This is drivel. > “If you were normally going to an office in a structured environment and now you’re working from home and have to focus, you’ve got a reason to be taking it,” says Lotano-Saba Lotano-Saba, a "vice president of pharmacy solutions at the global management consulting firm AArete", which is not a position granted with the trust to determine who meets diagnostic critera. > And if you’re also dealing with bored kids interrupting your Slack chats and Zoom meetings, you’ve got even more reason to seek a potion to help you focus. Yes, medicate the children so that you can focus. Don't think about their well being at all. (/s) > The only reason Ginsberg doesn’t have pills in her medicine cabinet anymore is that it got too expensive. Adderall, especially in this new shortage, is the Domaine du Romanée-Conti of prescription medication. Not only do you have to shell out for whatever your insurance doesn’t cover, but you also have to pay for a session with a psychiatrist every three months to get a new prescription Yes, healthcare in America is too expensive, and the cost of adderall is prohibitive to some people that might clinically benefit from it. It's quite unfortunate. And no, you don't need to see a psychiatrist every three months. Some GPs will prescribe after having a diagnosis by a clinical phsycologist. A psychiatrist specializing in adhd will better be able to help determine the best dosage, which specific medications might be beneficial based on observed side effects -- people react to focalin, ritalin, adderall, vyvanse, and others quite differently. The drugs also all vary in cost and how they'll be covered by insurance. > So Adderall has become a privilege of the L.A. elite. Yes, people abuse adderall, and it's made it more difficult for people that need it to live a healthy life. > Also, maybe, like inflation or something. This is surely a well researched article... > When I told a psychiatrist that I was late with this article and was thinking about trying Adderall to help me finish, he said incredulously, “You’ve never done Adderall?!” When I asked if I should lose my Adderall virginity, the respected psychiatrist paused and said, “Off the record? Definitely.” So the author saw an unprofessional psychiatrist? --- end of reading --- Look...It's just a drug. How many people are on antidepressants? You can't just stop taking those at the drop of a hat without a major depressive episode. Yes, taking too much adderall is bad. Taking too many antidepressants is also bad. Drinking too much alcohol is bad. Stigmatizing the drug, and the people that are impacted by a neuro-developmental disorder isn't doing any good for anyone. Aaand my executive functioning capacity has been used up, fuck this noise.
qgin 5y ago
I think people get too hung up on deciding who “really has” ADHD. It’s not a super meaningful exercise. There is no clean, black and white line demarcating ADHD from normal. A huge percentage of the population, if not a majority, experiences increased focus and motivation when taking stimulants. We’re all just trying to make the best of what we’ve got. If the benefits outweigh the risks, there’s not much sense in trying formalize a “fair/not fair” level of focus and motivation.
jswrenn 5y ago
Buried amidst the sensationalism of people "popping pills" at the behest of their psychiatrists is the real lede: > [...] the Drug Enforcement Administration decides how much can be sold for the entire country. And the DEA has dropped its allowed quotas. In 2016, it allowed 50,000 kilograms to be sold; but for 2022, it has lowered the amount to 41,200 kilograms. [...] All of which is leading some people to buy illegal Adderall, which goes by the street name of “Adderall.” [...] Some wind up with fentanyl-laced Adderall. This is unconscionable. These shortages inflict tremendous anxiety upon those who rely on amphetamines to treat their ADHD. As anyone who is prescribed amphetamines can confirm: effective treatment is very sensitive to dosage, and unplanned pauses in treatment Really Suck. A few months ago, my local CVS told me to either transfer my prescription, or come back the following month — they had reached their procurement quota. Last month, it took me two weeks to get to the front of their wait-list and get my prescription filled. What choices does this leave patients who are unable to easily get to other pharmacies? At best, they're compelled to override the judgement of their care providers and either ration or entirely skip doses. At worst (or so this article claims) it pushes patients onto the black market. A quick google search suggests that amphetamine shortages stretch back years. I feel immensely lucky to have lived in unaffected locales up until recently, and I feel immense anxiety to discover that my present locale is plagued by shortages with no end in sight.
AtlasBarfed 5y ago
Oh it's an LA problem? Right, this drug is perfect for high output coding obviously. I've never tried it, have adhd, and always wondered about Pandora's box.

38 points by danso 5y ago

"Or work-at-home ADHD." That is not what ADHD is... ADHD is not lack of focus, it's lack of control over focus. It's issues with regulating emotion. Issues with impulsiveness. etc.

Spivak 5y ago
Trying to be charitable I think what they mean to say is “people with medically untreated ADHD who have been managing their symptoms with structure and routine finding their strategies failing in a new environment they have less control over.”
- q_andrew 5y ago
  Given the context, it also might be a sarcastic illustration of people's misunderstanding of ADHD as a sporadic condition instead of a neurological disorder.
- kayodelycaon 5y ago
  The article makes no attempt to define ADHD or even say it's a valid diagnosis in adults. In fact, it implies otherwise.
ajkjk 5y ago
No, but it can make ADHD / ADHD tendencies a lot harder to deal with.

unixhero 5y ago

Adderall isn't particularly addictive.

veonik 5y ago
Methamphetamine isn't addictive? I realize that the war on drugs really skews perspectives, so maybe I'm way out of touch, but I'm _pretty_ sure it is extremely addictive. Can you provide some citations please?
- jokowueu 5y ago
  Adderall isn't meth . You are thinking of desoxyn
- renewiltord 5y ago
  Can you provide some citations that methamphetamine is in Adderall?
- srean 5y ago
  My dad used to take non-prescription meth during his student days for better focus (this was way before Adderall). He did not have any addiction problem with it and used it only as a performance enhancer, like before exams. He could and did discontinue at will. Our family life was and is as normal and balanced as it gets. He turned out to be a decorated scientist. He is in his 80s now and has no known health issues related to meth. Just an anecdote, but there it is. I suspect much of the harm caused by meth is not by the meth itself but the impurities and contaminants that result from synthesizing them at under-equipped (both in terms of know-how and physical equipment) home labs.
pastrami_panda 5y ago
I just googled it and every source I saw indicates otherwise.
- jokowueu 5y ago
  i can provide a comparison of sorts . cigs are harder to quit than adderall but caffiene is easier to quit than adderall . obviously im talking about prescribed doses.
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- kayodelycaon 5y ago
  Adderall is not dangerously addictive at therapeutic levels. It's no worse than caffeine.
  - dwaltrip 5y ago
    Caffeine is decently addictive? I can’t remember the last day I didn’t have a cup.
    - kayodelycaon 5y ago
      The withdrawal period is less than a month: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caffeine_dependence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caffeine_dependence
      - maxlamb 5y ago
        But isn’t a month a long time? The detox period for heroin is around a week as far as I know
        bladegash 5y ago
        It’s not quite the same kind of withdrawal. I routinely take weeks long breaks from Adderall and while I am a bit more tired and definitely less productive, it’s not like you get physically ill. There really isn’t much in the way of withdrawal and anecdotally, what symptoms there may be don’t last longer than two weeks.
MrMan 5y ago
having never taken it, I agree, I dont crave it. you know who cant kick it? my many former co-workers and boss who were addicted to it

renewiltord 5y ago

You can use an online service to get these these days. I think if we roll back COVID online prescription allowances it’ll be an interesting lock-in mechanism for current users. Big fan of easing access to pharma without standard gatekeeping.

Spivak 5y ago
Yeah it’s kinda a weird situation where we moralize stimulants and only prescribe them to people when it’s medically necessary despite it actually being safe for basically everyone when monitored by your doctor. Like this gatekeeping makes is an absolute PITA for me because I do have ADHD and have to jump through so many hoops just to maintain my prescription because the war on drugs or something. Like we don’t make some guy prove that their ED is debilitating and get psychologists notes and make them get blood tests constantly to make sure they’re taking it to get viagra, the only standard is “can you take it without messing up your health.” If you made this stuff accessible to anyone who wants it there would suddenly be no reason to worry that ADHD patients are selling it on the side.
- krapht 5y ago
  I don't think it was just "muh War on Drugs" Stimulants, especially crack cocaine, caused loads of crime in the 80s. I mean, it even does today - addicts crush and snort Adderall all the time for the high. It's the 5% of the population with addictive personalities that ruins it for everyone else.
  - netizen-936824 5y ago
    >Stimulants, especially crack cocaine, caused loads of crime in the 80s. I mean, it even does today This is just more false reasoning pulled directly from the war on drugs
  - freeone3000 5y ago
    The only reason it "caused crime" was because the drugs were illegal. Most of the negative effects of criminal drug use are the criminal aspect, not the abuse aspect. Alcoholism is terrible, but, banning alcohol made the problems much much worse, and affect many more people, and resulted in an infamous amount of organized crime. That's where drugs are today. When you could get cocaine over the counter, and opium on the street corner, the addicts needed help, but it harmed society as a whole less -- and banning the substances did not reduce the number of addicts, simply interfered with their ability to get help.

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dncornholio 5y ago

> Before the pandemic, America was already gobbling up 83.1 percent of the global supply. But in December 2020, prescriptions for Adderall skyrocketed. So it was high before, but now even became higher? Something tells me when 1 country accounts for more than 80%, there is already something going very, very wrong. This has nothing to do with ADHD, this is a culture problem.

krapht 5y ago
Is it wrong? I don't think anyone is up in arms over coffee and cigarettes, and my personal experience is that Adderall is just caffeine without so many side-effects. Incidentally, coffee and cigarettes is how I managed before getting a prescription.
- dncornholio 5y ago
  It's amphetamines.. It's doing way more to your body than some caffeine I can spot someone on adderal from miles, it's not much different from people on speed.
  - rimunroe 5y ago
    > I can spot someone on adderal from miles That sounds like quite the superpower. How exactly can you tell?
    - erdos4d 5y ago
      In university I ran into a lot of people who did this stuff to get grades. Many straight up acted like tweakers. Super fast speech, tiny pupils, twitchy, sweaty, etc. I didn't realize it was so popular until like 30% of my classmates would be like this during exams.
      - dncornholio 5y ago
        Exactly, I can spot it immediately in the way they talk. You have to experienced it yourself before you be able to notice it with others. After I had a night full of amphetamines, the world opened up

gonehome 5y ago

I suspect everyone just performs better on amphetamines adhd or not. This was basically what erdos argued too iirc. I’ve been curious about it since I’ve never tried it but many people I know have. I’d be curious how much better I would be able to focus/think with it.

BuckRogers 5y ago
Significantly. Though I'd argue you could come close or match it with sufficient willpower and conditioning your mind. It's just easy mode. I will say coming down off of it is twice as bad as the boost you gain from using it. Not worth it for that reason alone.
praptak 5y ago
The only reason I'm not taking it are reports from the users I know. The recurring theme is "soon you are unable to get up in the morning without your dose of speed".
- smabie 5y ago
  It's certainly addictive, but it's overblown imo. Like if you stop taking it after regular use you'll feel tired and have an adjustment period for a week or two, but it's not like it's gonna ruin you forever.
  - CSSer 5y ago
    You’re not generally wrong but I think it’s worth keeping in mind that this is going to depend on a combination of all sorts of factors in your personal health profile and the dosage you’ve been taking. It’s not just the addiction that is problematic. It’s the long-term consequences of the chronic side effects. We all know you need to sleep and to eat. This medication makes it harder to do both of those activities if not managed properly and thoroughly. Combine a failure to do that with long-term usage (abuse) and you've got a recipe for permanent damage on your hands that can cyclically reinforce that dependence. Here’s an anecdote. I did a group project with a guy in college who I got to talking with about it. He had one of these nightmare stories. He said he had to stop taking it because he was absolutely strung out. I asked him about his dosage and he told me he had been taking 80mg XR/day. I was unaware they even made dosages that high. He said that he didn’t realize it at the time but he just kept chasing the initial feeling (seems he didn’t understand the concept of tolerance), and his doctor responded by repeatedly titrating up his dosage. He was at that max dosage for about a year and a half. He said when he stopped he went through a months long phase of extreme depression and physical discomfort like he has never experienced in his life before. He shared some pretty brutal stuff with me. He said that it had been a year and he still didn’t feel like his old self. He said it was like his attention span was even shorter than before the medication and at this point he wasn’t sure if it would ever be the same.

999900000999 5y ago

If you want performance enhancing drugs, just admit it, and we can move to having it over the counter. I personally don't feel a need to take dangerous performance enhancing drugs, but I respect the rights of adults to make their choices. Legalize everything for those 21 or older.

renewiltord 5y ago
> … just admit it, and we can move to having it over the counter. Literally the worst strategy. There is one successful drug deregulation strategy in America: publish nonsense studies pointing at good healthcare outcomes then use that to wedge the drug into legality. “Just admitting it” would lead to a ban on it. Literally would be the dumbest thing to do.
rdtwo 5y ago
I don’t want it so available that everyone feels they have to use it to keep up with their coworkers
throwaway684936 5y ago
It's not mentally performance-enhancing in any significant way if don't have ADHD. If you have a "normal" brain, you get a psychological illusion of increased productivity.
- qgin 5y ago
  If the test of who has ADHD is checking who is more productive and focused after they take stimulants… then a very, very large percent of the population would quality.
  - throwaway684936 5y ago
    https://www.healthline.com/health-news/adderall-wont-give-your-brain-a-boost-if-you-dont-have-adhd#The-appeal-of-ADHD-drugs https://www.healthline.com/health-news/adderall-wont-give-yo... >New research finds ADHD medications like Adderall don’t improve cognition in healthy college students and may even impair the memory of those who abuse the drugs. ... >But how do these drugs respond differently to the brains of people with and without ADHD? Weyandt said that she believes the human brain might need to be at a deficit of some kind for drugs like these to work. If not, they could have a detrimental effect. >She said that neuroimaging research with people who have ADHD has found reduced activity — think blood flow — in parts of the brain associated with the condition’s symptoms when off medication. >Once given the proper medication, the activity increases in these regions of the brain, and ADHD symptoms go down. So a person with ADHD has an improved ability to pay attention, and shows improved memory, planning, and response inhibition, she said. >“Since we found the drug did not improve neurocognition and may negatively influence working memory, this may suggest a deficit is needed to benefit from the medication,” she added. “Furthermore, we have found in other studies that students who report significant ADHD symptoms are more likely to misuse stimulants.”

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q_andrew 5y ago

This is a good time to mention some things that should be more common knowledge: -Recreational use of prescription meds makes it vastly more difficult for people who actually need them. Especially when their condition causes an inability to schedule and coordinate. -Psychiatrically, recent studies are showing that neurotypical brains don't actually benefit much from stimulant medications (but the illusion of productivity can be a good placebo) https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0376871617302983 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S03768...

renewiltord 5y ago
Literally the easiest thing to get online. You can get a diagnosis, a prescription, and the drug in no time. There are so many providers. I put it off for ages but when I finally got around to it there was no shortage or whatever. This drug is easy to make; there’s lots of quantities; and we could make it less scarce really easily. There is no inherent law making it hard like there is one making colonizing another planet hard. It’s literally just regulation.

throwaway81523 5y ago

Scott Alexander had an interesting article about Adderall: https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/12/28/adderall-risks-much-more-than-you-wanted-to-know/ https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/12/28/adderall-risks-much-mo...

bdcravens 5y ago

A freelancing client, wanting me to work faster, offered me Adderall. Needless to say things soured quickly (that wasn't the only reason) and I gave them all their money back.

philg_jr 5y ago

Just like the majority of things in life, moderation is the important part. I was diagnosed with ADHD as a teen, and took adderall to deal with it and get through school. In my 30s, I continue with taking it in reasonable doses, with breaks occasionally. It helps me focus when I want, and I have no known side effects except for a lack of appetite after taking it. 10mg still gives me the same effect as it did when I was a kid. Amphetamines are useful when applied correctly in the correct dosages. Like the majority of drugs out there. Step aside doctors, let the pharmacists do their jobs.

frazbin 5y ago

I'm told that microdosing Adderall isn't a bad idea-- just take between 5 and 20 of the little balls in there. Amphetamine's effects are super non linear, and this cuts the side effects.

trafficante 5y ago
This is my experience as well. I’ve been taking it for the better part of 20 years - dabbling in various dosages of XR and Ritalin in an attempt to nail down an optimal therapeutic dose - and my conclusion has been that (for me) nothing works nearly as well as frequent microdosing of IR. As an aside: One aspect of Adderall that doesn’t get nearly enough attention outside forums/subreddits is that the generics seem to have wildly different effects/potency depending on the manufacturer. I highly recommend others with ADHD that are prescribed to Adderall IR try to experiment switching around generics if possible.

eyelidlessness 5y ago

I had to stop reading the article. Even if it might have some redeeming content further on, the title and first few paragraphs are preposterous. I got an ADHD diagnosis as an adult, albeit before the pandemic. The diagnosis itself has been a huge revelation about many aspects of my life, my mind, several things I would never have understood as connected… and it saved my life. I’m not “hooked” on adderall—at least not in the sense of a drug seeking addict. Nor am I “crazy”. I’m fucking chemically imbalanced. And no one who isn’t is going to feel calmed or feel their anxiety relieved by amphetamines.

to1y 5y ago
>no one who isn’t(crazy) is going to feel calmed or feel their anxiety relieved by amphetamines. This is false. Pretty much all people will experience a higher level of focus, calmer(less racing thoughts) on amphetamines.
- eyelidlessness 5y ago
  I have a hard time reading this “correction” as intended in good faith, you would have to have misread every aspect of what you’re responding to. But I’ll respond in good faith because it’s important to me that people are not misled on this, intentionally or otherwise. First of all, I did not mean ‘no one who isn’t(crazy)’, I meant no one who is not chemically imbalanced such that they will benefit from an amphetamine prescription. Second of all, none of my comment had anything to do with the benefits for focus or racing thoughts. When I mentioned feeling calmed and anxiety relief, those were speaking to the same benefit for ADHD patients. Amphetamines are stimulants. Heightened energy and anxiety are generally their most common side effects, just as with caffeine. People with ADHD typically (but not always) experience the opposite effect, at least up to their optimal dosage. More to the point, and I hope this will help clarify the overall scope of my comment: ADHD—despite the name, reputation, and many diagnostic criteria—is far more than either a deficit of attention or hyperactivity. When I say my diagnosis and treatment saved my life, I mean from the effects of traumatically crippling anxiety. I had never even wondered if I had the stereotypical ADHD symptoms. I had to work with my psychiatrists to translate the diagnostic criteria into relevant experiences with intense sensory overload, hyperfocus/hyperfixation, anxiety and depression, social problems. If it weren’t for me making the connection to sensory overload, I never would have even had the conversation with a doctor in the first place. I’d be trying—and likely failing—to find the right combination of SSRI and benzo. This is a very common story for a lot of people diagnosed with ADHD as adults, mine just happened to be fairly extreme because I was drinking myself to death to self medicate the anxiety. Which… self medicating is another common outcome for undiagnosed adults. Anyway. All of that is to say, you’re not wrong that amphetamines tend to have a similar effect on focus for most people, at least to a point. But lacking “focus” in that productivity sense is really more of a clue than a primary symptom of ADHD. This misunderstanding is mostly rooted in the diagnostic criteria being oriented around adult descriptions of children’s behavior. Not the actual patient’s experience in their own words. If you ask people diagnosed as adults, or even children who haven’t internally stigmatized their own experiences, what ADHD is like… it often more closely lines up with a lot of experiences expressed by a lot of people with autism. And it’s not that trouble focusing is a complete red herring, it’s that why we have trouble focusing isn’t a part of the discussion. So yeah. People abuse Adderall to focus. Common trope, no argument here. Those people abusing it, unless they’re unaware they’re undiagnosed, generally feel like they’ve taken an upper. Because they have! People with ADHD often feel the opposite even at an optimal dose, and generally should expect to be able to sleep while it’s still active and noticeably effective. Many of us even get sleepy especially on lower doses. I spent months while I was stepping up in dosage where I would need a nap about an hour after taking my morning meds. That is not how people react without the chemical imbalance Adderall treats.

jbirer 5y ago

Because of the ignorance and paranoia of some people I have to source 4F-MPH from shady sources in order to self-medicate my ADHD. Thankfully I can get my work done now but I wish I could just get it safely from the pharmacy.

chrsig 5y ago

> It’s so weird. I’m not seeing that people are having a hard time getting benzos at CVS Probably because benzos are schedule IV, where as adderall is schedule II -- it's much more tightly controlled. > “Kids were staying home without a routine. It was easier to call a pediatrician and say, ‘Joey can’t focus on the computer with remote learning. Can you help?’ ” And the pediatrician would refer to a clinical psychologist to do a thorough evaluation, including looking at things like report cards, statements from parents about behavior, and quasi-empirical tests to gauge attention span. > Adderall is prescribed for ADHD, which was once diagnosed only in the prepubescent. Now adults are discovering they have ADHD. Or occasional ADHD. Or work-at-home ADHD. ...No, people are getting diagnosed with adhd. as far as I'm aware, diagnosis as an adult still requires that there was a manifestation before age 12, but adults need fewer criteria to meet a diagnosis. They're not discovering that they have adhd, they're being diagnosed with adhd by qualified professionals. This is drivel. > “If you were normally going to an office in a structured environment and now you’re working from home and have to focus, you’ve got a reason to be taking it,” says Lotano-Saba Lotano-Saba, a "vice president of pharmacy solutions at the global management consulting firm AArete", which is not a position granted with the trust to determine who meets diagnostic critera. > And if you’re also dealing with bored kids interrupting your Slack chats and Zoom meetings, you’ve got even more reason to seek a potion to help you focus. Yes, medicate the children so that you can focus. Don't think about their well being at all. (/s) > The only reason Ginsberg doesn’t have pills in her medicine cabinet anymore is that it got too expensive. Adderall, especially in this new shortage, is the Domaine du Romanée-Conti of prescription medication. Not only do you have to shell out for whatever your insurance doesn’t cover, but you also have to pay for a session with a psychiatrist every three months to get a new prescription Yes, healthcare in America is too expensive, and the cost of adderall is prohibitive to some people that might clinically benefit from it. It's quite unfortunate. And no, you don't need to see a psychiatrist every three months. Some GPs will prescribe after having a diagnosis by a clinical phsycologist. A psychiatrist specializing in adhd will better be able to help determine the best dosage, which specific medications might be beneficial based on observed side effects -- people react to focalin, ritalin, adderall, vyvanse, and others quite differently. The drugs also all vary in cost and how they'll be covered by insurance. > So Adderall has become a privilege of the L.A. elite. Yes, people abuse adderall, and it's made it more difficult for people that need it to live a healthy life. > Also, maybe, like inflation or something. This is surely a well researched article... > When I told a psychiatrist that I was late with this article and was thinking about trying Adderall to help me finish, he said incredulously, “You’ve never done Adderall?!” When I asked if I should lose my Adderall virginity, the respected psychiatrist paused and said, “Off the record? Definitely.” So the author saw an unprofessional psychiatrist? --- end of reading --- Look...It's just a drug. How many people are on antidepressants? You can't just stop taking those at the drop of a hat without a major depressive episode. Yes, taking too much adderall is bad. Taking too many antidepressants is also bad. Drinking too much alcohol is bad. Stigmatizing the drug, and the people that are impacted by a neuro-developmental disorder isn't doing any good for anyone. Aaand my executive functioning capacity has been used up, fuck this noise.

qgin 5y ago

I think people get too hung up on deciding who “really has” ADHD. It’s not a super meaningful exercise. There is no clean, black and white line demarcating ADHD from normal. A huge percentage of the population, if not a majority, experiences increased focus and motivation when taking stimulants. We’re all just trying to make the best of what we’ve got. If the benefits outweigh the risks, there’s not much sense in trying formalize a “fair/not fair” level of focus and motivation.

jswrenn 5y ago

Buried amidst the sensationalism of people "popping pills" at the behest of their psychiatrists is the real lede: > [...] the Drug Enforcement Administration decides how much can be sold for the entire country. And the DEA has dropped its allowed quotas. In 2016, it allowed 50,000 kilograms to be sold; but for 2022, it has lowered the amount to 41,200 kilograms. [...] All of which is leading some people to buy illegal Adderall, which goes by the street name of “Adderall.” [...] Some wind up with fentanyl-laced Adderall. This is unconscionable. These shortages inflict tremendous anxiety upon those who rely on amphetamines to treat their ADHD. As anyone who is prescribed amphetamines can confirm: effective treatment is very sensitive to dosage, and unplanned pauses in treatment Really Suck. A few months ago, my local CVS told me to either transfer my prescription, or come back the following month — they had reached their procurement quota. Last month, it took me two weeks to get to the front of their wait-list and get my prescription filled. What choices does this leave patients who are unable to easily get to other pharmacies? At best, they're compelled to override the judgement of their care providers and either ration or entirely skip doses. At worst (or so this article claims) it pushes patients onto the black market. A quick google search suggests that amphetamine shortages stretch back years. I feel immensely lucky to have lived in unaffected locales up until recently, and I feel immense anxiety to discover that my present locale is plagued by shortages with no end in sight.

AtlasBarfed 5y ago

Oh it's an LA problem? Right, this drug is perfect for high output coding obviously. I've never tried it, have adhd, and always wondered about Pandora's box.