4 ms·

Purely anecdotal, but I have observed very poor outcomes for people who started on ADHD medication when young. Maybe a biased sample, but having grown up now an

Purely anecdotal, but I have observed very poor outcomes for people who started on ADHD medication when young. Maybe a biased sample, but having grown up now and seen it, I believe those drugs are poison, especially when given to teenagers and younger.

epicureanideal 4y ago
What kind of outcomes? Please share, very interested.
- aliqot 4y ago
  Seems that the same ones who were put on these meds from a young age are the same ones who are most vocally suffering from anxiety and depression. Jury's out on whether the meds were because of substandard upbringing (kids acting up, get them meds or they're out of this magnet school), and whether that has an effect on the psyche later in life.
  - ldjkfkdsjnv 4y ago
    Always so many psychological problems. Heavy anxiety and depression, psychosis, social problems. Just maladjustment all over the place.
    - rodw 4y ago
      But those issues are highly correlated with ADHD itself. Why would you assume that stimulant medication is the cause? In fact, data suggest that the problems you observed probably would have been worse absent the stimulant medication. A treatment can be beneficial even if it doesn't completely eliminate the associated issues.
  - mtlmtlmtlmtl 4y ago
    This can just be selection bias, though. People with ADHD are much more predisposed to anxiety and mood disorders(also addiction and psychosis). Medicine can help, but they're not a silver bullet. So it could just be that the people you've noticed are just people who are more likely to develop these problems. And if you want an anecdatum, I have ADHD, unmedicated during most of my childhood, and I went to develop all of the above except for psychosis.
    - aliqot 4y ago
      > This can just be selection bias, though. Absolutely, you are correct. To be clear, that's 100% a hunch I just posted, based on no data or experience other than the people I have known that long who are now adults. Funny thing, a lot of them are deciding not to medicate their children.
    - rodw 4y ago
      ADHD has a ~30% rate of comorbidity (some sources say as high as 40% to 60%) with both anxiety and depression (and, as you note, is also correlated with other issues such as bipolar disorder and substance abuse). Moreover, delayed diagnosis ADHD is even _more_ correlated with issues like anxiety than the ADHD population in general. If you think about it, that outcome is predicable: a lifetime of experiencing the kinds of problems created by executive dysfunction (especially with little or no understanding or explanation of the phenomenon) is a perfect breeding ground for anxiety or depression or both. I'm not sure if the same statement is true for diagnosed but untreated ADHD, but certainly seems plausible.
mtlmtlmtlmtl 4y ago
Definitely biased. In patients with ADHD, childhood treatment has been strongly correlated with better outcomes in long term studies.
pugz 4y ago
How do the outcomes compare to people with ADHD who were unmedicated? It's possible that the medicated outcomes are poor and yet still better than the unmedicated outcomes.
- ldjkfkdsjnv 4y ago
  I'm just saying I have a number of cousins, friends, etc who have been on them a long time. Very few of them completed college, have a career. A lot of them have anxiety, depression, and general maladjustment. If thats what they got out of the medication then they got nothing, they would have been better off spending their youth sober and healthy.
  - andymboyle 4y ago
    I mean, it's a neurodevelopmental disorder that makes it hard for people to accomplish tasks. And what you're describing just seem like all the symptoms people with ADHD would have. This isn't a perfect analogy, but it's kind of like saying a guy isn't a great runner because he tore his ACL and surgeons fixed it but it's still messed up, and saying he should've just never gotten the surgery. You're blaming the medication when people with ADHD are already predisposed to not being able to complete things, have normal careers, and are at high risk for anxiety, depression and other things. You're just seeing what ADHD looks like.
  - taeric 4y ago
    You likely have some cousins, friends, etc that have had much harder lives than you appreciate. Especially if you view this as not being sober... Correctly medicated ADHD people should not in any way compared to drugged or drunken people.
  - eurasiantiger 4y ago
    Yes, having major difficulties concentrating on school or work tends to cause anxiety, depression and maladjustment. Stimulant medications are not a cure, but they do improve quality of life in ADHD patients compared to baseline.
- 4y ago
triggercut 4y ago
Do you know if they were using other forms of treatment alongside medication? Or was medication their only treatment?
rayiner 4y ago
Outcomes for people with untreated ADHD are really bad. Something like half the prison population has ADHD, compared to under 5% of the general public. https://add.org/undiagnosed-adult-adhd-a-high-cost-for-society/ https://add.org/undiagnosed-adult-adhd-a-high-cost-for-socie...
andymboyle 4y ago
Very anecdotal here, but I wouldn't be the successful person I am had I not been given medication when I was young, starting in third grade. Night and day difference when I was on it. The medication made me a functioning person who could pay attention and do what I was supposed to do. However, my doctors treated me with medication _and_ had me go to a therapist for cognitive behavioral therapy. The medication helped me learn to slow down my mind, be able to focus when I normally couldn't, and develop the coping skills that allowed me to function that I was learning in therapy. My doctors also had never planned for the medication to be long term for me. It was a tool to help the therapy take hold. I was on it for about five or six years, slowly weaning me off in 7th grade once I'd developed the proper skills. I haven't taken any of that medication since then. I don't think many paired it with therapy back then. Maybe they still don't. But I use those tools I developed in Therapist Bob's office all those years ago on a daily basis. I never could've paid attention to what that man was saying had I not been on medication. Saved my life.
ericmcer 4y ago
I love stimulants for my ADHD, but totally agree that my friends taking them while we were growing up had pretty negative outcomes. One friend was taking 2 20mg pills a day as a 100lb 13 year old while I am taking 10mg a few times a week. The idea of pumping that much into a developing person and never letting their brain have a break from it is insane. They are noticeably spacey as an adult to the point where I am not super comfortable driving with them. Running stop signs and red lights is a frequent occurrence.
- rodw 4y ago
  > my friends taking them while we were growing up had pretty negative outcomes. Or - hear me out - maybe severe ADHD, the kind that leads to diagnosis and treatment with stimulant medication at a very young age, is correlated with negative outcomes in general. You know, like a disability. The number of people willing to believe - contrary to actual peer reviewed studies - that stimulant medication is harmful to people with ADHD, based on nothing more than a gut feeling, is astounding. People don't assume they can just intuit the proper treatment for other medical conditions, why do they think they can do that with mental health related issues?
  - ldjkfkdsjnv 4y ago
    I mean look, I can see it with my own two eyes. The gauntness in their face, the effect it has on their emotions over years of use. Knowing someone and seeing them go down hill and struggle, and then be better during the summers when they are off it.
    - rodw 4y ago
      I'm not asserting stimulant medications have no side effects. I am asserting that decades and decades of peer-reviewed medical literature indicates that stimulant medications are a net benefit for people with ADHD. This is not a controversial perspective among informed researchers or clinicians.
      - 4y ago
rodw 4y ago
> I have observed very poor outcomes for people who started on ADHD medication when young Relative to the outcome for those same people had they remained untreated, or a "control group" of people with ADHD who were untreated, or just relative to neurotypical/non-ADHD people in general? Maybe ADHD has a negative impact even when treated. > I believe those drugs are poison, especially when given to teenagers and younger. You're making a dangerously uninformed claim. Actual, non-anecdotal, peer-reviewed studies strongly suggest the opposite of your observation. Untreated ADHD can have profoundly negative consequences.

epicureanideal 4y ago

What kind of outcomes? Please share, very interested.

aliqot 4y ago
Seems that the same ones who were put on these meds from a young age are the same ones who are most vocally suffering from anxiety and depression. Jury's out on whether the meds were because of substandard upbringing (kids acting up, get them meds or they're out of this magnet school), and whether that has an effect on the psyche later in life.
- ldjkfkdsjnv 4y ago
  Always so many psychological problems. Heavy anxiety and depression, psychosis, social problems. Just maladjustment all over the place.
  - rodw 4y ago
    But those issues are highly correlated with ADHD itself. Why would you assume that stimulant medication is the cause? In fact, data suggest that the problems you observed probably would have been worse absent the stimulant medication. A treatment can be beneficial even if it doesn't completely eliminate the associated issues.
- mtlmtlmtlmtl 4y ago
  This can just be selection bias, though. People with ADHD are much more predisposed to anxiety and mood disorders(also addiction and psychosis). Medicine can help, but they're not a silver bullet. So it could just be that the people you've noticed are just people who are more likely to develop these problems. And if you want an anecdatum, I have ADHD, unmedicated during most of my childhood, and I went to develop all of the above except for psychosis.
  - aliqot 4y ago
    > This can just be selection bias, though. Absolutely, you are correct. To be clear, that's 100% a hunch I just posted, based on no data or experience other than the people I have known that long who are now adults. Funny thing, a lot of them are deciding not to medicate their children.
  - rodw 4y ago
    ADHD has a ~30% rate of comorbidity (some sources say as high as 40% to 60%) with both anxiety and depression (and, as you note, is also correlated with other issues such as bipolar disorder and substance abuse). Moreover, delayed diagnosis ADHD is even _more_ correlated with issues like anxiety than the ADHD population in general. If you think about it, that outcome is predicable: a lifetime of experiencing the kinds of problems created by executive dysfunction (especially with little or no understanding or explanation of the phenomenon) is a perfect breeding ground for anxiety or depression or both. I'm not sure if the same statement is true for diagnosed but untreated ADHD, but certainly seems plausible.

mtlmtlmtlmtl 4y ago

Definitely biased. In patients with ADHD, childhood treatment has been strongly correlated with better outcomes in long term studies.

pugz 4y ago

How do the outcomes compare to people with ADHD who were unmedicated? It's possible that the medicated outcomes are poor and yet still better than the unmedicated outcomes.

ldjkfkdsjnv 4y ago
I'm just saying I have a number of cousins, friends, etc who have been on them a long time. Very few of them completed college, have a career. A lot of them have anxiety, depression, and general maladjustment. If thats what they got out of the medication then they got nothing, they would have been better off spending their youth sober and healthy.
- andymboyle 4y ago
  I mean, it's a neurodevelopmental disorder that makes it hard for people to accomplish tasks. And what you're describing just seem like all the symptoms people with ADHD would have. This isn't a perfect analogy, but it's kind of like saying a guy isn't a great runner because he tore his ACL and surgeons fixed it but it's still messed up, and saying he should've just never gotten the surgery. You're blaming the medication when people with ADHD are already predisposed to not being able to complete things, have normal careers, and are at high risk for anxiety, depression and other things. You're just seeing what ADHD looks like.
- taeric 4y ago
  You likely have some cousins, friends, etc that have had much harder lives than you appreciate. Especially if you view this as not being sober... Correctly medicated ADHD people should not in any way compared to drugged or drunken people.
- eurasiantiger 4y ago
  Yes, having major difficulties concentrating on school or work tends to cause anxiety, depression and maladjustment. Stimulant medications are not a cure, but they do improve quality of life in ADHD patients compared to baseline.
4y ago

triggercut 4y ago

Do you know if they were using other forms of treatment alongside medication? Or was medication their only treatment?

rayiner 4y ago

Outcomes for people with untreated ADHD are really bad. Something like half the prison population has ADHD, compared to under 5% of the general public. https://add.org/undiagnosed-adult-adhd-a-high-cost-for-society/ https://add.org/undiagnosed-adult-adhd-a-high-cost-for-socie...

andymboyle 4y ago

Very anecdotal here, but I wouldn't be the successful person I am had I not been given medication when I was young, starting in third grade. Night and day difference when I was on it. The medication made me a functioning person who could pay attention and do what I was supposed to do. However, my doctors treated me with medication _and_ had me go to a therapist for cognitive behavioral therapy. The medication helped me learn to slow down my mind, be able to focus when I normally couldn't, and develop the coping skills that allowed me to function that I was learning in therapy. My doctors also had never planned for the medication to be long term for me. It was a tool to help the therapy take hold. I was on it for about five or six years, slowly weaning me off in 7th grade once I'd developed the proper skills. I haven't taken any of that medication since then. I don't think many paired it with therapy back then. Maybe they still don't. But I use those tools I developed in Therapist Bob's office all those years ago on a daily basis. I never could've paid attention to what that man was saying had I not been on medication. Saved my life.

ericmcer 4y ago

I love stimulants for my ADHD, but totally agree that my friends taking them while we were growing up had pretty negative outcomes. One friend was taking 2 20mg pills a day as a 100lb 13 year old while I am taking 10mg a few times a week. The idea of pumping that much into a developing person and never letting their brain have a break from it is insane. They are noticeably spacey as an adult to the point where I am not super comfortable driving with them. Running stop signs and red lights is a frequent occurrence.

rodw 4y ago
> my friends taking them while we were growing up had pretty negative outcomes. Or - hear me out - maybe severe ADHD, the kind that leads to diagnosis and treatment with stimulant medication at a very young age, is correlated with negative outcomes in general. You know, like a disability. The number of people willing to believe - contrary to actual peer reviewed studies - that stimulant medication is harmful to people with ADHD, based on nothing more than a gut feeling, is astounding. People don't assume they can just intuit the proper treatment for other medical conditions, why do they think they can do that with mental health related issues?
- ldjkfkdsjnv 4y ago
  I mean look, I can see it with my own two eyes. The gauntness in their face, the effect it has on their emotions over years of use. Knowing someone and seeing them go down hill and struggle, and then be better during the summers when they are off it.
  - rodw 4y ago
    I'm not asserting stimulant medications have no side effects. I am asserting that decades and decades of peer-reviewed medical literature indicates that stimulant medications are a net benefit for people with ADHD. This is not a controversial perspective among informed researchers or clinicians.
    - 4y ago

rodw 4y ago

> I have observed very poor outcomes for people who started on ADHD medication when young Relative to the outcome for those same people had they remained untreated, or a "control group" of people with ADHD who were untreated, or just relative to neurotypical/non-ADHD people in general? Maybe ADHD has a negative impact even when treated. > I believe those drugs are poison, especially when given to teenagers and younger. You're making a dangerously uninformed claim. Actual, non-anecdotal, peer-reviewed studies strongly suggest the opposite of your observation. Untreated ADHD can have profoundly negative consequences.