281–290 of 455 posts
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Yes, but in the long run amphetamines will do significant damage to your health.
I am not professionally employable without ADHD medication. I'm willing to that risk for roughly $3m in career earnings.
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>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…
I'm a parent who's scared about my child's potential need for this. We're just entering the diagnosis pipeline now. I'd like to give you an opportunity to convince me that I shouldn't be resisting that sort of thing, which is my (admittedly somewhat unfounded) reaction.
I do appreciate and understand that ADHD tends to be over-diagnosed to children due to them being... children.
I don't necessarily know what I would've done if I had been in my parent's shoes beyond actually listening, being empathetic and using my adult knowledge of the world to help. They took the meds away before I even got used to them and that was the end of meds until I got them myself last year (16 years later).
There is a whole pit of co-morbid issues in my adolescence that I believe being a considerate parent would entirely avoid. I can't definitively say that ADHD was the one thing that changed my life trajectory or made me bad at my day-to-day schooling.
I am not a doctor but I can't see the harm in starting low to get your kid into building an organizational system, study habits, learning what helps them work best, etc, so they can hopefully come / stay off the meds. No one wants to be medicated for life, not even doctors want you on any medication forever; the less you can put in, the better. Meds may not be needed, meds may be needed. It entirely depends on how much your kid is struggling, what kind of relationship you have (do they feel they can trust you and say bluntly what they need and are struggling with, is that something they are emotionally capable of voicing, etc.).
Medication isn't a panacea obviously and if you can help your kid get organized, both of you feel they can stay on top of work according to what's reasonable for their age and listen to them with patience and empathy, that will likely be as much as you can do as their parent.
My parents had high standards for me but rather than asking "how can we help? what do you need?" kindly and being someone I could rely on for help, they would scream at me and say various things that seemed helpful ("You're not average, average isn't good enough") but just ingrained that I was broken and worthless because I was trying, I was doing as much as I could and still wasn't making it.
The only reason I got diagnosed as a kid was that my brother was being diagnosed at the same time. There was no concern for me individually, it was a 'package deal' of pushing all the kids through the pipeline to figure out what was 'wrong with us'.
I am ranting now... :)
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Not to assume, but I figured I'd include this because this is _my_ next mental health adventure of figuring out officially: ADHD is co-morbid with Asperger's. The two also have many cross-overs (emotional sensitivity, sensory issues, seeming aloof, etc.) so it's worth a mention to totally rule out or gain a better context of how to give your kid the best shot. Asperger's is not at all an awful sentence of misery and awfulness to not be caught until later. Both ADHD and ASD are better 'caught' early obviously, so you and others can help create support systems to improve quality-of-life.
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I feel like my parents viewed parenting as factory line; each kid gets the same input and we expect the same output; if we don't get the same output, the kid is broken not your parenting style. Maybe this is just good parenting, but I would encourage you to consider the perspective of meeting each one (assuming you have multiple!) where they are at individually rather than where you or others expect them to be. Something I wish my parents had done was tell anyone and everyone to "fuck off" with their expectations rather than tossing me under the bus for being 'weird'.
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The other thing your are not that well adapted for is parenthood (lots of getting shit together and going someplace on a schedule) and that is harder to take a break from
Do you really need to do that on a weekend though?
> 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…
The pop-science definition of ADHD has started to stray very far from the science. There’s a growing tendency for newly diagnosed ADHD patients to try to explain all of their mental habits and preferences through the lens of ADHD. Some times they have helpful feedback for other people with similar habits, but other times they just paint ADHD with an overly broad brush. They often have unrealistically lofty ideals of…
I've noticed this a lot on the ADHD forums. Agreed, it's uncomfortable to read.
Personally, I'm very embarrassed and ashamed of my ADHD (hence the throwaway account here), so I try to minimise what I consider its scope as much as I can. When I was eventually diagnosed, even though I sought out being investigated for ADHD, I was disappointed! I said to the psychiatrist, I was hoping you'd tell me it's something else. But no, it was ADHD, and the medication does help.
Also if I am explaining it to someone for whatever reason, I'll make sure to point out that it might be a reason for some things, but not an excuse. I hate the thought of not taking responsibility. I mean, it's still my broken brain at fault, even if I didn't break it myself.
> 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 ther…
For me it was when I actually could motivate myself to do it... and then still didn't because of shiny external stimuli and daydreams. And a lot of "I know you're really upset, so I promise I'll get my act together and next time that you expect me to... wait... what were we talking about?"
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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 m…
Most common medical history items fall under something called CACI: Conditions AMEs Can Issue. (Yes, that's an acronym in an acronym. Welcome to the FAA. AME is the doctor you see for your flight physical, which you probably already know, but other readers might not.) The vast majority of folks walk out of their flight physicals with a medical certificate thanks to CACI. ADHD does not fall under CACI, and will trigge…
And yes, I do love acronyms in acronyms. My first job was in the government, the US gov't truly loves their acronyms.
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 tolera…
I don’t think I have ADHD but i want to take ADHD drugs to help with focusing. So I think I can be categorized as the Non-ADHD people.
I definitely feel an euphoric high when I take it, although it is less intense than MDMA, marijuana, or even alcohol.
You are correct to point out it doesn’t really help me focus more or improve performance. Its smart drug reputation is really misleading.
I found it less potent than coffee, which makes me very focused.
It’s most noticeable effectiveness is the suppression of my appetite and sleeplessness. When I am on it, I don’t feel hungry or sleepy at all.
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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
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
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 tolera…
I have been prescribed with methylphenidate last year. I don’t think I have ADHD but i want to take ADHD drugs to help with focusing. So I think I can be categorized as the Non-ADHD people. I definitely feel an euphoric high when I take it, although it is less intense than MDMA, marijuana, or even alcohol. You are correct to point out it doesn’t really help me focus more or improve performance. Its smart drug reputat…
I couldn’t work without drinking an insane amount of coffee, which makes me sleepless.
I plan to alternate between adhd drugs and caffeine.
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 tolera…
> Stimulant drugs do improve the ability (even without ADHD) to focus and pay attention. One function, which is reliably improved by stimulant medications, is sustained attention, or vigilance. Stimulants improve sustained, focused attention, but “selective attention” and “distractibility” may be worsened, possibly because of a drug induced increase in impulsivity. [1]
I currently take a small dose (5mg) of Evekeo with only very mild side effects. On 30mg of Adderall XR I felt some euphoria for the first two weeks and the insomnia was pretty bad for the first week or so.