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FDA approves new ADHD drug for children

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Re: FDA approves new ADHD drug for children

#121

If you're considering taking drugs for ADHD or giving them to your child, I highly recommend reading into Fen-Phen (1) and other popular, contested drugs. Fen-Phen was a drug marketed to housewives in the 70s that promised weight loss and increased energy. My grandma suffered heart issues later in life due to it. It's since had 13B in settlements brought against it. Purdue Pharma will likely see 10B+ in settlements b…

Statistically, if you are diagnosed with ADHD, treatment actually significantly increases your life expectancy.

If I'm understanding this correctly, are you saying that untreated ADHD is more likely to result in suicide?

Re: FDA approves new ADHD drug for children

#122

Seems that lots of people only think ADHD people have a hard time paying attention. If it was that simple I would be so happy. Here are just a few of the things I struggle with. - Will power. People with ADHD struggle sooooo much with will power. It’s a constant struggle with everything in life and really wears you down. - Constantly putting on a fake front pretending you don’t have ADHD. - Rejection sensitivity - Fe…

Heavy meditation practice helps a lot with all other points if you have the time.

Progresses are VERY slow but steady (even slower given the lack of will power), but quality of life improves dramatically over years. I even stopped micro-dosing because I didn't need it anymore.

The sooner you start, the better, given the time scale. You don't change something that deep in a few weeks, and you may slack off, give up or back track many times.

I'll advice Vipassana because I have experience with it, it's light on the religious aspects and you have centers to teach it pretty much every where. Anyway, don't try on your own, it's even harder alone.

Re: FDA approves new ADHD drug for children

#123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And the rest of your comment is pretty much the story of my life give or take a few degrees. It's always a small relief to know other people who have/had the same challenges. Thank you.

It was so much a relief to me too, and I’m glad I could help in that way. I’ll also tell you it saved my life. I had coped pretty well for years, but for a variety of reasons it deteriorated. I was in such bad shape before I sought diagnosis/treatment. Not saying that’s where you’re at but just validating that it can be seriously debilitating. Please feel free to reach out (same handle everywhere, personal site link…

> also if you do want to reach out and it feels daunting in any way, you can literally just say “HN” or any other recognizable thing

Talk about empathy in action. That was a really caring touch.

Re: FDA approves new ADHD drug for children

#124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was so much a relief to me too, and I’m glad I could help in that way. I’ll also tell you it saved my life. I had coped pretty well for years, but for a variety of reasons it deteriorated. I was in such bad shape before I sought diagnosis/treatment. Not saying that’s where you’re at but just validating that it can be seriously debilitating. Please feel free to reach out (same handle everywhere, personal site link…

Thank you very much for the offer. I feel like I'm on the other side of the worst of my troubles, but it has been a long road.

Cheers to the other side! The offer stands, if you ever want it.

Re: FDA approves new ADHD drug for children

#125

Seems that lots of people only think ADHD people have a hard time paying attention. If it was that simple I would be so happy. Here are just a few of the things I struggle with. - Will power. People with ADHD struggle sooooo much with will power. It’s a constant struggle with everything in life and really wears you down. - Constantly putting on a fake front pretending you don’t have ADHD. - Rejection sensitivity - Fe…

None of you ever want to hear it, but everyone goes through this. It’s the human condition. I’m an addict, and I’ve just justified with Herculean levels of mental gymnastics to keep abusing drugs/alcohol. There’s nothing you can say to me, I will convince myself it’s fine. Edit: I spent most of my youth playing video games for 5+ hours daily. I had zero work ethic. It caught up to me and I worked hard to fix it, and…

ADHDers do work hard, it's just that we need to work around our brains sometimes.

I got straight A's in middle school but when I started in high school my grades started slipping. I got diagnosed after 2 years and just by understanding more about my brain and talking to other ADHDers my grades skyrocketed. In college I'm coasting on straight A's again.

After 3ish years diagnosed, I still haven't found any medication that works for me without ramping my anxiety through the roof (with anything school related), but I've found it amazingly helpful when I'm not stressed out. You might wonder what I'm using adderall for if not for school, but for me it just helps my mental state and makes interacting with people and just generally living easier since I'm not constantly distracted.

I'm lucky enough that my ADHD isn't too severe and I've had good enough teachers to make it through most classes. I'm also lucky that I can pretty intensely hyperfocus on coding except for off weeks where I just wanna skate or play video games or read or whatever else. My github squares tell a story.

You admit to doing mental gymnastics to keep your addictions justified and I think this is an example of you trying to convince yourself that your problem is common. Maybe you should get some help

Re: FDA approves new ADHD drug for children

#126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your response perfectly sums up why ADHD confuses me. It seems to be very poorly defined, and from what I understand being diagnosed is practically still self-diagnosis because the doctor will ask you questions about your behaviour and judge whether you have ADHD or not based on that. Looking at the CDC website on ADHD [0] and without trying to force things to fit, I easily meet the criteria for inattention. Yet a lo…

> It seems to be very poorly defined, and from what I understand being diagnosed is practically still self-diagnosis because the doctor will ask you questions about your behaviour and judge whether you have ADHD or not based on that. This seems pretty par for the course. A doctor asking you questions and then deciding whether or not you meet some threshold based on the answers to those questions is a large part of me…

To add onto this there’s also lengthy cognitive testing (usually about 6-8 hours of tests) that is much more precise. My understanding from talking to my psychiatrist is that there are certain traits, such as reaction speed, that are correlated extremely strongly with ADHD. Usually patients with ADHD will test averagely on most of the cognitive tests and then perform several standard deviations below average on exactly those tests.

Re: FDA approves new ADHD drug for children

#127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a great start. I’ll add some more: - Other common mental health issues like anxiety and depression. I experience both chronically, treating my ADHD is currently the only management I need, nothing else has ever worked. - Sensory sensitivity including overload, confusion, neurological disorders. Hyperacusis and auditory processing disorder are my main issues. I just learned this past weekend that tinnitus may…

How does one treat chronic anxiety? Xanax has a miracle reputation but like all other benzos it is said to only works temporarily as a hotfix, then you build up tolerance and you go back to your baseline Pre Xanax (or worse). What is very frustrating about such explanations is that I can't tell if it exactly put you back to your pre Xanax era or if after tolerance builds up (for a same dose) you are better than befor…

For me, a mixture of minimum doses of Ritalin & Modafinil helps (doctor prescribed).

Re: FDA approves new ADHD drug for children

#128

Seems that lots of people only think ADHD people have a hard time paying attention. If it was that simple I would be so happy. Here are just a few of the things I struggle with. - Will power. People with ADHD struggle sooooo much with will power. It’s a constant struggle with everything in life and really wears you down. - Constantly putting on a fake front pretending you don’t have ADHD. - Rejection sensitivity - Fe…

How do you reconcile this with the observation that seemingly every single child in the United States is diagnosed with this condition and prescribed drugs to treat it? Watching from Europe, where roughly nobody is diagnosed with it nor prescribed drugs to treat it, I’m always baffled, fascinated and horrified watching Americans talk about it.

Re: FDA approves new ADHD drug for children

#129

Seems that lots of people only think ADHD people have a hard time paying attention. If it was that simple I would be so happy. Here are just a few of the things I struggle with. - Will power. People with ADHD struggle sooooo much with will power. It’s a constant struggle with everything in life and really wears you down. - Constantly putting on a fake front pretending you don’t have ADHD. - Rejection sensitivity - Fe…

In what way are all these things related to ADHD? I've previously thought I might have ADHD to some degree (Never been diagnosed though) since pieces like that article felt somewhat familiar to me. I would say I can relate to most of your list, but they don't really seem to be caused by ADHD to me. Or maybe I do have ADHD and that's why I can relate. I have no clue.

All of them are related to the executive functioning subsystem in the brain, located in prefrontal cortex.

Re: FDA approves new ADHD drug for children

#130

Seems that lots of people only think ADHD people have a hard time paying attention. If it was that simple I would be so happy. Here are just a few of the things I struggle with. - Will power. People with ADHD struggle sooooo much with will power. It’s a constant struggle with everything in life and really wears you down. - Constantly putting on a fake front pretending you don’t have ADHD. - Rejection sensitivity - Fe…

None of you ever want to hear it, but everyone goes through this. It’s the human condition. I’m an addict, and I’ve just justified with Herculean levels of mental gymnastics to keep abusing drugs/alcohol. There’s nothing you can say to me, I will convince myself it’s fine. Edit: I spent most of my youth playing video games for 5+ hours daily. I had zero work ethic. It caught up to me and I worked hard to fix it, and…

Your comment is akin to people who don't have clinical depression who say things like, "Everybody goes through that. After my brother died I was a wreck for weeks, but life goes on and I just had to buck up." Or people who dismiss ME/CFS saying "You have chronic fatigue? Who doesn't? I have to drink three cups of coffee before I can get anything done."
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