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Ritalin Gone Wrong

nytimes.com

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Re: Ritalin Gone Wrong

#131

Post by watmough »

jdefr89 wrote: post #18

I am currently on two medications. VyVanse for ADD and Anafranil for OCD. As far as effectiveness, yes the medication is helpful at the beginning. However, after being on it for two years the effect of the drugs wear off and you end up doubling your dose . That seems to be the pattern with all the medications I take, even those not concerned with ADD . Honestly I really improve my productivity through therapy related…

If it's not too personal, can you outline some of your OCD symptoms and behaviors?

Re: Ritalin Gone Wrong

#132

Post by bluemetal »

hop wrote: post #19

I have a real problem labeling 10 year olds that get bored and fidgety in boring situations with having a brain disorder and giving them speed. Find me 10 successful entreprenuers and I bet I can show you 10 people who had a tough time sitting through unengaging lesson plans in school. Doesn't help with ballooning class sizes either.

That is a broken argument. Are you trying to suggest ADHD doesn't exist?

Not being able to sit still is only one of multiple symptoms (from only one of the two categories - inattentive and hyperactive) used to diagnose people with one of several different sub-types of ADHD. (ADHD-HI, ADHD-PI, ADHD-C)

You need a certain minimum of symptoms for diagnosis.

Right now I have a strong pain in my left shoulder, I'm sure I am not alone in this right now of all the people in the world. I bet some of your successful entrepreneurs have had shoulder pain before. When it turns out I am not having a heart attack, and that all those entrepreneurs were not having a heart attack, would you think it correct to suggest that heart attacks aren't real? That is pretty much what you said above.

And beyond that, you need more then just a certain number of symptoms for a diagnosis of a disorder like this. There must be negative effects to your disorder in multiple spheres of your life. (home, education, romantic)

Suggested reading for anyone who doubts the existence of ADHD: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/9991388/2200_7-barktran.pdf

Re: Ritalin Gone Wrong

#133

Post by bluemetal »

sek wrote: post #20

So Ritalin is just a usual mind boosting drug, it has rebound effects and people develop a tolerance. Like cocaine, MDMA, ephedrine and meth. It differs in it's euphoric and adverse effects, but the positive influence is not permanent. Not a single drug can help you in the long term, you have to develop the abilities yourself. These drugs have the opposite effect, because as long as you take them you don't evolve. Th…

What do you mean by mind boosting? Do you mean that the effects of the drug when used by people with ADHD are no different then when used by an NT person, and that everyone is just being "boosted"? (if so, this is not correct, responses to these medications and the dosages required for certain effects differ between the two groups)

When you suggest that people need to "develop the abilities" themselves, do you mean to include ADHD people in this? It is believed that people with ADHD literally cannot develop such abilities. (actually, there appears to be about a 30% lag in their development of them .718yrs = 12.6yrs, .721yrs = 14.7yrs, .7*30yrs = 21yrs etc)

Re: Ritalin Gone Wrong

#134

Post by tim_h »

sek wrote: post #119
tim_h wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

First, even if natrius cannot answer your question, absence of a counter-example does not constitute proof of your argument. Second, I've been taking an ADD medication called Dexadrine for about 10 years now, and in my opinion the effect on me has not diminished.

I am not an expert, but when i read the other posts about Adderall(which is similar to Dexadrine afaik) it seems not problem free. The article suggests Methylphenidate does not have positive long term implications, but here in Germany for example Dexadrine is not available as treatment for ADD. So you suggesting we have not access to the effective medication. Just curious, did you stop it sometimes to check the diffe…

I don't know how similar/dissimilar Dexadrine and Adderall are, but they have really different effects on me. Adderall made me feel high, and seemed to encourage me to focus like a laser beam on low-level details. Dexadrine, on the other hand, has a very subtle effect on me. I've never felt high when taking it. It's more like a gradual transition into being able to focus at will. When it wears off I can no longer focus easily. On weekends I usually take half the usual dosage, and sometimes I skip taking it all together. When I skip it, aside from difficulty paying attention/focusing, I have mild withdrawal symptoms like feeling tired, headache and an increased appetite.

Having said all this, I want to point out that my doctor told me that different medications work for different people. I may just be lucky enough to have the right body chemistry for a drug like Dexadrine to work well for me.

Re: Ritalin Gone Wrong

#135

Post by perokreco »

_delirium wrote: post #54
hop wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The general point I'm making is their personality should be embraced rather than drugged. I had an Adderal prescription for a month in college, its stronger than any other stimulant I've tried and it horrors me they give it to children. The test they give for an ADHD diagnosis is a joke too. Do have trouble focusing in class? Ah yeah, most of engineering teachers aren't giving daily TED talks... :)

For diagnosis, my impression for adults is that it's usually in effect a self-diagnosis with the doctor rubber-stamping the request. Some doctors are probably more free with it than others, but I haven't heard of a situation where it was more strenuous a screening than asking a series of questions, where it was very obvious which answers were the "yes, I have ADHD" answers. So basically if you believe that you have A…

Your impression is wrong. My diagnosis took couple of hours and involved bunch of attention and ability tests. It was much more rigorous than I expected.

Re: Ritalin Gone Wrong

#136

Post by sek »

bluemetal wrote: post #133
sek wrote: post #20

So Ritalin is just a usual mind boosting drug, it has rebound effects and people develop a tolerance. Like cocaine, MDMA, ephedrine and meth. It differs in it's euphoric and adverse effects, but the positive influence is not permanent. Not a single drug can help you in the long term, you have to develop the abilities yourself. These drugs have the opposite effect, because as long as you take them you don't evolve. Th…

What do you mean by mind boosting? Do you mean that the effects of the drug when used by people with ADHD are no different then when used by an NT person, and that everyone is just being "boosted"? (if so, this is not correct, responses to these medications and the dosages required for certain effects differ between the two groups) When you suggest that people need to "develop the abilities" themselves, do you mean t…

The big problem is that there is no easy definition of what is happening. There are some words that describe the important undertone i call "boosting", they all have some euphoric impression too, but it declines after a while. These descriptions are somewhat like "ability to concentrate", "self-discipline", "motivation", "clarity". Some people say the difference is a lack of fears, or Mr Hyde is deactivated, who always manipulates you as a second personality who only seeks short term gratification.

Maybe it is easier defined by the complete opposite: There were tests with mice without dopamine production who starved next to food.

Maybe this is the real problem, we still don't know what we are really dealing with and we compare school grades to create some numbers.

Can you please elaborate on your numbers and who they are coming from and what they really mean?

I know some people here are easily offended, by saying there is no big difference between someone who has ADD and someone who hat not. But i am diagnosed myself and can't see a difference. We have a bigger problem here so maybe we are more entitled to take these. In the end, the problems are the same.

The main thing is, fucking everybody around me starts taking Ritalin, for the simple reason being a student. I have friend's who talk only about learning and convert into a Chinese stereotype.

Re: Ritalin Gone Wrong

#137

Post by juiceandjuice »

tokenadult wrote: post #4

I was interested to see that the researcher who wrote the op-ed, a psychologist based at my alma mater, has participated in some of the research projects he reviews in the op-ed. As I read the comments here, I'll be collecting ideas for questions to ask the local researcher in person as I try to learn more about ADD. I was particularly interested to see that the op-ed criticized several earlier studies for their stud…

For the record, ADD doesn't really exist anymore. It's ADHD with subtypes inattentive, hyperactive, or combined inattentive and hyperactive.

I'm inattentive. About once a year I decide to try to go without medication for a month, but it's too hard. I've done mindfulness exercises, tried to focus on developing new habits, etc... but medication works best. A combination of concerta and wellbutrin works best for me, because I can take lower amounts of the stimulants and wellbutrin has less side effects for me. I was on adderall for a few years, but headaches + sleep stuff made it more annoying as time went by.

I got diagnosed when I was 20 by a family practitioner, when I decided I was having problems with focusing (physics major). after a few years of that I decided he was shit and I needed an official diagnosis and a psychiatrist to sort it all out, someone who knew about the disorder and medications. We tried Strattera, which worked awesome except for the "sexual side effects" which were too weird for me.

Friends can tell when I'm on or off of it. Colleagues can't, although I'm conscious of my decreased work.

Re: Ritalin Gone Wrong

#139

Post by bluemetal »

sek wrote: post #136
bluemetal wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you mean by mind boosting? Do you mean that the effects of the drug when used by people with ADHD are no different then when used by an NT person, and that everyone is just being "boosted"? (if so, this is not correct, responses to these medications and the dosages required for certain effects differ between the two groups) When you suggest that people need to "develop the abilities" themselves, do you mean t…

The big problem is that there is no easy definition of what is happening. There are some words that describe the important undertone i call "boosting", they all have some euphoric impression too, but it declines after a while. These descriptions are somewhat like "ability to concentrate", "self-discipline", "motivation", "clarity". Some people say the difference is a lack of fears, or Mr Hyde is deactivated, who alwa…

I'm working and unable to spend a lot of time find the papers (for which you would need access to the journals to read)

I do have this transcript of a talk which does a much better job than I can. http://dl.dropbox.com/u/9991388/2200_7-barktran.pdf

For more published research, checkout the references used in the publicly available stuff from that dr's website.

Re: Ritalin Gone Wrong

#140

Post by Alex3917 »

laserson wrote: post #138

Wow, 3 million "children". There are over 62 million children in the US. That means almost 5% of all kids are getting medicated... http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=US+population+under+age...

It's worth noting though that three year olds aren't taking these drugs, so the actual rate is more like 9% of kids have ADHD, and a good percentage of those (60%?) are currently taking drugs for it.
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