Aldous Huxley predicts Adderall and champions alternative therapies

The alternative is that you prevent millions of people in managing their disability while asking them to bet on your view of the world AND on our collective ability to change it. In the best case scenario where we manage that shift, that's what, 10 years of my life gone while society adjusts? Will you write my kids a nice letter explaining them their dad is going to be a deadbeat the next 10 years while we fix society, because somebody on the internet thinks daddy shouldn't be on stimulant medication?

You're just not presenting an attractive deal to anyone, whilst very politely telling disabled people making the best of their shit situation that their crutches should not exist. Hell, maybe they shouldn't need to exist, but how is that my fault? And while I can't tell if you stand on the side of 'using meds to manage ADHD is a failure of self discipline and morality', but if you do: I promise you most people with ADHD have more self discipline in their little toe than others do in their entire body. But self discipline doesn't make a cripple walk, as much as it doesn't make my brain make the chemicals I need to put my body into action. I've spent enough time of my life flogging myself into action, believing I was a fundamentally lazy human, I'll take the meds.

Definitely DO use this medication if you need it - it's the first medication your doctor will likely ask you to try precisely because an extensive body of research says it's the most effective way for treating ADHD.

As I understand it, the aspartate and saccharate still dissociate in solution. If so, there isn't much of a plausible reason to consider them different drugs. If not, they might act more slowly or not at all.

None of this puts Adderall in the class of substituted amphetamines like MDMA or Desoxyn or exotics like ALEPH: https://www.erowid.org/library/books_online/pihkal/pihkal003...

I have ADHD and take metylphenidate(I've tried many kinds of stimulants as well) -- and the NO2 analogy is an imperfect but better analogy than saying stimulants simply adjusts the baseline of people with ADHD to function like "normal" persons.

I feel there is a narrow window of dosage and time where it might feel that way -- i.e. stimulants at the onset might calm you down, reduce anxiety, but all stimulants are very broad hammers.

For me it feels like it's impossible to re-create chemically exactly the neurotypical focus that I've seen in other colleagues.

Like spending 5-6 hours of continous work where you drill down just enough, get back on track, don't get distracted, don't get too anxious, don't get hyperfocused AND do that consistently, day after day after day.

My non-chemical modes are either hyper focus for 2 weeks on a problem, immerse myself but then completely lose interest, most of the time without showing much for it OR procastinate it a long way, get extremely anxious and work really hard on the problem.

With stimulants it's a bit like: - dosed just right:it evaporates anxiety, stressful situations feel easy to deal with, BUT there's always increased heart rate, grinding teeth and some tension at the end of the day - some stimulants make mundane things wildly interesting (on isopropylphenidate I spent a few hours playing with a PLSQL debugger because I thought it was really cool), but no sense of "GO, GO, GO, do it". - some make things seem urgent enough and help stay on track -- like the metylphenidate I'm prescribed. - some make going into a flow-like state easy and fun (like methamphetamine and phenmetrazine). - some are pure energy and urgency -- like modafinil.

All of the stimulants have the potential to give me euphoria, all of them temporarily increase libido I still have to be mindful of not focusing on the wrong thing, the "normal" feeling is very fleeting, it's very easy to get hyper on stimulants, all of them feel like wear & tear at the end of the day, some more than others.

But talk therapy can help some folks come to accept the differences that their ADHD means in terms of how to relate to other people or to better understand why how ADHD impacts their own behavior and self-perception.

I myself have found it’s much easier and happier to shape my life around my particular ADHD than trying to change my behavior (something that’s destined to fail and only compound the negative emotions associated with ADHD).