> All stimulants are addictive and you will have physical side effects from discontinuing use.
I love those side effects though. It is so nice to stop taking them and feel cozy and rest for a few days. The best description I have for it is that it feels like when you get home from a hard days work and are tired and go sit down in your sofa and just relax. Just that the feeling lasts for days! Awesome, right?
I hate being on the meds and I never take them when I don't work, but I have to take them to do any kind of work requiring focus like for example filling out a form.
I think this varies highly from person to person. As someone who takes one to two days off a week, when possible, I must say I get some pretty brutal withdrawal side-effects.
None of the side-effects are really dangerous or life-threatening by any means, but they are still somewhat disabling. I've been taking my medication for about 8 years now, and I am starting to feel like the medication:
1. Has drastically diminished it positive returns
2. Is starting to take more away from me than it's giving back
Not sure, what other option I'll move to, but I do not have many of them left since I have tried almost all the various stimulant formulations multiple times minus Desoxyn.
> Since starting: I'm less angry. I'm less annoyed. I have the ability to listen to my spouse talk to me. I'm not jittery or jumpy any more.
THIS! Absolutely this.
Bit crazy that these are also the symptoms of someone on withdrawal from amphetamines and other stimulants†, huh?
But wait a sec... we had these before going anywhere near medication?
Could it possibly be we've been living a life of dopamine withdrawal?
† I was going to say "amphetamine addiction" but stopped myself... a significant number of these poor folk are self-medicating to escape the constant agony of their inner turmoil. They just couldn't get what they needed under the supervision of modern medicine, and micro-dose their intake so it delivers the beneficial effects and minimises the side-effect.
> For the month or so that it worked, it was pretty awesome. Unfortunately, that feeling didn't last more than maybe six weeks.
Sort of similar. I found every wrong road I took (supplements, diets, physical) helped - for 2 weeks and then never again. Stims turned out to be my right road.
> I don't take mine on the weekend, generally. I find it helps keep me grounded in terms of my capabilities on vs off the meds, as well as giving me some non-amphetamine-d time to work through emotions.
I did this up until about six months ago and definitely appreciated the chance to reconnect with my "nominal" self, but unfortunately it was causing significant issues for me and my family. I would crash and be tired (which was not unusual in and of itself, but more exaggerated), I would have extreme executive dysfunction, and I would be completely unable to get anything done around the house and/or spend quality time with my wife and kids. It was all the misery of my pre-medicated working life compounded and condensed into the most precious hours of my personal life.
I was reluctant to start taking meds seven days a week because I feared even more that it would start losing its effectiveness over time, but fortunately that has not happened (yet) and my weekends are much more productive and happier for everyone.
> tried to see if I had gotten past the point of needing it by tapering off
A small point, but the "discontinuation effects" for these meds can be severe, and they can make people think they still need to take the meds. This keeps people taking meds for very long amounts of time.
Some people are okay with the side effects, and they've made an informed choice about the risks of taking these meds long term.
The Guardian newspaper has been running a couple of stories about long term use. I think they're a little bit alarmist, but the personal experiences are useful.
> I take phenibut about 1x/week, I have been for about 2 years now. I think it's generally pretty OK for me, though I've started to worry that it impacts my memory a touch, at the edges.
You're addicted, you just don't know it.
> it is wild that you expected to be able to be able to take drugs daily for weeks without withdrawals
If you're referring to benzos, the doctor said it would be fine. If you're referring to phenibut, I wasn't taking it every day. Maybe every few days or maybe once a week.
And thats BS. It's completely physically and psychologically addictive for many people with severe withdrawal symptoms. If they're not considered addictive then thats an issue with the DSM and inconsistent metrics used by medical fields.
> As I mentioned to someone else, please take an earnest visit to https://www.reddit.com/r/StopSpeeding/ and consider the idea that a lot of our ADHD peers struggle with stimulants.
I'm sure many do struggle with abusing stimulants. They're not silver bullets, and do need appropriate care and monitoring by a medical professional. Especially when starting a new treatment.
However, I find that link is also full of things like "Bob was addicted to Adderal, and took 30mg everyday for 8 years". To me thats sounds like a successful therapeutic treatment without other supporting info like "Bob would use his monthly supply in a week". Few would consider "Bob took a normal dosage of an SSRI for 8 years" as an addiction.
> That's a myth. Take a double dose of your prescription and report back whether you feel it (sort of kidding, it's a dangerous path).
To clarify, I'm sure some do get a mild high. Many don't. Maybe I'd get one on a higher dose, but I've got no desire to do so as I get much more enjoyment over just feeling awake and being able to focus. Though I definitely get a "mild high" if I accidentally take an extra dose of my SSRI.
> Some antidepressants can have terrible withdrawal symptoms too - I went through the worst couple of weeks of my life after tapering off dosulpine, and I know someone else who had it rough after tapering off a tricyclic.
Apples and oranges. Not all withdrawals are equally bad.
Savvy healthcare providers will switch you to Fluoxetine, which has an extremely long half-life, and then taper the Fluoxetine.
Phenibut's withdrawal symptoms are on another level entirely, especially when people take abuse-level dosages to feel temporary euphoria: https://www.reddit.com/r/quittingphenibut/
This needs more context, because unlike stimulants, you can't quit guanfacine instantly or you'll feel pretty ill. You have to taper off it for a week or two.
Also, you can't drink on it (enjoyably) and it made me feel tired and emotional.
You say that with such authority, but in my personal experience they can absolutely cause dependency. I've had long-lasting withdrawal effects from certain SSRIs that were both physically and mentally painful.
Headaches (the most frequent symptom my wife experiences, as do my friends), excessive sleepiness, exhaustion, shaking hands, etc...
It's possible, however, that I may have been slightly more tired, but beyond the threshold of noticing this; or slightly slower reaction times. This isn't a scientific study.
> just the general feeling like you're on a drug bender even though you took just one.
As someone who has been on Vyvanse (prescribed) for a few years now, I can say that this feeling definitely goes away eventually. Unless I drink a lot of really strong coffee…
> Where are you getting this from? Withdrawal syndrome is a minor component in any real addition and is nothing without craving for the substance which is not present with SSRIs. As someone who has experienced both reasonably severe SSRI withdrawal and nicotine addiction I find your comparison ridiculous (no exp with opiates, but it seems safe to assume they aren't better than nicotine).
The issue is the way your body normalizes to the new default of higher Serotonin levels - when you suddenly return to normal the present state is worse than the it was before you started taking SSRI's (I read a few good papers on the topic a while ago, but I don't remember their titles now - wikipedia is probably a good place to start: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antidepressant_discontinuation_...).
Also lack of craving is a ridiculous justification for effectively prescribing substance abuse - for example aderol et. all are amphetamine salts - that people don't have a craving in the sense that they would for cocaine is just because the high lacks the euphoric effect -- they still can't function normally without dosing -- and it definitely doesn't mean it's fucking reasonable to prescribe to seven-year-olds.
Likewise people have cravings to watch their favorite tv-show or check their Facebook accounts - these cravings do not qualify these activities as substance abuse.
> I think they only work if you got anxiety or something
Probably something to that. I didn't feel much at the prescribed dose. Being curious and foolish, I took 3x. Did feel that. Socially effusive. Good sleep. There was a physical aspect. A warm glow, muscles that felt relaxed rather than stiff. Like waking up in warm sun after a particularly good night's sleep.
People without anxiety, who aren't literally and metaphorically tense, probably get far less of that. But that's what it does for a really anxious person like me, especially with a bit too much. So of course I did it again the next day.
You quickly come to long for, or believe that you're just better off, in that state all the time. But there is tolerance. It stops working like that at the same dose after a few days in my experience. So, take more. I was in big trouble within a month. That's the psychological addiction in my experience, the strong desire or preference for being in that state, emotionally.
I couldn't stop. No physical consequences but intolerable withdrawal mostly of rebound anxiety and insomnia. I eventually got off them with a very long taper. ~5 months with the dose adjusted weekly. No significant physical withdrawal. At the right dose of a long-lasting benzodiazepine, I felt like before I had started taking them, more or less. I did have to learn to deal with the psychological need to be more disinhibited than normal. If I could do that, and not escalate doses, getting off would be possible. It was, and I haven't taken any since the last dose of the taper. I think about that state and sometimes I do long for aspects of it, but they're not really cravings anymore. Only get those for nicotine.
I love those side effects though. It is so nice to stop taking them and feel cozy and rest for a few days. The best description I have for it is that it feels like when you get home from a hard days work and are tired and go sit down in your sofa and just relax. Just that the feeling lasts for days! Awesome, right?
I hate being on the meds and I never take them when I don't work, but I have to take them to do any kind of work requiring focus like for example filling out a form.
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