Neurodivergent on Sidechat | So fucking sick of propaganda like this. Yes, they can be abused. But I would likely be a drug addict myself, and honestly dead, if I didn’t start adhd meds. *Untreated adhd* is correlated with a higher risk of substance use disorder and other issues.

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Neurodivergent 5w

So fucking sick of propaganda like this. Yes, they can be abused. But I would likely be a drug addict myself, and honestly dead, if I didn’t start adhd meds. *Untreated adhd* is correlated with a higher risk of substance use disorder and other issues.

728 upvotes, 32 comments. Sidechat image post by Anonymous in Neurodivergent. "So fucking sick of propaganda like this. Yes, they can be abused. But I would likely be a drug addict myself, and honestly dead, if I didn’t start adhd meds. *Untreated adhd* is correlated with a higher risk of substance use disorder and other issues."

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Anonymous 5w

they act like we’re getting high off vyvanse smh

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Anonymous 5w

I wasn’t medicated until I was 20. My life was spiraling and I was self medicating with drugs and alcohol. As soon as I got on adderall I felt like I could see the path forward and was able to start doing the work to get my life back on track. Obviously it could be a different experience for kids and it depends on the situation. I know it can be abused, but for those who struggle every day with ADHD, it’s a lifeline.

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Anonymous 5w

I was on ADHD meds every day (IF I remembered to take them) from age 5-18. I wish I had a better option, but they got me through school, they helped me make and keep friends, and they gave me impulse control that kept me safe.

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Anonymous 5w

I used to work in mental health and one of my clients was that really smart kid except he couldn’t concentrate for the love of his life and would get incredibly aggressive and unmanageable. Diagnosed adhd, parents refused to put him on meds. He has to be in a special education classroom and doesn’t learn anything, he’s so much behind other kids on everything despite having perfectly intact cognitive abilities. I wish meds weren’t as stigmatized so that this kiddo would have more of a future

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Anonymous 5w

i am all for medicating if necessary but as someone who almost kms due to adderall (and has been unmediated ever since) there NEEDS to be a push for therapy before just putting kids on medications. hopefully this done in other places and i was just unlucky with my primary care doctor being a fucking idiot

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Anonymous 5w

All the rhetoric of the kids being too drugged up is so frustratingly ignorant. Like my dad will be watching Fox News fear monger about it then ask if my friends are medicated and be surprised when I say yes and I just have the urge to yell like, they were suicidal. Like the alternative was that they were struggling intensely and each of us had the added stress of keeping each other sane. Like this is the current best option.

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Anonymous 5w

Think about the WSJs target audience. Articles NEVER meaningfully change anything. It's jerk off bullshit for ghouls and goblins, they aren't going to yank anything away because of some 2 bit column

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Anonymous 5w

I've been on medication since I was 11/12. When the shortage hit during my sophomore of college everything spiraled out of control. I tried other medication that wasn't Concerta but I reacted negatively and just went off all meds, crashed and burned near the end of my junior year. I had to medically withdraw. I got my regular medication back but it still took 8 months for me to begin taking it regularly. Everything became so much more manageable and I finished my final semester strong

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Anonymous 5w

untreated adhd led me to literally using alcohol and nicotine to get shit done do they think thats a better alternative or something

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Anonymous 5w

this is how my parents treated me and im 99% sure it made me placebo myself into convincing myself i was high bc of how anxious their perceptions made me

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Anonymous 5w

Modern-day lobotomy🙄

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Anonymous 5w

i would think that adhd leads to higher rates of substance use in the same way depression does, because of dopamine seeking. have the people i know who are medicated for adhd don’t even LIKE to take their meds.

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Anonymous

#1 5w

Exactly this. There are so few options for ADHD kids…what do they expect them to do instead? Just grin and bear it? I’m glad you were able to navigate everything successfully and hope you’re doing alright these days. You deserve it. 💖

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Anonymous

#2 5w

I am so sorry to hear that you went through all of that. It’s so true that everyone is different. I’ve just heard so many stories like yours and mine, and my literal psychology textbooks at university even say what we’re saying. They act like having poor impulse control, impaired concentration, and other symptoms isn’t already putting someone at risk.

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Anonymous

#3 5w

The way I take my Vyvanse with a large coffee in the morning and literally feel like taking a nap immediately after 😭

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Anonymous

OP 5w

Totally agree, and I just realized I didn’t say it explicitly in the post but I’ve been sober and much healthier for a long while now after starting the meds <3 glad we both had that resource and hope others are able to as well

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Anonymous

#2 5w

Proud of you!!!!!!! 💖💖💖💖💖

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Anonymous

OP 5w

It’s honestly probably the coffee, not the Vyvanse. Caffeine can have the opposite effect on people with ADHD.

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Anonymous

#3 5w

I have ADHD and I stopped taking Vyvanse because it makes me high. Massive dopamine burst in the morning and nothing I do later in the day can match it

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Anonymous

#8 5w

therapy needs to be thought of as a first line option vs stigmatized further as smth that only needs to happen when things are Super Bad Only and medications should be used hand in hand with therapy, and medication should only be considered if therapy alone does not work. i do great on my meds, but only when i'm regularly in therapy for my anxiety and depression, and even then my meds aren't a cure all

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Anonymous

#5 5w

Can’t relate any less. Am on 50mg Vyvanse and have been for a few years now. Prior to that I was on max dose adderall and they switched me over cuz my tolerance was f’d

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Anonymous

#10 5w

it’s almost like everyone reacts entirely differently

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Anonymous

#9 5w

my point exactly, glad it's working for you!!

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Anonymous

#10 5w

this is gonna be me soon, i built up a tolerance to 20 mg of adderall, i tried 25 mgs for a while but didn’t think it was doing anything so im on 30 now, but honestly i think its too high, i feel dizzy all the time so im probably gonna go back to 25s

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Anonymous

#13 5w

Of course everyone is different. For me, medication helps me manage my executive dysfunction. It's not a magical fix all, I still had to implement practices to stay on task. But it made self motivation so much easier

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Anonymous

#10 5w

Can you tell me more about your experience switching over because im on the highest aderall dose rn and its just making me feel bleh

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Anonymous

#17 5w

this is how my parents were for the longest time until I reached 8th grade, which was right after Covid, I was so angry and upset that I couldn’t focus or learn anything that I had a mental breakdown. I had to be put in a room by myself and was left there for hours until school ended, I became withdrawn and depressed. My school counsellor threatened to call CPS if I didn’t receive help because I was a danger to myself and others. They finally put me on concerta which only helped a little bit-

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Anonymous

#12 5w

it helped me focus but it messed my hormones up and made me angrier, except now I could focus on my anger and lash out worse. I was switched to Adderall in 9th grade, it has helped me SO much. I’m in college now, still on Adderall, I can focus more, and I’m less angry. I hate the stigmatization that meds are bad, they are extremely beneficial.

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Anonymous

#15 5w

It was great. No withdrawals because you’re switching from one amphetamine to another. Vyvanse is actually a prodrug, which I won’t bother to explain but I’d recommend googling. Funnily enough, despite being extremely similar, the tolerance from Adderall didn’t carry over to Vyvanse. Went from feeling nothing when I took adderall to feeling functional when I took Vyvanse. Would recommend

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Anonymous

#4 5w

I have the effect even without coffee. But caffeine on its own definitely does it too lol. Adderall XR did the same thing. 😂 I’m just built weird.

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Anonymous

OP 5w

little cheat right here take your vyvanse and then take a nap immediately , it’ll wake you up and kick in for you

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Anonymous

temucactus 5w

MY GF DOES THIS IN THE MORNING. They’ll wake up, take their meds, go back to sleep (without an alarm set!!) and then wake up in a bit.

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