Posted by karlmarx on October 14, 2005, at 17:35:44
In reply to Re: Adderall XR - help, anyone?, posted by lemon68 on October 13, 2005, at 23:00:54
My experience - Adderall XR, up to 25 mg, works well for developing and maintaining mental focus. It made me a bit testy though, especially with my boss, which was not a good thing.
I found that tolerance developed rather quickly; I started at 10 mg and 2 months later was taking 25 mg. A couple of months later and my psychiatrist had me up to 20mg/three times a day of regular Adderall.
At this dosage it works quite well, and whenever tolerance started to set in if I decreased the dosage to, say 40 mg a day, waiting until midday to take the first dose, then after about a week or so going back to 60 would work well again.
Different variations of dosage and schedule seemed to effectively counteract my tolerance at this level.
Another technique which others have used successfully to combat tolerance is to supplement your diet with phenylalanine or tyrosine, the precursors to dopamine. Either of these amino acids can cause high blood pressure, and a sort of attenuated speed sensation on their own. So it's imperative to be careful about this - you should consult your doctor about it and monitor your blood pressure, but it's one way to go a day on with Adderall and then a day off with the amino acid supplementation.
The problem with Adderall is that you will, for one reason or another, stop taking it eventually. At the dosage I was taking this resulted in a crash, not a depressive speed crash, but just a metnbolism crash.
I almost literally slept for two days when I stopped after about 8 months at the 60 mg dosage. I would wake up to eat and use the bathroom, and then nothing seemed so attractive as getting back into bed. Which is precisely what I did.
Then, for the next week I was fighting to stay awake all day and walking around in a mental fog. Somehow I made it through work, but it seemed like every time I sat down all I wanted to lie down and go to sleep. And when I got home that is the first thing that I did.
I wish I'd never taken it. Because now I know it works, but I also know how incapacitating it can be. I guess I am lucky that I didn't experience the depression some people do, but being out of commission for nearly a week is nearly as bad.
That said, I am picking up another presription next week. I have concluded that I just need to be judicious about its use, and that means supplementing my doctor's instructions with common sense. I won't be taking 60 mg anymore, and I won't be taking it continuously either - weekdays at work when required is all.
poster:karlmarx
thread:565490
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20051010/msgs/566937.html