It's also worth noting that ADHD often comes with other mental health comorbidities; in my case, it exacerbated my depression. I would often fall into a spiral of inability to focus -> feeling bad about myself for not completing work that I was generally more than capable of doing -> even less ability to focus. I still have depression, but starting on ADHD medication all-but-removed my most frequent trigger.
I had the same issue!
I told my prescribing doctor this same thing and she trusted me enough to try out Adderall before SSRIs again. Turns out my hypothesis of my depression + anxiety largely being tied to my sense of productivity was right.
After going in for an EKG check-up on orders of the prescribing doctor, I found a fairly benign heart issue that the cardiologist believes may be the cause of my "panic attacks" (eg: my attacks may be heart racing -> panic, not panic -> heart racing!)
All of that from just treating "I feel bad because I get nothing done".
Not sure. My provider asked me to get one done. I talked to the cardiologist about this and she didn't seem surprised it was requested nor that I was the first to get it done.
I've been toying with the notion that I may be having an undiagnosed ADHD for a while now (I've noticed that about 70% of the stuff in any ADHD thread on HN, like this here, tends to reflect my life or at least resonate with me...). I became more confident of that when, at one point recently, I realized - hey, I'm drinking some 10+ cups of black tea every day, and I did that since being single-digit years old. Turns out I may have been unconsciously self-medicating for as long as I remember.
BTW. I suffered from the same type of spiral you described in the past. I've managed to mostly overcome it for now, though I took it from the other end - I've manged to minimize "feeling bad about myself for not completing work that I was generally more than capable of doing", to the point of preventing the positive feedback loop. I wish I could do something about the focus part, though.
Did you get a big boost when you first started with it that reduced as you developed tolerance with habitual use?
I've always been pretty careful with caffeine consumption in order to avoid tolerance, because I didn't want to get into a state where all it did was boost me back to my "normal" (i.e. feeling crappy until I got my coffee, and having to use increasing amounts to get past my baseline).
Similar to the feeling (although much weaker) hydrocodone gave me after I had oral surgery.
After that, realizing that my preferred decongestant was not only helping my cold symptoms, but also allowing me to pay attention when people were talking and complete plans in a "this seems like that thing other people are really good at, but I'm not" kind of way... that was a major tell.
Interesting. Was it pseudoephedrine? I took Allegra-D every day in high school and college to manage allergies as wells as colds and sinus infections. (I hear that's not advisable, but I didn't know any better then, and somehow my allergist didn't either.) I wonder if it was helping me concentrate also.
I've never been diagnosed with ADHD, but many of the things people are describing here are familiar. Overall I've been pretty successful in life despite this, but I've had my ups and downs. The pandemic has been a down; I'm really struggling with concentration, so much so that I left my job and am taking a sabbatical before finding another. There are certainly valid reasons it's been hard (e.g., I have two young kids, went entirely without daycare for a while, and am helping my son with online kindergarten now) but they seem to affect me much more than my wife, whether that's due to undiagnosed ADHD, anxiety, the different natures of our work, burn-out, or some other factor.
It's possible for it to lead to increased clenching/grinding of teeth.
With that said....a decent diet and doing all the things you're supposed to be doing anyway in terms of oral hygiene and you ought to be fine. It's not a "you're going to ruin your mouth", it's a "pay more attention to this".
Been taking Adderall XR for >10 years, no cavities or other dental concerns personally speaking.
it does dry out your oral/nasal cavity. It can cause your body to produce mucus to compensate. I commonly feel like swallowing is slow as if there is a thin layer of mucus lining my throat. Even had yellow mucus drip out of my nose as if it were a nose bleed (happened 3-4 occasions), which comes from having a sinus infection.
This is one of the reasons I switch to micro-dosing on an empty stomach and supplementing with coffee to limit exposure to amphetamines.
Go ahead and take legal cocaine though, hope your post helps you sleep at night
I get a new pharmacist every time I fill a script and I never share one iota of my diagnoses with them, they just fill the Rx and advise on contraindications and unusual doses they see.
Can you see into a person's brain with your own 'two eyes' as well? A neuroscientist can actually see our neural activity with fMRI and other tools to study brain science unlike your pharmacist buddies and yourself talking to random customers for 5 minutes in a grocery store.
Do you know their entire medical history? How severe the ADHD is? Any other issues they are treating or not treating? If you can point to a study to back up what you are saying then by all means go for it. Otherwise all you have is anecdotal evidence and pretty weak evidence at that.
I'm certainly guilty of that last one. Since getting diagnosed I've been making a point to never leave a health problem ignored. Sure, it might take 6 months to a year for me to eventually book the appointment, but I'm getting them under control at my own pace.
Consider
Lifetime Remaining x Quality of Life
If QoL is negative but can be switched to positive at some cost of LR it's not a hard deal to make. Especially in a world with car accidents and deadly diseases.
If taking Vyvanse most days knocks a few years off my lifespan, it doesn't matter. I'm going to die anyway, eventually.
As we all are, ADHD-medicated or not.
Edit: smokers have reduced rates of Parkinson's disease, and nicotine is a stimulant.