How Do You Know if You Are Addicted to ADHD Medicine?
Question by Amanda: How do you know if you are addicted to ADHD medicine?
If anyone on here has been addicted to it please share your stories.
I’m asking this for one of my friends.
Well he takes a lot of it about ever 3-5 days
he definatly cant go a week without taking it a couple days
Best answer:
Answer by Texas
For anyone with the question “Am I addicted to X?”, where X might be any sort of drug, nicotine, caffeine, ADHD drugs, heroin or whatever…
The first thing to do is see if you can go 1 day without X.
If you fall into temptation and fail to manage the day without X, maybe you have a problem, maybe this is something that needs treatment, peer support, something to make it more positive and motivating. You might need nicotine gum, a prayer team, a 12 step group or whatever.
If you succeed the day without X, how do you feel at the end of that day… was it easy? was it hard? Can you try to do without for 2 or 3 days next time? Maybe it isn’t that hard to do without that thing you were worried you might be addicted to. Mind over Matter works, you have the power in you to resist all forms of temptation, and God will be there to help if you call on him.
Answer by JoJo
Ceasing ADHD medication for one day is absolutely not an effective way of deciding whether or not you’re addicted to it. As with every other psychoactive medication – pills for anxiety, depression, OCD, you name it – there will be a brief period of withdrawl when you stop taking it. In fact, ADHD medications are known for causing a “rebound effect” in the hours immediately after they wear off. When my Ritalin wears off in the evening, for example, I often feel a bit cranky and overwhelmed, though the sensation usually isn’t strong enough to disrupt my life in any appreciable way.
If your friend were to stop taking ADHD medication, he would probably feel very crabby, moody, or even flat-out miserable for a day or so. This “rebound effect” or withdrawl is very well-documented and has nothing to do with addiction. It is simply a matter of one’s brain suddenly having to readjust itself to a very notable shift in chemical balance.
A better way of determining whether or not your friend is addicted to ADHD medication is to consider whether or not he keeps stepping up his dosage without his doctor’s approval. Does he continually take more and more each week and become almost frantic at the thought of going a few hours without it? This would constitute a genuine addiction and is one of the reason why ADHD stimulants are so tightly controlled.
You say he takes “a lot of it” every 3-5 days, which doesn’t tell me much. How much is “a lot?” Is it more than he’s supposed to be taking? And why is he only taking it every couple of days? That’s an exceptionally bizarre (and potentially neurologically traumatic) dosage schedule for ADHD medication, unless there’s some new drug on the market I’m not aware of. Exactly what medication is he on?
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