Did Adderall break my brain?

[katyb0baty]

In my late 30s I wanted an Adderall prescription as a way to lose weight, but then it turned out I really had pretty severe ADHD. After 18 months I was up to 30mg of Adderall per day, then my blood pressure spiked and my doctor took me off Adderall cold turkey. I fell into the deepest depression of my life, and now two years later I still haven't completely recovered. I'm back on Adderall but still struggling badly. Here's my question -- does anyone know if my experience with Adderall could have done some kind of permanent damage to my brain? This might sound crazy, but I feel so terrible and helpless in a way I've never experienced before. Like my executive functioning is exponentially worse than it had ever been, and now even with Adderall I find it extremely hard to function at the level I used to without any meds or diagnosis.

[forgetsalot]

Hi Katyb0baty, thanks for being honest and sharing. It sounds like you are really at a challenging place in life and wanting to find answers. From what I have read so far there is not a lot of evidence that stimulants have a negative long term effect on people over time - though I couldn't reference any studies but stimulants have been used for a long time. I wonder if it would be helpful to look to the present and look ahead to see what can help you moving forward. There is so much you can try and be hopeful about.

Going cold turkey off stimulants I imagine can cause f dopamine, seratonin and other feel good hormones to drop drastically and since those are already low in people with adhd you probable experienced an intense drop.

Also, are there any other life changes that could contribute to depression? Hormones, life changes around work, home, love, etc. Perhaps getting your depression treated (therapy, meds, exercise, sleep, diet, etc) and continue your current stimulants is what you should be focusing on. Meditation and mindfulness helps me be in the moment and rather than wondering about things in the past that I could have/should have done.

Anyway, I hope this helps. The brain and body is amazing and we can really regenerate and carve out new neural pathways (neural plasticity). Remember your motivation to be well and keep chugging along. Take care.

[BTV65]

I found Adderall helped bring a clarity to my thinking and focus. Some people describe it as putting on glasses. Everything has always been a little blurry around the edges, you think it's normal. Everyone is like that right? Then you put on glasses and suddenly you clearly see the world around you. You can never look at it without glasses again without realizing what you are missing.

However what you are describing sounds pretty severe. I have a strong hunch that you have some other issues going on in your body chemistry/mental/emotional makeup that has not been diagnosed yet. You might want to just start from scratch with a new Doctor and see if they can't take a look at your issues from a new perspective.

Stimulants by there very nature are short term. Unless you OD'd on them, I wouldn't expect there to be any long term symptoms of having taken them.