trying to write w out any adderall
I write. You read. That's it.
I was diagnosed with ADHD (that’s Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) the day after my 23rd birthday — April 29th, 2021. Receiving that diagnosis was a breath of fresh air — a cool breeze on a hot day.
In the months leading up to the diagnosis I was incapable of sitting still for more than a few minutes at a time, making work nearly impossible. I couldn’t focus on what was in front of me. Trying to finish every task was like fighting a war with myself. And just like any war there was no real winner.
But the lack of focus and the hyperactivity weren’t the worst of it. The worst was the mood swings.
These were weekly, if not bi-weekly, cascading meltdowns in which some small thing would set me off and spark a torrent of negative thoughts. My particular mood swing cocktail was mainly self-loathing and fear of failure, two feelings I’ve dealt with in many flavors throughout my life. I’ve described the sensation to my therapist as a voice — my voice but somehow foreign and distorted — that omnipresently echo-whispers in my mind. And these mood swings were accompanied by a physical sensation that I’ve never really conveyed to people — like my head was being squeezed from all sides and at the same time being almost gently carved into with a sharp blade. Like a hunk of meat trapped in the vice of the meat-slicer at the deli counter.
It’s hard to describe to another person— even now more removed from those sentiments — how it feels to disgust yourself. How do you admit to someone — especially someone you love and who loves you — that you feel unworthy of their feelings? Sitting here, typing, I stumble over the words. Stumble over myself. I hit a few keys, backtrack, press delete. Start again. That’s what living with ADHD is. A continual process and cycle of trying, failing, and trying again.
This is why I tend to deflect compliments. And it’s why genuine, thoughtful praise — even the most basic if it seems intentional — often makes me teary, or at least hits me harder than it does a lot of folks. I seem to have a hard time coming to terms with the cognitive dissonance of my mind spinning negative threads and the positive things I’m hearing. I can see what the complimenter is seeing but can’t seem to make my mind see.
Then after my diagnosis I was prescribed medication — first a stimulant, then an anti-depressant to stem the mood swings, which I take in conjunction with each other.
And things were solid for a while. At least on the ADHD front. Not problem free, but at least everything was manageable. And the voice in my mind was diminished, back-burnered to a less omnipresent volume.
And now I’m facing — like many, many people with ADHD — a national shortage of adderall. This shortage — partially the result of supply chain issues and partially the result of over-prescription — has now created shortages of other alternatives — like ritalin or vyvanse.
Monday without adderall I was almost falling asleep at my desk at work going through withdrawals. This whole week I’ve felt sluggish and slow and yet somehow electric and bouncy. It all seems to be a contradiction in terms. And it is. But that’s also what living with ADHD is.
You feel both stretched and squeezed, alive and dead, depending on how much of your brain you can manage to lasso. Anyone living with ADHD is a rodeo cowgirl or cowboy, trying to stay aboard the bronco as long as possible before it bucks you, sends you sailing, skidding into the dust.
I’m not here to litigate whether ADHD is real or imagined — I know it’s real. Nor am I here to litigate whether people should be prescribed adderall or other stimulants. I can only speak from personal experience.
(As an aside, I’m speaking as someone who truly needs adderall. Who actually has a hard time functioning without it. But I know its reputation as a study drug for those without ADHD as well as the realities of over-prescription that have occurred as more folks are diagnosed with ADHD, whether they should be or not. But I’m not writing about that right now.)
And the difference when I’m taking adderall and when I’m not is profound. Before, I had such a hard time simultaneously letting go and latching on.
For example, walking around on the street I’d make eye contact with a stranger and then spend the rest of the day pondering that fraction of a second of eye contact: was there something on my face? Was I wearing something ugly? Did they think I was ugly? Did they think I was cute? Did I think they were cute?
And then I’d forget that I had made plans to meet someone for lunch. Or I would have to scramble to meet a deadline. Or I’d start a personal project and then not follow through.
The common misconception is that folks with ADHD can’t focus. But ADHD is not the lack of or inability to focus. It’s having so much focus that it can’t be properly applied. Your brain can’t separate what should be latched tight and what should be let go.
The result is a mind that careens, bounces, ricochets from one topic to the next. And baked into that paradigm is a tendency to focus more on negatives than positives. As human beings we’re biologically hard-wired to register bad more than we are good. In the days when we were all hunter-gatherers, bad meant death. Now, it just means a bad grade. Or a fuck-up at work. But our brain can’t tell the difference. Bad is bad is bad no matter how you slice it. Or it slices you.
Before I started taking adderall, small things would stay with me way past their expiration date. And other stuff would float by me despite my best efforts to wrangle it in.
All of which brings me to writing. I love writing. I love words. I like the construction of a sentence. Like the way it looks on the page. The way it sounds when you read it. When you hear the words echo in your mind. I think because the words on the page can drown out the swirling vortex of negativity constantly churning inside me.
I like seeing scenes come to life. To hear lines spoken. To see it play out on the screen. I like setting it all to music. To imagine characters and places. To give direction to all this restless energy.
Writing without adderall is like riding a bike without the chain. Like all metaphors, it’s an imperfect one. Because it’s not that the adderall is the chain necessarily, it’s just that it makes writing so much easier. Maybe it’s the grease that keeps the chain running smoothly. Honestly, I don’t know how bikes work.
Either way, what felt like pulling teeth before — even though I fucking loved it — became more like an exhausting, but rewarding hike through difficult terrain. Some days were easier than others. But I was no longer fighting myself every step of the way when on adderall.
That’s why I’m happy to say I wrote this newsletter without any adderall. And goddamn did it hurt. Almost physically. Writing these words felt like my mind was being stretched and squeezed all at once — carved and sliced at the deli counter of my own self-distaste. But we made it. And I guess we’ll keep on making it.
addendum
I’m currently writing this section with the aid of adderall after my parents were able to locate a temporary supply.
Comparing and contrasting not having it and having it I’ve been able to more fully capture the sensation and put more to paper on it. I’ve decided to leave my un-adderalled words unchanged above simply as a mark of something resembling pride.
Trying to write without adderall is like having the words on the tip of your tongue. You know you’ve done this — can do this — and yet the answers can’t seem to slip by the bars of your teeth.
You can almost feel the neurons trying and failing to fire off in your head, like electricity that’s primed to turn on a lamp but simply doesn’t. It’s frustrating to say the least.
More than anything else it proves the veracity of having ADHD. The lived truth. I know from personal experience that many folks doubt ADHD’s existence or short-change its impact — it can’t be that bad.
Take my word for it, it is real. And I’d much rather let the words flow than force them out at knife point.