3 posts tagged “adult add”

This sucks.  I should be in bed.  I'm tired, and tired of being tired (tired of being admired?  Let's face it -- I'm pooped).  But somehow I seem to be unable to make the concession to sleep.  Going to sleep is admitting that the day is over, and I've done nothing useful all day.  I should try to be productive; work toward the goals of getting more money (i.e., actually billing some of my clients), or a cleaner house.  But all I can manage to do is randomly wander the Internets, clicking from site to site, consuming everything yet producing nothing in return.  My attention wanders, like an ADD-infested rat on Ritalin.  Quickly jerking from one idea to the next, to yet another, than back to the first again for a few more minutes.   Then repeat three or four times.

I'm tired, but not sleepy.  There are plenty of stories about people who get bursts of energy in the middle of the night and will go on binge projects -- clean their entire house, write a book, or create a masterful work of art in one sitting.  I want to be one of those people.  To wake up Wife at 6 am, dreary yet elated from the stupendous results of my project.  Babe, look what I did while you were busy sleeping!  The place is gorgeous!  The painting is a masterpiece.  The pottery...well, I don't have a wheel in the house.  Just way more imagination than sense.

As yet another manifestation of my depression, I bought a new computer.  I've been planning on buying around this time anyway; waiting for a certain conflux of technologicial events -- Intel's Penryn family of CPUs to become affordable and Vista Service Pack 1.  Well, they're out now, so with much trepedation I bent over, picked up the phone, and called Dell.  Approximately $2,500 later I have one brand, spanking (that always sounds so kinky) new Dell XPS 420.  Four gigs of RAM, E8500 CPU @ 3.16G, 2 x 500G hard drives, nVidia 8800GT 512M video card, and yes, two monitors.  I went nuts and got the 24" with adjustible stand, and every video/audio input the guys at the factory could come up with.  Next to it is my "old" 17" digital, fully-adjustable LCD screen so I've got my two monitor honey pie.  I'm going to keep it for six years, just like my previous ones, so it's not as outlandish as it may seem.

But all this system is is a giant enabler.  Letting; nay, helping me multitask, making it very simple for me to do a bit of A, then on to a bit of B, then some of C, and finally back to A.  But Just for a minute, because B and C are still calling for me.  Having a new computer let's me run 30 IE windows, Outlook, 10 Firefox tabs, iTunes, and a mapping program all at once, each working on a different project.  It's just amazing (I know I keep coming back to that word, but I can't think of anything more appropriate right now).  Technology as an enabler.  Who woulda thunk?

In today's episode, the Grumpy one puts another medicine on the chopping block as he continues his quest to live a happy, well-adjusted, and hopefully medication-free life.

Losing the Dex did a lot to calm my sense of nervousness during the day, but I was still uncomfortable much of the time with clients.  Instead of being relaxed, I felt like I was caught stealing chickens -- nervous, afraid, and not sure what to say.  The Busbar in my regiment was supposed to cure this, so adjusted the dosage up and then later down in a nice sinusoidal pattern.   The outcome of this is that I'm actually more nervous with clients when I'm on buspar than when I'm not, so I've quit it as well.

My morning routine is becoming much less complicated.  Strattera, and stool thinners.  Plus a bowl of cereal and some juice, but that's not the important part.  The big deal here is that I'm down to only one real "pill"  I think that's fantastic, but I still find myself lacking in energy (and therefore commitment and empathy) to my clients.  I don't always want to put in the extra effort or energy to solve the project properly.  I want to go for the quick fix, and get out of there.  More sleep should help this, which is my next (and ongoing) project.

I came to the conclusion recently that I wasn't happy with myself.  More specifically, I wasn't happy with my pharmacology.  I found myself feeling nervous and anxious much of the time.  Instead of being relaxed and confident around clients, I was feeling unsure of myself, like back in high school when the teacher calls on you and you didn't do your homework.  Knowing I could figure it out, but defensive and apologetic.  The suave and debonair dude that I envision myself to be was no where to be found.  Also, my blood pressure is high.  The last couple of visits to the doctor it's been in the neighborhood of 150/100.  Maybe that is a contributing factor.

I'm still not sure entirely why this was, and to some extent, still is.  My first thought was that maybe I was over doing it on the puppy uppers.  I cut my Dex in half for a month, as an experiment to see how I would react.  No change.  Then, as much out of curiosity as medical experimentation, I cut out the puppy uppers entirely. 

THAT was a huge change.  I'd been taking Dex or Adderall for so long I couldn't remember what it was like not being on some sort of speed.  Giving it up was ugly.  Now I'm tired pretty much all of the time.  I want to take a nap in the middle of the afternoon.  Seeing a personal client in the evening after work just takes way too much energy.  And working out?  Forget about it.  I want to go home and flop on the couch next to Corwin.  I feel like Superman when he was robbed of his powers and forced to be merely human for a while.  Gawd, this is awful.  How do people keep going all day?

The surprising part is that I don't think my focus or ability to concentrate on a single task has degraded that much.  I'm a little calmer and my blood pressure is down, but the overall change was not what I expected.  I didn't realize how much the Dex was propelling my over-reaching lifestyle until I stopped taking it.  Now I'm floundering through the day without it.  Forcing myself to pay attention to (or worse, to care about) clients when I just want to go home.  My usual response is I'm tired and I don't care anymore.

I've been "clean" for about a month now, and I think I'm ready to start taking it again.  Maybe not every day, but sometimes I just need that extra little boost.  The scary part is I sound like an addict when I say that.  Trying to microdose myself up to maximum functioning is like seasoning soup.  Add a little bit of this, taste.  Add a little bit of that, taste.  Keep adding until it tastes right.

Going forward, I have two basic thoughts:  1) adjust the meds, or 2) adjust my way of thinking.  I've spoken with my doc and he's not being very helpful in terms of other drugs or combinations.  I think I'm going to try going back and forth one more time with the Dex and and search for subtle clues.  Option 2 involves seeing a therapist and changing the way I process stimuli.  The idea being that if I can change the way I process and respond to the environment, I can do so in a way that's easier on myself and less stress-inducing.  But this involves a large financial commitment, that I'm not ready to make, although I am gathering names "just in case."