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129 points surprisetalk | 2 comments | | HN request time: 0s | source
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alterom ◴[] No.45958585[source]
This article (and the title alone) is harmful. Adderall is not about increasing mental efficiency.

What Adderall is about is:

- helping with executive dysfunction for people who suffer from it.

- allowing people with ADHD like me to function. To do the things that everyone else does, things that we want to do and need to do, but can't do because of the way our brains are wired.

- increasing the lifespan of ADHD people who don't get help. Women with ADHD die about 9 years younger than those without ADHD [1].

- making our lives less painful, since every small task incurs pain, resulting in 3x depression rates [2] and alarmingly high suicidal ideation rates (50% of ADHD adults [3]).

Please, please, educate yourself about ADHD and medication for it before writing something like this title.

No, Aldous Huxley didn't. "predict" Adderall.

To understand more, I've put together a resource which, I hope, will be easy enough to digest. Here's my experience of getting prescribed Adderall for my ADHD:

https://romankogan.net/adhd/#Medication

If I have attention deficit and I could write it, I hope you (and the author of the text we're discussing) could spare some attention to it before talking about Adderall, amphetamines, and other stimulants prescribed for ADHD.

Thank you in advance.

[1] https://www.npr.org/sections/shots-health-news/2025/01/23/nx...

[2] https://add.org/adhd-and-depression/

[3] https://crownviewpsych.com/blog/adhd-increased-risk-suicide-...

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1. Arch-TK ◴[] No.45962592[source]
Amazing website.

One thing I noticed is that while I hate being told what to do, and my partner hates being told what to do, and we understand deeply how we feel when someone tells us what to do, we still tell each other what to do (which goes especially badly after a long day).

Edit: I am glad you wrote this, so I didn't have to. It feels like reading my own autobiography. But the problem with reading about this stuff is that, if you forget for a minute that it's literally just how life is for you, it reads like some fantastical fiction comedy. I avoid telling anyone I deal with that I have ADHD because I feel like if I tell them they'll lump me in with some crappy mental model, and I avoid telling anyone I deal with about these problems because they sound completely absurd.

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2. alterom ◴[] No.45965608[source]
Thanks for this comment! You describe a very relatable situation :)

> I am glad you wrote this, so I didn't have to.

My hope was that this website would fulfill this goal, and I'm very glad you think so <3