[hirvi74]

> psychiatric drugs have not worked for me personally, but that certainly doesn't mean they won't work for you. The key to recovery is making them a part of a larger commitment to your overall health. You cannot simply take a drug and ignore the other aspects of your life. Americans have been conditioned to think that a pill solves everything, but this could not be further from the truth

Fellow ADHD'er here, and I am starting to realize this too. I made it through more than 2/3 of my life without treatment, but have sought treatment for almost a decade now. In hindsight, I am not actually sure the treatments really helped as much as I thought they did during those times. I sometimes wonder if the psychoactive effects of treatment merely make me perceive like I am more productive than I am in reality.

I believe the treatments obviously had an effect, but the benefits came with their own costs. Therefore, I feel like I have consistently had a net-gain of 0 improvement. Treatments seem to help with more physical symptoms than mental i.e., lessened hyperactivity but not much improvement in executive functioning.

I feel like I was promised a panacea with how doctors, research, and various anecdota describe the effects, but have been left with a more disappointing reality. I have been debating stopping treatment, but I fear there could be negative repercussions as well.