[anonymoushn]

I would be surprised if even 10% of people taking therapeutic doses of stimulant ADHD meds experience euphoria. IME the noticeable effect of taking 10mg of methylphenidate was that I could stand in my open plan office and not have every word of a dozen conversations invade my consciousness constantly. If I was working in an environment designed to allow people to focus on their work, I probably would not have noticed any effects at all.

[TeMPOraL]

I wouldn't call it euphoria, but the first 10mg of methylphenidate I took kept me running around the house at high gear for almost an entire day, doing all kinds of non-critical chores that ordinarily were too boring and/or difficult to get into. Subsequent doses did not have anywhere near as drastic effect :).

But, euphoria or not, on stimulants I can at least feel the change near-immediately. It's unlike pretty much any psychiatric drug out there, where in most cases you can spend months taking it and still have serious doubts if it's doing anything (same with therapy). Hell, I can't think of a non-psychiatric medication that works as fast and as clearly. Paracetamol and Ibuprofen come close when dealing with sharp pain.

[codr7]

Oxy does the same for pain, also stops working pretty quickly.

The problem with both stimulants and opiates is overdosing will kill you pretty effectively, and many will eventually overdose if they keep using them long enough, chasing the initial effect.

Modern medicine unfortunately seems focused on creating ever more addictive substances and treatments, creating subscribers I guess, which says a thing or two about how well profit driven healthcare works in practice.

[TeMPOraL]

I don't know how bad are opioid overdoses, though my understanding is that for at least some products, the opioid is mixed with paracetamol, specifically in order so you die from OD-ing on the paracetamol before you get high on the opioid.

As for stimulant medication, I haven't heard of this being a real danger - not at the doses that prescription drugs have. Hell, I personally know a person who ate two boxes (i.e. 60+ tablets) of methylphenidate in a suicide attempt, and all they got from it was couple hours of hyperactivity, followed by a big headache, after ER flushed their stomach; they got discharged less than 24 hours later. But sure, if you drop the pharmaceuticals and go for illegal drugs, where the doses can be 100x as high, I guess you can mess yourself up pretty bad and rather quickly.

[codr7]

Yeah, I know about the paracetamol; I took Oxy 24/7 for two months after a spine operation, and then got that crap instead. It's pure evil if you ask me.

[viraptor]

I really don't think it's reasonable to mix addictive stimulants in general into a discussion about ADHD drugs. There's a difference between (for example) crack and ritalin. It's hard to even chase the initial ritalin effects - once you go past your useful dose, you just start getting similar symptoms as not taking it at all + side effects.

If it doesn't work well, you'll get lots of other options - they're just as much a part of the modern medicine. This is becoming a meme. Why repeat this rather than post information about alternatives, if you care about this issue?

[codr7]

I don't find that stimulants in general have enough differences to draw a line, not that I've tried all of them but many. Maybe Ritalin is different? I've seen plenty of people hooked to different kinds of stimulants though.

Look, we're experimenting on children who can't sit still long enough by giving them pretty serious drugs, for profit. We're still waiting on the long term consequences from that game.