[throwaway54-762]

It's an extremely hard drug for anybody, ADHD or no. Adderall / Vyvanse is prescription meth[0] (something I've heard from several of my AD(H)D friends). If the pros outweigh the cons for an individual, great; I wish them the best. But while I can't find the research I remember to back this up, it's looking like long-term medication with amphetamines may be ineffective or harmful.

EDIT [0]: Yes, I know that that prescription meth literally exists under the name Desoxyn, that is not what I mean. See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5321949 and https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5321935 .

[MartinCron]

A few years ago, my doctor encouraged me to stop taking Adderall based on the conventional wisdom that it was likely to cause heart disease. I'll always remember what he said, I only prescribe Adderall for depression in my terminal cancer patients, because I'm not worried as much about their long-term heart health

OK, Doc. Let's not refill that prescription, then.

This conventional wisdom has recently been challenged, but I think there is no great consensus on this issue yet.

http://www.dailyrx.com/adhd-medicines-were-not-linked-seriou...

[throwaway54-762]

Oh, the possible negatives I had in mind were brain-related: "diminishing returns" due to tolerance or other factors after long-term use, and adverse side-effects of the drug flooding your brain with seratonin and dopamine over long periods of time (obviously similar to that observed in long-term methamphetamine use).

[MartinCron]

I see. I wasn't a long-term user and was always extremely conservative with my dosage, so I didn't encounter any of those brain-related issues.

Even with the fact that they are in the same family of drugs, comparisons to long-term meth abusers doesn't seem quite right.

[throwaway54-762]

Every person is different, and meth is definitely abused in higher proportions more than prescription adderall — I am not contesting that, or attempting to compare adderall users to meth users.

I am trying to highlight the similarities between the drugs themselves.

[MichaelGG]

Prescription "meth" is just that: meth. Methamphetamine is legal in the US and available under prescription (brand name: Desoxyn). It's scheduled just the same as Adderall -- not that scheduling means much; most of it's science-free political posturing.

Adderall/Vyvanse are amphetamines but not methamphetamine.

[throwaway54-762]

It's figurative, not literal. I am very much aware of desoxyn and that adderall is actually composed of four amphetamine salts, none of them literally meth. However, the amphetamine family of drugs have very similar effects — meth is very similar to adderall is very similar to vyvanse.

[MichaelGG]

I don't understand the figurative part. Is that like folks who call oxycodone "legal heroin" or "synthetic heroin"? Is it supposed to sound edgy or provide some sort of shock effect against ignorant people? I don't get it.

[throwaway54-762]

I don't describe it like that to "sound edgy" or provide "shock effect." It's just pointing out that these drugs are very similar chemically and biologically, and that people should examine their own biases that divorce adderall (medicine!) from meth (evil drug!) in their minds — they are not so different substances.

[JohnBooty]

However small the chemical difference, there is an enormous practical difference.

Meth can produce an intense high. Adderall, not so much.

I don't have any experience with meth so I can't compare Adderall and meth directly. However, I'd compare the extremely limited "high" from Adderall with... what a person with no caffeine tolerance feels when drinking a medium latte from Starbucks. And, like caffeine, you quickly grow accustomed to Adderall and no longer feel a high from it.

So while it's true that they're chemically similar, and that we shouldn't be demonizing anybody in my opinion, I don't think Adderall and meth are very similar in a practical sense.

While Adderall is obviously misused by some, it is seldom abused in the catastrophic ways that meth is.

[kragen]

I think you're naïve.

Experienced amphetamine users are not able to distinguish the effects of amphetamine (Adderall) and methamphetamine (Desoxyn) in double-blind "taste tests". The main difference is that the effective dosage is different.

It's easy to abuse amphetamine in the catastrophic ways that methamphetamine is abused: you crunch it up and snort it instead of taking a slower-releasing pill, and you take higher dosages than you'd take to focus on your homework.

[throwaway54-762]

> However small the chemical difference, there is an enormous practical difference. Meth can produce an intense high. Adderall, not so much.

This just isn't true. Adderall is several amphetamines and the drug definitely produces a high. The medical application of the drug is this rush of dopamine and seratonin allows users to focus and ignore distractions.

The high is an amphetamine high, much like meth, actually. You've noticed that tolerance diminishes these effects; so have many meth users.

[rdl]

From a former tweaker I know: smoked meth (or even hotrails) is in an entirely different class, but swallowing methamphetamine powder (capped or in a paper "parachute") isn't noticeably different in peak intensity from the 30mg IR adderall pills, but the meth lasts much longer.

Insufflated meth is higher peak than comparable by weight adderall powder (crushed up pills), but just increasing the adderall quantity makes up for that.

[chimeracoder]

> Adderall / Vyvanse is prescription meth (something I've heard from several of my AD(H)D friends).

No, that's Desoxyn[0].

What you may be referring to is that Adderall, methamphetamine, and MDMA have remarkably similar effects, which is true - the active ingredients in all three are metabolized in a similar manner, and the main differences are the means of ingestion, the bioavailability, and set/setting. In methamphetamine, for example, the extra methyl group simply ensures that it can cross the blood-brain barrier more easily, but it doesn't change the actual effect of the drug in itself.

[0]http://www.rxlist.com/desoxyn-drug.htm

[throwaway54-762]

> What you may be referring to is that Adderall, methamphetamine, and MDMA have remarkably similar effects, which is true - the active ingredients in all three are metabolized in a similar manner, and the main differences are the means of ingestion, the bioavailability, and set/setting.

Precisely. I'll add a clarifying edit now that two people have interpreted my statement differently than intended..

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5321935