[Scienz]

Personal anecdote, since there are some comments here by people claiming an early ADHD diagnosis might have changed their life: I was "diagnosed" with ADHD about five years ago, at around age 25, and it was a horrible experience. I'm not sure if I have ADHD, but at the very least was very depressed at the time, and they gave me some self-evaluation asking a bunch of questions like, "Do you have trouble concentrating? Does your mind wander?" Of course being very depressed I tended to be pretty hard on myself answering, they gave me the diagnosis, and at the first sign I gave of skepticism about it they basically ridiculed and humiliated me, telling me I was in denial and nothing in my life would ever change unless I started taking medication. They completely ignored any other problems I was having and other possible explanations once they pinned the ADHD label on me. In a conversation that lasted an hour, I didn't get a single word in after making the comment, "Well I'm not really sure if I have this..."

A few years later I did try taking some Adderall, unofficially acquired from a friend, and in three days it caused me to start having all kinds of mental health problems (OCD and Tourette's type symptoms, fyi) that I'm still not fully recovered from. Admittedly I think I took a bit too high of a dosage, but I'm scared to even try again if only three days of something could basically turn me halfway insane. Maybe if I'd started on only a half dose it wouldn't have happened, but I'm worried about the fact that such people were trying so hard to push a drug that ended up having those kinds of effects in only three days from only a slightly elevated dosage.

So I definitely think this whole thing is a huge pharma scam at this point. I'd be highly skeptical of any ADHD diagnoses, especially when they're all based on self-reporting (notoriously unreliable) and a bunch of therapists, teachers, etc. who are quick to jump to whatever explanation fits with their prejudices about a person. It scares me that they're pushing these drugs on people, especially at such young ages, not to mention how it prevents the real underlying problems from being solved.

[pavel_lishin]

I have to take your story with a big ol' bucket of salt, because you ignored medical professionals, and then tried to self-medicate with un-prescribed drugs of unknown dosage.

[Scienz]

Point taken - I may have ADHD or I may not, as I implied I don't really know, and the bad reaction to adderall obviously isn't universal. Though I'll also say the dosage wasn't unknown, and the professionals gave me extensive reasons not to trust them. Drugs don't affect you differently depending on who prescribed them, and the main point of the story was that I didn't trust these people to accurately diagnose or prescribe anything. If they won't even let me question them about their diagnosis, I wouldn't trust them to listen to me about my reactions and side effects either.

This is a controversial subject though, so I'm going to step out now. Just wanted to share the story of my negative experience with it.

[chimeracoder]

> the main point of the story was that I didn't trust these people to accurately diagnose or prescribe anything.

Your experience is an indictment of bad psychiatry, which nobody here would defend. But you explicitly say you wouldn't trust them to diagnose you with anything (I wouldn't either), so I'm not sure why you then draw the conclusion you did:

> So I definitely think this whole thing is a huge pharma scam at this point. I'd be highly skeptical of any ADHD diagnoses

(FWIW, your comment is gray as I write this; I didn't downvote you, but I wanted to explain why I think someone might have).

[bayesianhorse]

You are describing symptoms of depression and some mild or severe psychotic symptoms, combined with the very risky and assertive decision of self-medicating.

A bipolar disorder would explain these symptoms. Also bipolar is a very common comorbidity of ADHD, with overlapping symptoms. At the very least, the social problems that come with ADHD predispose for bouts of depression.

Taking destabilizing drugs like Ritalin or Amphetamines is also known to trigger manic episodes or other psychosis. Which is one of many reasons why medical professionals won't tell you to start at the final dose for the first few weeks...