PsychonautRyan
Bluelighter
(Sorry for the long novel by the way, I have a lot to bitch about)
I'm 20 years old, an engineering student in community college, and I'm trying to make up for a few crappy semesters, and so far I'm getting a B-average, I've been a chronic underachiever, and I'm trying to make up for it, and I'm seeing a psychiatrist and taking Adderall to manage ADHD symptoms.
My brother is 17 going on 18, a senior in HS, has a 1.7 GPA, and sits on his ass playing X-box. He criticizes me for my arrogance, and my shift to a driven, overachievers complex than from slacking off. On the side, our grandma is 73, just got out of rehab because of a disc in her back, is on Xanax, morphine and hydrocodone, a heavy drinker, chain-smoker, and she lives a sedentary lifestyle playing bingo on Pogo and watching NCIS marathons.
Honestly, I'm resentful of her, though I try to take pity on her: she's had plenty of opportunities to live healthier, make a 180, and she'd have a better quality of life. I've quit smoking and I try to cut down on drinking, and I try to meditate on occassion and practice mindfulness. However, I feel sorry for our family for investing time and energy into her rehab, when her solution is to just knock back a pill for it.
I know addiction is a brain disease, not a personal choice, so I try to think that it isn't easy for grandma to live like this either. I try to avoid seeing grandma, even though she could go anyday now, knowing that I'd have to hold back from saying anything snide when seeing her. Anyway, my brother starts attacking me for having a superior attitude with grandma, I also try a diet of fish oils, piracetam, St. John's wort, 5-HTP, ginkgo biloba, B vitamins and other nootropics/mood lifters to help, and my brother says I'm just falling back on vitamins to enhance my healthiness.
Getting into a pissing contest with him is futile: he says I wouldn’t be getting good grades without Adderall, and then putting me down for failing my first few semesters because I was unstructured and undisciplined, and unprepared for transitioning from high school,and off of Adderall at the time. When I make the point of saying that I was in AP and Honors courses in HS, and only was taking caffeine, he says that was a “fluke” and that I’m still using caffeine as a dependency.
If I try to make a decent point, he just says “I don’t care”, then turns the TV volume over me and tells me to shut up (apparently you care just enough to cut me down, but not listen to my side). If I’m pissed off, he says it’s “my fault for not ignoring him” which acknowledges immaturity, though true. He points out my arrogance and how I’m anti-social for distancing myself from the family (gee, it’s not like criticizing and cutting me down is going to bring out the best in me).
I’ve resisted the urge to punch him on multiple occasions because there are better ways to resolve conflicts. He says he has a right to an opinion, which is true, but he said that he wasn’t going to change it no matter what arguments I make, logical or emotional, so he’s narrow-minded, when I’m trying to use the discussion to reach a higher understanding. He might as well be wearing ear muffs and saying out loud "na-na-na-na-na-I-don't-have-to-listen". Whenever I get into a heated debate with somebody I disagree with, whether politics, religion or philosophy, we can always shake hands and agree to disagree, and I can at least recognize the sincerity of that person, for example, I once got into a debate with religious fundamentalists, and though I'm an atheist, we could trade arguments respectably, and I can at least see that they care enough about my soul's fate (however nonexistent) to discuss it with me rationally, with my brother it's just a pathetic and immature pissing contest.
My mom and family feel the way I do, but aren't blunt about it, and I just had to listen to mom b*tch about how grandma started smoking again after 4 weeks of rehab "for old time's sake". My brother says I feel superior, and then says to me "Well, at least I don't have to rely on pills to get ahead", 10 minutes later: so you're a slacker who doesn't achieve anything, whereas I'm working and going to school, setting my goals and achieving them, and you have a moral high ground without Adderall?
At one point, I asked him, last spring, when our mom was wanting to get an ADHD diagnosis and start on medication because he's disorganized, "Well, which label do you prefer, having ADHD, a neurochemical imbalance that causes academic deficits, or just say prefer "dumb, lazy slacker" who can do better but doesn't bother giving a fuck?", and he shot back with "Dumb, lazy slacker, I don't want to have ADHD like you", thanks bro! %)
Honestly, I would still use Adderall as a pick-me-up and a booster if I didn't believe I have ADHD, in the same way Paul Erdos used amphetamines to succeed in mathematics, and I would see it the same way as caffeine, as a means to achieving my goals. When I study without Adderall: I daydream, I don't retain the information, I have to get up and pace around every few minutes, and that's IF I study after endless procrastination, so if anything it levels the playing field.
I'm 20 years old, an engineering student in community college, and I'm trying to make up for a few crappy semesters, and so far I'm getting a B-average, I've been a chronic underachiever, and I'm trying to make up for it, and I'm seeing a psychiatrist and taking Adderall to manage ADHD symptoms.
My brother is 17 going on 18, a senior in HS, has a 1.7 GPA, and sits on his ass playing X-box. He criticizes me for my arrogance, and my shift to a driven, overachievers complex than from slacking off. On the side, our grandma is 73, just got out of rehab because of a disc in her back, is on Xanax, morphine and hydrocodone, a heavy drinker, chain-smoker, and she lives a sedentary lifestyle playing bingo on Pogo and watching NCIS marathons.
Honestly, I'm resentful of her, though I try to take pity on her: she's had plenty of opportunities to live healthier, make a 180, and she'd have a better quality of life. I've quit smoking and I try to cut down on drinking, and I try to meditate on occassion and practice mindfulness. However, I feel sorry for our family for investing time and energy into her rehab, when her solution is to just knock back a pill for it.
I know addiction is a brain disease, not a personal choice, so I try to think that it isn't easy for grandma to live like this either. I try to avoid seeing grandma, even though she could go anyday now, knowing that I'd have to hold back from saying anything snide when seeing her. Anyway, my brother starts attacking me for having a superior attitude with grandma, I also try a diet of fish oils, piracetam, St. John's wort, 5-HTP, ginkgo biloba, B vitamins and other nootropics/mood lifters to help, and my brother says I'm just falling back on vitamins to enhance my healthiness.
Getting into a pissing contest with him is futile: he says I wouldn’t be getting good grades without Adderall, and then putting me down for failing my first few semesters because I was unstructured and undisciplined, and unprepared for transitioning from high school,and off of Adderall at the time. When I make the point of saying that I was in AP and Honors courses in HS, and only was taking caffeine, he says that was a “fluke” and that I’m still using caffeine as a dependency.
If I try to make a decent point, he just says “I don’t care”, then turns the TV volume over me and tells me to shut up (apparently you care just enough to cut me down, but not listen to my side). If I’m pissed off, he says it’s “my fault for not ignoring him” which acknowledges immaturity, though true. He points out my arrogance and how I’m anti-social for distancing myself from the family (gee, it’s not like criticizing and cutting me down is going to bring out the best in me).
I’ve resisted the urge to punch him on multiple occasions because there are better ways to resolve conflicts. He says he has a right to an opinion, which is true, but he said that he wasn’t going to change it no matter what arguments I make, logical or emotional, so he’s narrow-minded, when I’m trying to use the discussion to reach a higher understanding. He might as well be wearing ear muffs and saying out loud "na-na-na-na-na-I-don't-have-to-listen". Whenever I get into a heated debate with somebody I disagree with, whether politics, religion or philosophy, we can always shake hands and agree to disagree, and I can at least recognize the sincerity of that person, for example, I once got into a debate with religious fundamentalists, and though I'm an atheist, we could trade arguments respectably, and I can at least see that they care enough about my soul's fate (however nonexistent) to discuss it with me rationally, with my brother it's just a pathetic and immature pissing contest.
My mom and family feel the way I do, but aren't blunt about it, and I just had to listen to mom b*tch about how grandma started smoking again after 4 weeks of rehab "for old time's sake". My brother says I feel superior, and then says to me "Well, at least I don't have to rely on pills to get ahead", 10 minutes later: so you're a slacker who doesn't achieve anything, whereas I'm working and going to school, setting my goals and achieving them, and you have a moral high ground without Adderall?
At one point, I asked him, last spring, when our mom was wanting to get an ADHD diagnosis and start on medication because he's disorganized, "Well, which label do you prefer, having ADHD, a neurochemical imbalance that causes academic deficits, or just say prefer "dumb, lazy slacker" who can do better but doesn't bother giving a fuck?", and he shot back with "Dumb, lazy slacker, I don't want to have ADHD like you", thanks bro! %)
Honestly, I would still use Adderall as a pick-me-up and a booster if I didn't believe I have ADHD, in the same way Paul Erdos used amphetamines to succeed in mathematics, and I would see it the same way as caffeine, as a means to achieving my goals. When I study without Adderall: I daydream, I don't retain the information, I have to get up and pace around every few minutes, and that's IF I study after endless procrastination, so if anything it levels the playing field.
