Saturday, November 30, 2013

HOW TO GET OFF OF ADD MEDICATION: ADHD or ATTENTION DEFICIT DISORDER MEDICATION

After quitting ADD medication, a cup of coffee can help stablize your system. You can add natural stimulants. While making your morning coffee, add 1/8 of a teaspoon of cayenne powder and a teaspoon of Saigon cinammon directly on top of the fresh coffee grounds in a drip filter. Add water and let it drip. You can also take a bite of fresh ginger with your coffee. This activates your brain. Our pediatrician actually said that caffeine has the same effect as expensive ADD medications. 

After having a bad experience with Adderall, I was prescribed Vyvanse, which I was on for three years.

In August, 2013, I completely quit the medication. I weaned from the Vyvanse by titrating down for four weeks. The first two weeks I opened the 70 mg capsule and sprinkled half of it into my morning yogurt. The last two weeks, I sprinkled one-third into the yogurt so I was taking less and less each day.

Since I believe most dis-ease has an emotional component, even if it is genetically buried through generations of belief, I knew I didn't need to be on this medication. It interfered with my ability to connect and be fully conscious. In 12-step programs they call this 'conscious contact' with your inner self, higher power, or source of life, creativity and being.

And to be honest, I really love my ADD brain. I don't want to rein it in. In primitive times, man had to think on his feet in order to avoid danger. We are not made for long hours in front of a computer, focused only on one task. Some of us are meant to multi-task. It's the "hunter" instinct.

People with ADHD just don't fit into this society so well -- the society that lives in tick-tock mechanical man mode, as the spiritual humorist Stuart Wilde puts it. (R.I.P. Stuart Wilde, my favorite metaphysicst.  Here is a cautionary tale about his sudden death.)

I knew I had to have another catastrophic spiritual experience like I did when I quit drinking 19 years ago on September 11, 1994.

So on August 11, I woke up feeling tortured by guilt that I hadn't honored my one promise to myself: to   finish writing the book series I had started three years earlier when my husband left me for Gene Simmons.

That morning I saw a slim book sitting on my dresser that had been given to me by the inimitable comedy impressario L.G. Ross.  The book is called "The War of Art: Break Through the Blocks and Win Your Creative Battles" by Steven Pressfield.

I opened the book against my will and started reading. I was finished in an hour. I collapsed to my knees sobbing. This book gave me the kick in the butt I needed to finish what I started.

I got up, went to my computer and in two weeks I had finished the BOOK! Actually it's a book, movie and TV series that turns tragedy into comedy.

That day, I forgot to take the Vyvanse. I never refilled the prescription even though I had a few left. I am sending them to the moon on the next Virgin Moon flight. I don't want to pollute the water system. We are all too hyped up.

But in the meantime I am using natural stimulants like ginger, cayenne, cinnammon and yes, coffee!!

Love coffee.