Hi all… (waves)
I just have to share something that may be valuable to others, you never know… and maybe someone else has a similar story to share. I’ve been on a trial of 3 different psychostimulants for adult ADD over the past 5 weeks, and I’ve kept an incredibly detailed food, drug, and mood diary during that time. I’ve responded really well to the drugs, and I’ve also had a very strong atypical response to all 3 (Focalin, Ritalin, and Adderall. Yep, even Adderall makes me all relaxed and sleepy and mellow, and my blood pressure drops to the point where I have to be very careful about getting up suddenly.) But I’ve had some ups and downs with how well and how consistently everything has worked. I couldn’t shake the feeling that there was a specific reason. I went through the diary very closely today, and I think I’ve possibly figured it out.
I don’t have any trouble getting to sleep at night, but I have had a consistent problem with waking up 3-5 hours earlier in the middle of the night/early morning than I want to. What I’ve been doing a lot of the time is taking melatonin then. I realized that whenever I did this and then took the stimulant 3-5 hours later, it was a MESS!!!It always ranged from less-than-great results to a DISASTER. It took me forever to figure this out, because I’d be fine when I first got up. But then the most noticeable symptom later on was that the atypical response was greatly intensified. (I vividly remember the day I had a huge cup of coffee and Ritalin, and sort of passed out asleep on the floor for two hours and then stared at a lamp for hours… I’d had melatonin early that morning.) On the days when I hadn’t had melatonin early that morning, things went so much better. I still had the atypical response to stimulants, but it wasn’t like getting hit in the head with a sledgehammer.
The point is, I wonder if anyone else has been in this situation and noticed this??