ADD Forums - Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder Support and Information Resources Community - Looking for Advice, Comments, anything else

Let me start this off by introducing myself; Hi. I'm a 24 year old male that was diagnosed with ADHD non Hyperactive at age ~12, roughly 2001. Around this time I was floundering badly in the 7th grade. I was re-diagnosed with adult ADHD-PI at age 18 after failing in vocational school.

I started writing some backrgound history and it turned into my life story, If you actually want to read it you can do so here: http://pastebin.com/4Q1E4rrG

I would have kept it here, but It just got way too long. Sorry.

tl;dr Alot of things contribute to me failing in school and life in general, though Concerta helped at one point.

I'm seeing a ARNP who's trying to help my depression and ADHD symptoms with medication. She prescribed me 10 MG of Adderal to start and later started me one 75mg of effexor since the adderal wasn't helping with my motivation/depression issues.

The first week of the adderall was a marked improvement. It quickly lost effectiveness after that. Last time I saw my doctor, she upped my dosage to 15mg(twice a day) and prescribed me 75mg of effexor(since I had never tried an SNRI she wanted to see if It would help, and since effexor has a reputation for being a 'last line of defense' when it comes to severe depression).

The Adderall seems to continue to do nothing, even at this new dosage.

I've been on the effexor now for 1 week. It's been... interesting. To say the least. First dosage I took at night before bed, that morning I was having withdrawal symptoms(something that apparently happens to some people when you start treatment at a higher dosage than 37.5 mg), lots of yawning, generally felt incredibly weird and floaty(almost like the one time I tried marijuana, though not as bad). For the first half the day, I yawned every 3-4 minutes, sometimes more. Every time I yawned I was unable to finish it, and felt like I couldn't catch my breath. Eventually I started finishing the yawns, and every time I did I got what I later figured out was a brain zap. So to say the least, my first 4-5 days weren't that great.

I decided to stick with it, though my girlfriend was pretty apprehensive and wanted me to stop. A week after starting though and most of those symptoms are gone. I'm determined to stick with it, with the hopes that It will actually have a positive effect on my life.

I feel like I'm running out of both time and options. My depression has never been very serious, though It's been with me since I was atleast 13. There were no peaks and valleys, It did not come and go. It was an ever present blanket of fog in my head. I resounding emotional apathy, feeling almost nothing besides occasional anger but only when frustrated. Most people would probably describe me as very easy going and relaxed, my girlfriends mom even felt like my gait was relaxing somehow. In reality It's because I had/have almost no feeling of connection to anything.

More recently(last year or 2) I have had some real dips into sadness, including thoughts of suicide though no intention of acting on it. I still didn't have much feeling to go with it, just thoughts. This lead me to the realization that I had been actually contemplating suicide for quite a while(since atleast age 17), just inconspicuously and with no real intent, almost invisible to me.

In any case, the other day I read about SCT(sluggish cognitave tempo) and It was like reading a CIA bio on myself. Every symptom struck a chord in me. I literally had every symptom on the list. Something that never happened with my ADHD-PI diagnosis(always only got 4 or 5 out of 8 or whatever).

So I have to ask, what would you guys recommend I do when it comes to ADD/SCT? The adderall doesn't seem to be working anymore, like I said. Would It be worth it to up the dosage more until I do feel something? Or should I just scrap it all together and try something else? Is there another drug out there that is better suited to helping with SCT?

oh and I'm trying to get my life on track, I'm going to be trying(hopefully) attending Evergreen with my girlfriend this fall.

Any words of encouragement or advice or anything at all would be appreciated, thanks.