My 'smart drugs' nightmare
bbc.co.uk
bbc.co.uk
I became distracted - more so than normal. While the drug made me focus, it was on the wrong things - such as playing video games on my smartphone."
That's because of something called the Yerkes-Dodson curve which basically says if your body is not aroused enough then your performance decreases, and if it's overly aroused then you can't focus on anything. This applies to well-learned tasks or other things that depend mostly on cognitive abilities (differently shaped for different types of tasks). It sounds like the author didn't need to take modafinil because he was already good at concentrating on things and taking it just put him on the far end of the curve and destroyed his performance.
News at 11
What happens is that I don't get enough sleep, and feel the secondary effects of that even though the fatigue is still masked by the drug. The fix is easy enough - just reminding myself to sleep more. I've found it's not difficult to get to sleep on the drug despite not feeling sleepy at all.
That said, the stuff is not a superpower pill. It affects different people differently, it affects you differently on different days, it can make you fixate on random tasks (like the author mentions) and if you're anxious about something, modafinil will make you spin and spin about it.
Works great for housecleaning, though.
An hour?? Amateur. It takes me 2-4 hours every night to fall asleep, no matter how tired I am when I lay down. And then I wake up 3-4 hours later, and then fall asleep again after another 30 or so minutes. Been that way for as long as I can remember.
So yeah, I'm always tired during the day. Was starting to affect job performance, and things to help sleep (eg melatonin, no blue light or caffeine before bed, etc) weren't helping. So I tried modafinil myself, as well as armodafinil. The latter's much nicer. But neither are any kind of miracle drug.
I don't get any headaches from it, but I do notice my palms sweat a lot more, my appetite decreases a bit, my joint paints are amplified significantly, and it's easier to stay awake. But it's not like being wide awake. It's still clear that I'm mentally worn out. I'm not really sure if this is an atypical result, but I can't really see how this is a very good "study drug" given that. It is a boost, definitely, but it's a very tiny one, like ~10-15%.
I also build up a tolerance surprisingly fast. I can't use it more than two days in a week. Thankfully, the tolerance fades pretty quickly as well.
Also, to anyone who tries it, be sure you stay away from caffeinated beverages while on it. This stuff seems to amplify caffeine's effects or something, and it's quite unpleasant. A cop of coffee plus 200mg of modafinil's about equivalent to taking two caffeine tablets for me.
Of course, you probably won't be able to get it. Doctors are incredibly stingy with prescribing this, and even if they do, the US brands are around $1000 - $1300 per month.
sure if you force yourself to stop breathing eventually your body will shut down and force you to breathe
but you are also capable of taking control of your breaths, determine their length, frequency, potency
sleep is the same
learn to control it
if those 2-4 hours are undesired, while waiting for your body to wrestle control back from you, then they are wasted, or worse, time.. unless you argue those 2-4 hours are actually meditation time for you
The 2-4 hours are just wasted time where my mind goes over having a million fake "conversations" in my head, recalling past traumatic events and regretting my actions then, and if I'm lucky, thinking about a problem I've been trying to solve during the day.
Can't really count it as meditation because my mind is racing at 100 miles an hour the entire time. I can always tell when I'm getting close to falling asleep because my thoughts become more and more erratic, almost dream-like in their absurdity. Sometimes I'll snap out of that state and realize what was happening.
I'd love to learn how to control it, though. That'd be super.
It also really helps just throughout the day. Quite regularly my brain just goes into overdrive and by late afternoon it's all over the place. Every single time that I force myself to sit and meditate (I use the Headspace app, usually 20 min sessions), my mind is significantly calmer and I feel a sudden boost in energy. Kind of like pressing a reset button.
The same goes for mornings. I often can't really get started until 11:00 or 12:00, but those few times where I manage to meditate first thing, I'm able to snap out of the 'coffee/internet' ritual with very little effort.
Perhaps it's extra effective for me because I get overstimulated and/or over-obsessed much quicker than most people, but I'm still amazed at how effective something as simple as sitting and observing my thoughts as they pass actually is.
In my opinion, if it's even half as effective for the rest of the population as it is for me, it should be as normal as brushing your teeth twice a day (and it often has been compared to brushing).
I'd love to learn how to control it, though.
That'd be super.
i'm happy to offer some methods i use:
slow down, create a sleep space you can trust, breathe, visualise, learn
for you, or posterity
That sounds nice, though. The Adderall would probably help a lot too, but I don't seem to have any luck at all with doctors being open to letting me try things out to see if they'd benefit me or not.
The last time I went to one for sleep issues, she tried to push an SSRI (Zoloft) on me >_>
Good luck with everything.
1) Going for a walk in a park. Cool fresh outside air helps reset the brain.
2) Read something, preferably a book. Not on a phone or tablet. Not too interesting which will keep you awake wanting to finish it "Understanding The Linux Kernel", for example does wonders for me.
3) Watch a documentary about nature or space. Something not too intense or crazy.
For 1, that's a great idea and I really need the exercise. But it's ruled out for 4 months of the year due to northern temperatures. I have a very low tolerance for cold, so if there's snow outside, it's extremely unpleasant, tears up my throat, paradoxically burns my hands and ears, etc. Can overdress to compensate, but even then it's still unpleasant and slippery outside.
For 2, I'd love to read more in general. But I have absolutely no imagination, and get lost in side thoughts. I'll find out after having read six pages that I had zoned out and don't remember a single thing I read. Maybe that's okay if I'm just trying to fall asleep. I think I'll give this suggestion a try with my "Making Sense of Japanese" book ;)
For 3, won't the blue light from the TV cause someone to stay awake? I heard it disrupts the body's production of melatonin, because it think it's daylight.
There's stationary bikes, gyms, etc.
Plus, not going outside is an attitude issue. I've gone running a few times in winter, despite having Raynaud's syndrome (or something similar, my extremities tend towards ambient temperature unless I'm jogging or doing something equally strenuous). It's doable. Not pleasant and requires some thought and care though.
>For 3, won't the blue light from the TV cause someone to stay awake? I
Any bright screen makes falling asleep harder, fools the body into thinking it's daylight. Only something like Kindle with very gentle light doesn't make going to sleep harder.
I've been taking 1000% Vitamin D3 daily for the past eight months or so. Also occasionally take calcium (for heartburn) and magnesium. I think it did ultimately help with some bad chest pains I was experiencing, but a lot of that has also just been acclimation to them. Haven't gotten another blood test to see what I'm at now, because even with my insurance, the out of pocket charge for the last visit was over $1000.
Has not really helped with sleeping, though. I hear natural UV light is supposedly a lot better than D3 supplements. There was a good TED talk on how that helped people's cardiovascular health as well, whereas supplements did not. But all the "sun lamps" filter out the UV for the risk of skin cancer. The only actual UV ones I can find are meant for reptiles (lizards, turtles) or cost $1000+ >_>
I also don't get hangovers when I avoid caffeine. And I have lots of strange tolerances to other chemicals, so ... I'm kind of an oddball, I guess. Probably some weird liver issues going on.
The tablets come as 200mg, and the armodafinil as 150mg. I did try cutting them in half, but found the effect much weaker. Even the whole tablet of the stronger armodafinil doesn't really get me back to "wide awake" status like everyone seems to claim they get. It's more like, "exhausted but not yawning and having trouble keeping my eyes open" tired.
Perhaps it's different for different people, and perhaps this is only a problem if you smoke too much though. I'm not sure.
Unless you have nightmares about developing a rash and getting a poor night's sleep.
"Estimates of the background incidence rate for these serious skin reactions in the general population range between 1 to 2 cases per million-person years."
http://www.rxlist.com/provigil-drug/warnings-precautions.htm
People react differently to different medications and more than likely his experience was an outlier.
For me, strattera was like a sleeping pill that out me down for an entire weekend. Ritalin spikes quickly and gives you a rush. On Ritalin, everything was intensely interesting and in the most boating classes I would be on the edge of my seat and the professor couldn't talk fast enough.
But it's also easy to get focused on the wrong thing and run off on some tangent in all the excitement, like when you're supposed to be studying for an exam (I bet I can show that P=NP). The first time I took a full dosage I had got a headache, which I attributed to a new increase in blood flow. Ritalin also tended to cause insomnia.
Adderral greatly suppresses appetite and tends to cause hyper focus and hypertension, but is also the least noticeable unless dosage is very high.
Modifinal didnt feel as effective or as clean as adderral. Given the choice between an energy drink (blue sugar free monster) or modifinal, I'd take the energy drink for efficacy.
For the most part I always come back to adderral. The major gain is the absence of fatigue and the appetite suppression is a nice side effect that's probably helped me stay slimmer than others my age. The biggest problem is hyper focus, and this seems to be quite common. Hyper focus is great when you need to study, read, and get work done. When I was in university I could code for 14-16 hours a day for weeks. The problem is that you can't easily turn it off. Over time I found myself losing my quick footed sociability. In fact I feel that my vocabulary may have atrophied over that period, and words are no longer as readily available.
For me, net-net the benefits have far out weighed the costs. However I've scaled back my dossage considerably over the years (although a sugar-free Monster energy drink seems to have a long lasting amplifying effect) and every few months I'll let my prescription lapse and go on a holiday until I feel I'm slipping into unproductive ways.
Upon reflection about how poorly sleep/wakefulness/daydreaming is understood, I decided that I didn't want to guinea-pig myself with biological forces out of my depth.
You need to know how you respond to the easy stuff first. This guy jumped right into the deep end without looking.
He spoke to a previous user, consulted a doctor, and took it as part of a test by an Oxbridge Professor of Clinical Neuropsychology with "an international reputation in the fields of cognitive psychopharmacology, neuroethics" [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbara_Sahakian ].
That is some level of 'looking'.
I wouldn't. And what OP said is absolutely true when it comes to nootropics. Moda should not be taken lightly. Start with the basics and work your way up.
You jump in the "deep" end with modafinil and you get a headache, a sleepless night, and people call you ugly? Why is that "not to be taken lightly"? People do a lot worse than that casually.
I was heading into the article expecting him to end up with a stay in a psychiatric unit, with long term memory loss or personality disorders, with organ failure or loss of consciousness. 'Drug nightmares' can go really badly.
And if the good effect was moving him a few percent in focus, do "the basics" ... do anything measurable at all?
He comes up with the idea of dud pills (that stuff really sounds like modafinil, and the sulfur smell test is a dead giveaway,) and the doctor pontificates on liver enzymes - when anyone with a passing familiarity with the substance would suggest starting with a much lesser dose and structuring appetite, hydration, and sleep so as not to have a terrible time.
I've tried them all in various combinations and doses. Doesn't really work for me. Modafinil gives me bad headaches by the evening, and combining it with, say, Brahmi or Ashwagandha makes me feel nauseous after a few hours.
Maybe there is a nootropic cocktail that works, but I can't figure out which one. In the meantime, building better habits through good 'ol willpower seems to yield better results.