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Comment by barking_biscuit | Hacker News Reader

hmm... caffeine actually helps for ADHD as it's a stimulant. I can only take my meds on weekdays and I've pretty much had life long addiction to either coke, pepsi or red-bull. When I started taking effective medication I basically stopped drinking caffeinated drinks. Just don't need it. I can't take my meds on the weekends, and virtually always I go get something with caffeine in it to help.

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it depends - caffeine uses different receptors than are helpful for many people with ADHD, and since it isn’t managed by someone outside, it’s easy to get big swings of usage or other problems due to, well ADHD.

It’s common that folks with ADHD will use Caffeine, it just doesn’t work as well as other stimulants for many people.

As I said, I may have ADHD as I have a lot of the classic symptoms, but I have a daughter with diagnosed ADHD and I do not have nearly as significant symptoms as she does. All I know is cutting caffeine improved my general concentration and significantly decreased my anxiety as a bonus.

As a person completely unqualified to diagnose anything but with similar problems, I suspect the real root of your issue might just be the anxiety. If you could address the roots of that, caffeine would probably become irrelevant.

Untreated ADHD is a common cause of anxiety

ADHD travels with friends and anxiety definitely tends to be one of them! When you get a proper diagnosis they try to rule out if it's not simply just anxiety, and or something like obstructive sleep apnea. Both of these can have ADHD-like symptoms. Luckily for me I have all three of these things, so it's been fun teasing apart what's what, but that's why a formal diagnosis is an important process.

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