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Comment by fiaz | Hacker News Reader

Absolutely correct - please consult with your doctor before you take any advice off of the internet. Messing around with your neural circuitry may cause more harm than good.

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I feel the need to caution the OP that the average doctor can't be counted on to know more about messing around with neural circuitry than random people you find on the Internet. We simply don't have the scientific knowledge at this point to make reliable predictions about the effect of drugs like adderall on a given person.

From what I've been able to tell, all drugs that act as neurotransmitter reuptake inhibitors (including amphetamines like adderall) have a strong potential to cause unpredictable and undesirable side effects. It seems wise to use such drugs only as a last resort to treat a debilitating condition. Lack of motivation suggests you might want to find something more compelling to work on.

Because doctors know everything. I know a woman whose doctors took a year to find the broken pieces of bone swimming around her leg because they were sure her back was causing her leg pain and a man whose brother was diagnosed with MS because of exposure to a chemical known to cause MS-like symptoms (in a different order). Myself, I've been told by doctors that a joint problem would heal in a month - after it had already been six months. Then there's the story of how doctors failed to notice the absence of one of my male organs until I brought it to their attention at age 10.

Seems to me that most doctors are pretty much robots with a lot of institutionalized "knowledge".

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