It has to do with the rate dependency principle (developed by Peter Dews): Rate of response determines a drug's effect, with other variables only influencing the drug effect by affecting rate. Every drug works towards an optimal level of response. Stimulants have high optimal levels. Let's look at rat data. Take a rat that has been conditioned to press a lever 20-50 times an hour. That is its baseline rate. Give the rat some amphetamine and its rate of response will go way up. Up because amphetamine has an optimal level of response higher than the rat's baseline rate. Then, look at the opposite effect involving chlorpromazine, an antipsychotic/sedative. Take the rat conditioned to respond 20-50 times an hour and give it chlorpromazine, and the rate of response will go down. Down because chlorpromazine's optimal level of response is lower than the rat's baseline rate. In humans without ADD, their baseline rate of response is lower than the optimal level of response of any stimulant. But in humans with ADD, their baseline rate is higher than the stimulants' level. So the stimulants pull them down, making them less agitated. There's a theory that cigarette smoking in certain teenagers is actually an attempt to self-medicate. Nicotine has a stimulating effect in most people, but it must work in the opposite way with people with ADHD, due to the rate dependancy principle. Isn't psychopharmacology interesting?

no, but stimulation is.

take ridalin chop it up, insert into nasal passage, notice increased rate reponse in humans without ADD......that'll get your bull running

I think I am self-medicating through Nicotine. I am way more depressed and apathetic without it (I know, I have gone weeks and months at a time without smoking since beginning this addiction). It perks me right the fuck up. I think it also aids my concentration, but that part may be a side effect of my ritualization of its use.

so why do some nicotine addicts report the morning cigarette perks them up, while the afternoon cigarette helps them wind down?

I never need to wind down. It's all about perking me up.

I want to quit sometimes but I,m afraid I,d get fat,just about everyone I ever knew that did quit smoking put on alot of weight.

Stimulants suppress your appetite (Dexedrine, anyone?). That's why you eat more when you go off them. I would imagine the morning cigarette perks them up because their metabolism (and therefore, baseline rate of response) slows down while they sleep.....and then by the afternoon they've picked up, so the cigarette calms them down?

Errrr...the first "them" in the second paragraph should read "people" or "repulsive chimney-imitating chain-smokers" or something. Sorry about that ambiguous pronoun.

My brother has ADD. He also suffers from migraines and his girlfriend of 6 years just dumped him. They were thinking about marriage previously. He takes ritalin and something else. That shit saved his life. He was the quintessential hyper active child before then.

mmmmmmmmmmm dexies time release.....that'll REALLY get yer bull runnin

the meds stimulate the area of the brain that is running low on attention span synapses and organization skills. or something like that.

Holy Shit!!!!! we just bought Out magazine..........what a good feeling it is to buy our your compe.... hey is anyone going to watch the X Files this sunday I was just...? god my mom can be such a bitch when NO! I don't need more coffee, jesusageschristo boats are fun when driven by wind where did those scissors go? anyone seen my red Swingline line um um stapler

Was that a dramatic re-enactment?

No. No idea. No.

no, that was patrick's imitation of Dave on crack.

dave does crack? DON'T MAKE ME COME UP THERE DAVE!!! we seriously did buy Out magazine.....in gay publishing this is a historic moment....really

What fascinates me is when a med developed for one purpose has a secondary, totally different use. For example, beta blockers, such as nadalol and propranalol are primarily heart meds. But they have a secondary use in controlling anger. It's not something you'll find in the official drug literature, but there is research, and it does work.

that was funny, patrick. i actually laughed out loud. did anyone see the movie "hurly burly"? it was terrible, but sort of like that.

uh, alright, glad to help. never saw the movie, so i have no context of any comparison

We learned about addiction today. We learned that the way chemicals are tested for their addictive properties is that they're given to animals, and then the animals are made to work for the ability to self-administer the drugs. The drugs that the animals are willing to make an effort for are the ones said to be physically addictive. Some chemicals that animals will work for: *opiates *ethanol *barbiturates *benzodiazepine anxiolytics *amphetamine *cocaine *caffeine *chloroform *ether *nitrous oxide *lacquer resin Cocaine is the easiest chemical to get them to work for and it is often used to make them work for drugs that they don't want to work for. They won't work for: *antipsychotics *tricyclic antidepressants *other depressants, including Prozac *aspirin *mescaline *tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) *LSD *Naloxone The drugs in this category are therefore not considered to be physically addictive. Where is nicotine, you ask? For years, the tobacco companies would use animal data to support their claims that nicotine was not addictive. It turns out that if you give nicotine to the animals on the same reinforcement schedule that you give them the other drugs on...toxic levels of nicotine will build up very quickly. The animal gives up working for it very quickly. So it *looks* like it's not addictive. But if you put the animals on an a restricted or intermittent schedule, the animal will work very hard to get it. More info: the government classifies illegal substances in two ways -- a) those which are abused but have therapeutic effects and b) those which are abused and have no therapeutic effects Interestingly, morphine is grouped in class A and heroin is grouped in class B, even though they are virtually identical in terms of chemistry and effect. Furthermore, heroin actually has better therapeutic effect since it reaches the brain faster than morphine and so relieves pain quicker. But for some reason the government green lights morphine and red lights heroin. They're both equally and highly addictive, however.

For the life of me/I will never understand why so many Whitefolks are willing to put their kids on drugs to 'manage' their behavior. Sometimes/little boys can be VERY rowdy. But I honestly believe in 8 cases out of 10/it has a lot to do w/homelife & father absence. I did not grow up in a fractured family/but I remember growing up w/a wild-&-cazy brother who was a basically buggin' from age 7-10. He was diagnosed as Dyslexic at appx. age 8 & received treatment for it. Eventually/he outgrew his reading & behavioral problems. But if my Mom hadn't been a doctor & taken the time to familiarize herself w/Ritalin & the other drugs (all of which she refused to let my brother take) that are now so commonly prescribed for so-called ADD-HAD boys/but had been a poor Black woman w/little or no health insurance/I'm sure drug therapy wd never even have been offered for my brother. Therapy for dyslexia/spending more 1-on-1 time w/our father/& focusing more on discipline & consequences/seemed to cure the problem. In the past 3 mos./I have had the astonishing experience of working w/2 different women/both White/both the mothers of Black sons due to their past involvement w/Black men. Both boys were being raised by their mothers in all-White households (one w/a White sibling) & no Black persons in their daily lives to serve as the most basic role models. One boy was 7/the other 9 or 10. Both boys were described by their mothers as 'out of control'/ unmanagable'/or 'impossible to deal with'. Both mothers expressed the fact that their sons' symptoms manifested at appx. age 7 or 8 -- the age when a large # of Black boys begin to experience 'problems' in school. And both had been diagnosed as ADD/HAD per their school guidance counselors/or outside psychologists. Both were on Ritalin. Only one child was in therapy. I cdn't help but think that perhaps the problems these boys were experiencing had a lot to do w/the fact that they were living in all-White environments/due to their respective fathers' lack of involvement in their lives & their mother's current relationships w/White men. And if their mothers had made a greater commitment to understanding what it means to raise a Black child/to discussing racial issues & making sure their sons spent time around Black people/maybe these boys wdn't be manifesting so much frustration & bad behavior. A 7 or 8 yr old doesn't have the language skills or experience to tell someone "I'm tired of living in a world where no one looks like me!". One mother commented on how the barbershop she took her son to cdn't manage to give him a decent haircut. When I pointed out that maybe she shd try a Black barbershop/her response was "But he doesn't have nappy hair." As if Blackfolks only have one type of hair! I think her ignorance abt Black people has a lot to do w/her son's emotional problems. And the psychological-psychiatric community seems to have a great stake in the quick-fix of putting kids on drugs to regulate their behavior (becuz most of the parents' insurance plans will pay for drugs indefinitely/but only foot the bill for 12-16 sessions of therapy) rather than looking at the root causes & family problems behind those behaviors. If you've got 7 & 8 yr olds on Ritalin/what kind of chemical fix will they need to cope w/life by the time they're 18 or 20 ?

CRACK

I agree with you there, Dragon--I think most of this ADD stuff that's, er, sprung up--has no founding in reality. All kids are off the wall. NO need to give them drugs for it.

if you wanna know what the whitefolks problem is - we're control freaks. it's probably why we like ritalin and prozac and probably the main reason why we kill ourselves. langston hughes taught me that.

Droopy, you're such a fool! :) I caught a few minutes of Oprah on Friday. She was featuring parents w/out-of-control kids. These critters made BeBe's Kids look like the Little Rascals! If I had a child who slapped & swore at me for telling him to clean up his room/then proceeded to trash said room/pulling the covers off the bed/throwing his lamp across the room/snatching posters & pictures off the wall, etc./I wd wail on his ass so hard he'd be too sore to fuss or fight anymore. I know it sounds anachronistic in these times/but the kids I saw (both boys & girls) seemed to have 1 thing in common -- they only acted out that way around their mothers. Dad/their grandparents/their teachers/weren't subjected to their tamtrums. Which/to me/is a Big Red Flag that Mommie has been coddling & indulging them since infancy/rather than disciplining them & teaching them to have some basic respect for her when they were 18 mos. old & 2-yrs.-old & 3 yrs old. Kids don't suddenly turn into terrors at age 6 or 7 -- that crap starts way before then. But why are White parents so willing to medicate their kids/yet so unwilling to use physical discipline? I know that in my parent's generation/Whitefolks beat their kids just as much as Black parents did. But when the 60's rolled around/you suddenly had all these White parents who didn't believe in corporal punishment. And that trend has continued for nearly 40 yrs. Altho' nowadays/if you slap or spank yr kids/you cd end up on the 6:00 news in handcuffs. But at least DCW wd come & get the bastards/so you wdn't have to deal w/their tantrums anymore. And 7 times out of 10/the little terrors are boys. Which is why I'm all abt daughters. At least 1 of the kids on Oprah was also on medication/but the mother didn't say what drug it was. I just don't see how parents can tell their kids "Just Say No" to pot & cocaine & beer when they've raised them on meds since they were 5 or 6. I'm glad all I have to worry abt raising is a cat.

droopy----i didn't know that you knew langston hughes !! i'm impressed !! incidentally, i know human animals that will work for alcohol or drugs-(one & same)--it's my line of work---NOT FOR the stuff, but helping the humans that want the stuff so badly.........

wait-NOT helping them get the stuff, but helping them get OFF the stuff....thought i better explain, for any bozos that might be reading this.....

R.C., are you saying then that ADD doesn't exist? My brother has ADD. I don't. We were both raised in the same enviroment, in a stable two-parent household. My brother was a holy terror between the ages of 8 and about 14, when he went on Ritalin and other meds. Nothing, and I mean nothing else helped. My mom was well versed with ADD and the treatments (she's a mental health professional). His behavior essentially meant that there was no chance of any decent relationship between us for those years, something which I still regret, and possibly why we aren't as close as a lot of other siblings are. To this day, my brother needs his meds to help him concentrate on his studies, else they (and his life) goes all to hell. I will agree that ADD is probably over-diagnosed, but in the legitimate cases, it's a complete lifesaver.

I believe ADD & HAD are real. And yr brother sounds like one of the people who needed Ritalin it & was helped by it. But I think real, clinical cases of ADD/HAD are far less common than the psych professionsals wd have us believe. IMO/there's nothing new under the sun. Yet think abt it -- when yr parents (who I assume are in their early 40's/which makes them part of my peer group) were in elementary school/did they ever hear of classmates who had AAD/AHD? I sure didn't. Yes/there was always that kid who had a hard time sitting still & paying attention in class. But after a few parent-teacher conferences & some serious disciplining at home/Johnny the Jumping Bean managed to get his act together. And a year or 2 later/he was performing at or above grade level. Becuz he'd learned that #1. acting out in class wd get him an ass-whipping at home #2. school is where you go to learn & there are negative consequences to not performing well in school 3. sometimes boring shit can't be avoided/so you figure out a way to deal w/it w/out making a spectacle of yrself. Nowadays/that same kid wd be put on Ritalin to accomplish what time/attentive parenting & self-dislipline can achieve w/out drugs in many cases. Becuz there are so many single Mom's out there raising their sons w/out a man in the house/ working 2 jobs becuz they get little or no $$ for child support/& they just don't have the time & energy to sit down & do behavioral modification excercies w/their kid every nite. Again/what makes me the most suspicious is the fact that ADD/HAD disgnoses are so widespread among middle-class White kids -- i.e. kids whose parents have health insurance. When Rakim in Bed Sty/whose mother is on Welfare/starts acting out in 3rd grade/he's labeled as a "slow learner" or a "behavioral problem" -- both non-clinical diagnoses that medication is not offered to treat. Becuz Rakim's Mom can't afford Ritalin. Plus I have never seen any hard data on what causes ADD/HAD. I don't see how this disorder suddenly appeared in the last 25 yrs. when there seems to be no historical medical info. on it. You can trace the history of other mental illnesses back hundreds of years -- even if they were only described as 'lunacy' or 'hysteria'/the symptoms were detailed & can be identified w/known mental illnesses today beuz the symptoms match. So where are the cases of kids with ADD/HAD symptoms from 50 or 100 yrs. ago? I suspect that what psychologists often classify as ADD/HAD in kids has a lot to do w/eating too many processed foods/consuming too many chemical additives/environmental toxins/& spending too much time infront of the t.v. or video games. But that's too hard to prove. The Feds certainly aren't gonna fund studies showing that young children are acting crazy becuz they've been exposed to too many harmful chemicals/or too many lightning-fast images on a videoscreen/than screw up their brain function. But y'all know how paranoid I am...

one of the taste buds on the tip of my tongue is all fucked up and inflamed. it fuckin hurts and dinner's almost ready.

are you sure it's not a pimple? In the past I've had pimples on my tongue, and it's really annoying.

i removed it with a toenail clipper. i probably don't have to tell you it hurt like hell. that was hours ago and it's all better now. god, my eyes are watering up again at the memory. sheesh.

Oh my God. Home surgery is never a good idea. Did you sterilize the clippers before you used them? I'm shivering at the thought of you answering 'no.'

goddam, man.

if by sterilizing, you mean blowing on it really hard a couple of times, then yes, i sterilized it. look you guys, i had to do it. remember in first blood when john rambo sewed up his own arm? he had to do it, too. if he hadn't, he probably would have never made it out of the abandoned mineshaft alive.

R.C./P.D.: Actually, both my parents are in their early 60's. I am inclined to think that there's more to the ADD thing than just the health insurance payola (although I think that's a good explanation). I think it's going to be comboniation of a great number of factors -more leisure time, poor diet, less exercise, the increase of foreign chemicals in our bodies (I can't remember what the stats are, but I remember reading about how there's a ridiculous number of chemicals that are now permanent parts of our bodies that didn't exist before 1920), etc. I don't know if an ass-whipping is the answer. I would have the kid run around the local track a few times. I think you have to force kids to do things they trow fits about at first, because how else are you going to earn their respect? Like Bill Phillips says, "sometimes the last thing you WANT to do is the first thing you NEED to do." _____: What. the. Fuck.

you can talk about things just appearing (like ADD...etc) then i think about my grandparent's time- to start they walked a mile to school. it sounds like kids that couldn't settle down were punished, perhaps the 'chronically bad' were kicked out- sent to work their energies out on the farm or at least doing chores. in general they exerted a lot more physical energy in everyday life than kids do today except when into a sport. also, the way my grandmother talks, you were expected to keep it together yourself or maybe you were cut out to do something else. today many parents expect their kids to keep up to a certain standard across the board whether the children themselves are up to it. and if the kid doesn't seem to be coping and being normal the parent takes it as their responsibility to 'make it happen'- with drugs or whatever. it's easier to try an out of the box answer than put in the tremendous work it takes to provide some real discipline. i think that there have always been 'bad kids', or hyperactive kids- just today there are a lot more people in a lot less space. at the turn of the (last) century schools had like 20 people in them in total and kids knew that the teacher could discipline them if necessary (yes, i realize this might lead to abusive moments- but respect of authority alone could keep most kids orderly.) of course i haven't raised any children, and now i am totally rambling....

Another point is that as a cultural group, "teenagers" ( and by definition, "pre-teens")have only been around for about 50 years. It used to be you were a kid until about 12 or 13, then it was time to take on the responsibilites of an adult. This is still reflected in things like bar and bat mitzvahs. I've also felt that a nice, painful initiation ceremony for both sexes is somethign modern society needs. Something to impress on you that things are different and it's time to be responsible for your own actions. Maybe there would be less teenage parents and what not. Plus you could have some really gnarly scars!

Like the one _____ now has on his tongue. Agatha must've been out when you pulled that stunt. Don't you know that you can make tongue pimples pop by putting a clean washcloth in hot water & placing it on yr pimple? Or by swishing hot salt water around in yr mouth? Sure/it stings/esp. if the water's too hot. But it can't hurt as much as slicing off a tongue pimple w/toenail clippers. Yeesh! Cdn't you at least have dipped them in some vodak or something 1st to sterilize them? I worry abt you, _____. I really do. ------------------------------------------------- I tend to agree w/you on the initiation rites thing, Sem. But I've knmown a few parents who created special Rites of Passage for their kids. And it all seemed kinda fake to me. Meaning becuz it wasn't based on any specific cultural tradition but pieced together from various African traditions that had little to do w/modern life in America. And unfortunately/most African cultures don't offer much initiation for girls/beyond female circumcision/which is barbaric. If I had kids/I hope I cd come up w/a meaningful ceremony that requires a long preparation -- say 6 mos. -- & gives kids a real sense of achievement & stepping forward into young man/womanhood. But right now/I can't imagine what that wd entail. Plus I've always been uneasy w/the idea of declaring teenagers to be 'adults' when they've achieved certain goals or completed certain rituals. Becuz then/adult privileges wd have to follow. And I don't even think most 16-yr-olds shd be allowed to drive!

i'm fine. tongue's fine. i obviously know what i'm doing. i'd been soaking my tongue in beer all day anyways.

Let me say this about ADD. Unless you've lived with it, you don't know what the hell it's all about. I don't care what kind of degree you have or how many kids you've worked with that have it. It's real. It's frustrating and getting your ass busted or special/extra attention doesnt always work. I dont know about the drugs but I suspect that they work better than getting beat for something that you have little to no control over. How would you like it if you got the shit knocked out of you every time, say, you got a pimple? Sure, you could pay more attention to cleaning your face but sooner or later, everyone gets one. That may not be the best example but maybe you see where I'm coming from. You'll never know how hard or frustrating it is for these people/us unless you've been there. Sure, taking the time to remind kids with ADD that they need to "focus", "pay attention", "listen", "understand", "settle down", etc. will help for a limited time, maybe giving medication will give the child freedom to enjoy life as a kid without having to concentrate so much on academics and such. Now, I'm a big believer in corporal punishment.Every kid needs it some point in his/her life, although not every kid gets it. I'm not talking about beating them until they cant sit down but a good swat or two on the butt with your bare hand is an excellent attention getter. Having said that, what if you could totally eliminate the behavioral problems with medication? Would that be better than having to spanking the child on a day to day basis? Especially if the child has little or no control over these problems? I think so... P.S. I really dont think its a black or white thing. I really dont think that much of it has to do with how many parents are in the family. "Folks" are "folks". Some folks strive to be good parents and do all they can to help their kids to become moral, productive members of society. Some folks just dont give two shits about their kids or how they turn out and have no business having the prvilage of being parents. Hell, the last time I checked, you had to pass a test to get a drivers license. They'll let any dumb mother fucker have a kid....

Aaaah, could you repeat that? I wasn't paying attention.

for fucks sake, i couldn't even finish the rest. Dragon Lady! all i saw in your posts was- Black- White i'm all about daughters, whitefolks (Folks- for fuck's sake!) BOYS, problems, etc. why do you have to reduce a well known medical condition to race or gender? we all have problems. some behold themselves to race (statiscally) and some to gender as well. but ALL children think - how come no one looks like me? More importantly-how come NO ONE is like me? how soon they forget. i suggest all of you, boy and girl alike, never EVER forget what it was like to be a child. ADD and ADHD is REAL and a serious condition, and thank god, we are getting better at diagnosing it...... for the better of ALL sorry to the rest i got too frustrated after reading that post to read all of the threads... although i read most sorry i just got angry give me some ritalin NOW