Actually, I think Adderal/Ritalin is methylphenidate. It’s been about 6 years since I did my thesis, but otherwise you are absolutely right.
The same qualities that make a person talented in arts are now symptoms of ADD. Things such as daydreaming are now symptoms. So a kid ends up taking Adderal or Ritalin. Then the mom goes to the doctor and says “My kid is all jumpy and can’t sleep.” So the doctor prescribes the kid with meds to help the child sleep. Then the kid ends up on prozac and Xanax which are not supposed to be prescribed for kids due to their tendency to cause suicidal ideation in children, and then the kids start hearing voices telling them to hurt themselves or others because the drug cocktails they are on are messing up their poor little heads, so the kids end up on anti-psychotic meds and by the time they graduate, you’ve got a messed up little person whose only coping skill is to self-medicate with whatever they can get their hands on because they’ve learned one thing: Take a drugs, that makes it all better”
Yes, you're clearly right. I went to law school rather than medical school because any word containing more than 10 letters may as well be Greek to me.
I also agree about the INSANELY liberal distribution of these phycho-stimulitve drugs and it's tragic result in far too many children. There needs to be a serious national discussion about drugging our children. I'm not sure what the answer is, but we're just about to the point where the first "drug generation" is entering their mid to late 20s, and these chickens are going to start coming home to roost.
MethylphenidateMethylphenidate belongs to the piperidine class of compounds and increases the levels of dopamine and norepinephrine in the brain through reuptake inhibition of the monoamine transporters. MPH possesses structural similarities to amphetamine, but its pharmacological effects are even more closely related to those of cocaine, although it is less potent with less potential for addiction.
Rxs of psychotropic medications for children under the age of 16 increased 800% between 1990 and 2000. I don't know what the increase/decrease has been since 2000 but I am not optimistic about what it would be.
FWIW, chae, the descending spiral of prescriptions you describe is almost exactly the chain of events that happened to a close friend of mine. An adult woman. Before that whole episode of her life was stopped she was prescribed and using about eight psychotropics and at least twelve strong medicines for physical problems including the lovely Warfarin anti-coagulant. For all practical purposes she was mentally a vegetable for eight years of her life. But she just wouldn't hear from her husband or anybody else that the doctors might not have her best interests in mind.