I Hate my pills

By Wesley Bevell

My life has been all about finding people I relate to, finding if people have the same problems as me, ESPECIALLY people who have ADHD. I would find doctors or people with ADHD on the internet (that probably either say things everyone deals with, ADHD or not, or just saying completely wrong things) who mention things that supposedly every person with ADHD has dealt with, and I’d try to find points in my life that fit those narratives.

But do people really have universal experiences regarding the disorder? Do I actually fit symptoms from people with actual ADHD? (Which I should, I was diagnosed at the age of four).

Following this line of thought, when talking about my own disorder, ADHD (Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder), I tend to ask myself questions like “Do I seriously get distracted that easily? Am I being hyperactive?”, not even sure of my own symptoms. I tend to watch those videos that are like “How to know if you have ADHD”, and trying to recognize symptoms people would show, knowing I had ADHD and trying to fit the symptoms into my life to see how accurate they were. My life is about exploring my brain.

Growing up, my parents normalized anything bad happening regarding it to be my fault, always the result of my ADHD, always me being too energetic or too unfocused. I felt awful. I was not allowed to have sugar due to their belief that it would make me hyperactive, which it does not, there was a study done that showed sugar doesn’t make kids hyperactive, which was shown in “The Effect of Sugar on Behavior or Cognition in Children by JAMA”, it was conducted in 1995 by MEDLINE and PsychINFO which consisted of a blind experiment of having parents trying to identify things their kids did after supposedly giving them sugar.

And still, I would have moments where I would blame myself, small things like when I would repeatedly shove my cousins off the couch or bed because I was a rough playing child and really liked power rangers. 

I would often find myself doing embarrassing things after being hyper, then remembering these moments while trying to sleep, I’d physically revolt when any of those memories stuck, forever haunting me.

However, I would have one special day throughout each year. I would get one day in a whole school year to prove I did not have to continue taking my pills, each attempt a frustrating failure. Day after day, I’d be involved in a fight, I was caught arguing with a friend a little too aggressively, joking with friends and not doing work, and swearing a little too loudly to the point the teacher would hear me. All these events would lead up to 4th grade Halloween.

On Halloween, the school would have a halloween parade with every grade, kindergarten to 8th grade, and we’d all be lined up in our grade and class. There was this one girl who I’d been tablemates with and even partnered up with her for group assignments that knew me for a while. Yet fatefully, I said one swear, and by chance, she heard it and told on me.

The outcome sucked, the teacher would inform my mom, explaining what I said as my mom did not speak English. Which this case is a bit ironic, I still swear, on medication or not on medication. But I wasn’t done, not until 6th grade. After another failed trial attempt to get off my medication, I would figure out how odd that 4th grade day was, I typically swear, and the girl knew me pretty well to know that I swear, yet uncharacteristically told on me. It was strange. So I appealed to my parents. “Try it again, but don’t tell the teacher.” So the game was on.

We tried the experiment one last time, I would go to school without my medication again, this time, not informing the teachers, and I came out without a touch of suspicion. The now unbiased eyes of the teacher couldn’t even see my mishaps, I went throughout my entire day like I would for anyday, and get this, I wasn’t even on my best behavior. I’m naturally not the best student in terms of behavior, yet I acted completely naturally, and I breezed through. 

I could say this was similar to a real life experiment: Stanford’s Rosenhan Experiment, an experiment where Stanford sent 12 people with fake identities and illnesses to trick psychiatric institutions to give wrong diagnoses. When the institutions found out, they asked for a rerun of the experiment and Stanford agreed, the institutions would go on to pick out 41 people they thought were acting to have illnesses, Stanford revealed they didn’t send anyone, proving people, even doctors can’t tell if someone is actually ill.

Years of starving myself due to the ADHD pills ended just like that. I was done.

After this event, I never took the medication again, showing I could control my disorder. I would start eating lunch at school instead of biting my fingernails. I no longer had to go refill my medication as I didn’t need my medication. And the best part? I proved with medication or not, a teacher can’t tell I took my medication, basically saying even though I have ADHD, I act as normal as a regular person.