Ritalin Vs. Adderall Instant releases

Before I begin, a little note: I am prescribed Ritalin for ADD and I am an adult, my experiences may not hold true for the younger people on these meds. I also have no training or degree in Pharmacology or chemistry, these are strictly personal observations. I was also on a pretty good prescription coverage insurance program that allowed me to get my Adderall at a twenty dollar co-pay. After the loss of that insurance I am making due with the resources I have.

So after being switched from Adderall XR to Ritalin IR I thought I would offer my two cents. Ive done a little research online and havent been able to find the answers I was looking for so here is my observation. First of all Adderall is way more expensive then it has a right to be. I mean if you dont have insurance you are looking at least $200 a month in script cost and thats if you take it once a day. If you are suppose to take it more than once a day you are screwed. That being said I do think that Adderall is superior to Ritalin in many ways. My first complaint with Ritalin is the come down. I am sure that many would agree with me here. I have heard in my research that Ritalin has come to be referred to as Diet Coke and I can see why. At least in terms of craving more as the effects wear off it is a dead ringer for coke. In terms of effect on the brain Ritalin effects the brain in nearly the same way as cocaine. I havent noticed a marked improvement in terms of concentration as I did with Adderall. Conversely Adderall effects the brain more in the way of meth and since both Cocaine and Meth have the effect of craving more once the effects wear off I am wondering why it is so much more pronounced with Ritalin.

Once upon a time before I actually had a legit prescription for either I did experiment with Ritalin and found almost the same effect in a compulsion to continue use as the positive effects wore off. Even though they were not XR I still found they had a rather peak and valley effect. As a side comment it was a good thing I had a very limited supply of pills because I probably would have continued use til they were gone. Although this is another topic entirely I will say I probably had the best athletic practice ever in terms of performance.

With Adderall I never had a compulsion to re dose when I felt the effects begin to wear off. I was also far more focused on what I was doing with adderall yet with Ritalin I feel somewhat scatterbrained in I can start something and pay attention to it for a while but soon feel a desire to move onto something else whether what I was doing was finished or not, not unlike the effects of ADD without the help of meds. Part of that for me was the interruption of that desire or perhaps a better term would be a compulsion to do more to continue to stay on task. On Ritalin I tend to feel like after a half an hour to and hour the feeling is closer to taking massive amounts of caffeine than anything productive. I have seen in my other reading a reference to Ritalin as little more than glorified caffeine and though I would not necessarily agree with that I will say they do have their similarities.

Also with adderall the after effects are not nearly as unpleasant. Not only does ritalin have that nasty compulsion to do more but if you do not you do tend to feel more or less like you have had way to much caffeine and are all revved up with nothing you could possibly concentrate on enough to actually do. Again I have never noticed that effect with adderall.

Im sure there are a lot more observations that I have neglected to address here but feel free to add your comments or experiences and if I think of anything else I will add another post about it. In general though I feel way more whacked out on ritalin then I ever did on Adderall and felt like Adderall actually did what it was suppose to and well, without the negative effects. Just my opinion. Despite the cost, if you can afford it I would say Adderall is by far the better choice but again to each their own.