Adderal xr makes me sleepy. Anybody else has had this problem

[radders631]

Ok so I recently got diagnosed with ADHD the dr put me on adderal xr to start off. Adderall XR was Terrible for me it made me extra sleepy, depressed, lack of motivation, zoned out, moody, etc. It def didn’t help me focus if anything it made it worse. My question is is what medicine worked best for you. If your somebody that has taken adderal xr and had similar side effects

[Penny Williams]

I have run across a few folks like this. I know of a child who took another dose of a stimulant before bed so she could sleep — otherwise her mind and body were too active for her to fall asleep.

A Patient’s Primer on the Stimulant Medications Used to Treat ADHD

Penny
ADDitude Community Moderator, Parenting ADHD Trainer & Author, Mom to teen w/ ADHD, LDs, and autism

[efreel13]

Wondering if you changed your meds or dose after this post? My son (8 yrs old) just started 10 mg Adderal XR and he’s taking a nap at recess instead of playing. He’s for the first couple of hours and then he can’t keep his eyes open. We are going back to the doctor this week, wondering if we should ask to change the dose or try a different med.

[iix ADHD iix]

What helped me is take an SSRI at different times of the ADHD medicine. Don’t take too much ADHD medicine if the higher doses consistently make him tired. Don’t change the dose drastically from one day to the next. Ideally, getting Genesight can help A TON if you can afford it.

Learning how long each medicine dose is benefiting you and what speed of release the medicine is can do a LOT to improve how tired your son is getting.

Is it imperative to obtain enough sleep and if stimulants are messing sleep up I recommend first trying some sleep medicines, melatonin/melatonin complexes/hydroxyzine/or even benzo’s/sedative hypnotics like ativan/lunesta if you have to.

[rebell90]

HOW well do you sleep at night?

I take Adderall xr twicea day. It’s actually the intones where I don’t feel it, but I am way more calm,able to think things through and less overwhelmed , and I don’t have to move 24-7, I have also been told I am more thoughtful and considerate. That being said, it’s one of those that will not wake me up, nor necessarily make me sleepy. It does calm by body and mind. I know adheres have trouble sleeping. Used to be on a bad sleep night, the Adderall calmed me down so I did feel sleepy, as I should have ! And I take my second xr abiut -6 hours before bed, and when it’s in fact my bedtime , I do not feel awake ! First day on it over a year ago, I actually took a nap ! For the first time in god knows how long. When added the second xr , my sleep was so good and got to bed quicker , bc I wasn’t all scattered and hyper at night. So , I’m wondering if maybe the addsrdal itself doesn’t make you sleepy, but rather the quality of your sleep may be poor? So the med calms down the adrenaline mode that an adhder is normally in ? Which for me is what causes poor sleep!

[Angelacawein]

I didn’t have this problem with the name brand Adderall by Shire but with the generic Adderall by Teva it was so bad that I was falling asleep driving and standing up. I felt like a zombie.

[iix ADHD iix]

Try journaling each dose and annotating it a bit. Pay attention to what you’re eating (if anything) and what you’re drinking prior/after you take a dose, and if you find a particular beverage or meal makes you more tired that day, you would write that down. Be diligent about it, but not obsessive. Just wrote the kind of stuff I do below here to give you an example of how I sometimes keep track of medicine doses and how they are affecting me with notes and how I am sleeping that day, what I am eating/drinking/doing around the time of the dose. The more detailed the better you can really try to get into the nitty-gritty of when you feel the most focused/unfocused.

Try something like this where you list each dose with an annotation:

5 mg Adderall tablet didn’t do anything for me
10 mg Adderall felt good
15 mg Adderall felt good as 1.5 10 mg tablet split over the course of 3.5 hours.
20 mg Adderall made me tired if I took second 5 mg after a certain duration of time.
Beyond 25 mg, I feel my anxiety is worse; especially if I don’t sleep well.

Here’s another way you can do what I did above there but just with commas separating the list:

30 mg Vyvanse felt too weak, 40 mg Vyvanse felt more helpful, 50 mg Vyvanse felt very good, 60 mg Vyvanse was sometimes good but made me more sleepy, 70 mg Vyvanse was overkill and made me tired the whole day

[Author]

Posts