Madison LaRocque

                                                                     Annotation #4

 

    As my fourth annotation, I did a newspaper article. It comes from the New York Times, and the author talks about how in college she had abused Adderal. She talks about the aftermath; what happens when you are out of a school environment and off to the real world with an addiction to a prescription drug.

The author states she started taking Adderall her senior year at UCLA. She bought the drug off a guy with stringy hair and bags under his eyes. The dealer told her that his Adderall made him feel like a zombie, but immediately took back the statement in fear of losing his customer. When she took Adderall, the author finished her 15 page paper in one night, distraction and stress free. She said it was her and her paper with tunnel vision. She even liked the side effects which included weight loss. After graduating with an English degree, the writer packed her bags and headed to New York with a position at a law firm at the age of 23.

 

    The author realized she needed to get her own prescription to Adderall so she isn’t constantly paying and relying on others. She claims her doctor didn’t seem to care that she self diagnosed herself with ADHD to get the pill.

After getting prescribed, the author realized she couldn’t do anything without her new medication. She couldn’t socialize without it, or maintain her energy. And she claims the meds had no “off switch.” She was starting to lose control.

 

    When the author left her law firm career and became an assistant at a women’s magazine, she found herself buying more and more refills to her prescription. She would spend her grocery money on Adderall refills. She would start taking more than the suggested dosage which resulted in sleepless nights. She admits it benefited her professional life but not her personal life. She tried to tell herself she had her life balanced out but in the back of her mind she knew her life was starting to spiral out of control. She even admitted she thought she was becoming schizophrenic. In the end, the author described herself as uninspired, unproductive, and miserable. She knew it was time to stop.

 

    It wasn’t easy to quit. She was constantly tired and upset. She felt stupid without the drug and unable to focus and follow through. She was shy and lost her sociable wit. After months of depression and slow healing, the author started to go back to her normal self. But overall, it wasn’t worth the pill to begin with.

 

    I love this article because it gives me a sense of what happens after college. It reveals what the real life consequences are to abusing Adderall in college. The drug follows you and takes over your life. It isn’t a drug that you can just stop taking and I want to incorporate this into my paper, showing after college addiction is brutal. The author gives her side of a story in full detail and is very honest. Some questions I have are how many graduates actually stay addicted to adderall? When do people decide they can live life without the drug? Do they actually perform better in life while abusing the pill?

 

 

Miller, Kate. "The Last All-Nighter." Opinionator The Last AllNighter Comments. New York Times,

4 Mar. 2013. Web. 29 Oct. 2013.

                       http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/03/04/the-last-all-nighter/?_r=0