The road not taken

I was just reading an article in the Times Magazine section. I was referred to the article by an email on a mailing list by someone I respected enough to follow, though it was really the title of the article that drew me in: "Generation Adderall."

It was a mini-autobiography of its author's life on that drug. It was well written and the author was likable, two good reasons to believe everything she said, which was, in brief, that it did her all kinds of harm. It made her an addict until only three years ago when she was finally able to kick with the help of a psychiatrist. She describes the creative process as follows: "You start one place, go through hell and wind up somewhere else, somewhere that surprises you." She and her doctor agree that "Adderall [ . . . ] was a perversion of that journey."

The hell she is talking about, I assume, is the same one I confront writing these blog posts. Imagine if I could just take a pill and pervert that journey! She is trying to say that the hell is a necessary element, but why should that be? Is it a moral issue? Is she saying that without the suffering, you are creating without paying the required fee? Are you thus some kind of thief?

Indeed, her writing skills and her degrees were earned on this perverted journey, so by rights, she should return them. Still, she didn't avoid suffering. Her life as an addict seems like punishment enough to hear her describe it. If anything, she has overpaid and the universe owes her a refund.

I'm not convinced she would have gotten through school without adderall. The control case for this experiment was not run. When I was in school, there were assignments I couldn't face the hell of doing. Adderall was not available for my generation.

In a sense, I am taking the easy way out by picking on her, thus avoiding the hell of figuring out what to post today, but my hatred of the culture of assertion has taken me over like an illegal drug. She asserts with the confidence only a 33 year old could have, though when I was that age, neither my confidence nor my writing skills were at her level.

I'd like to take the opportunity to theorize about the workings of ADD medication. Some of us are more complicated than others. Our lack of focus reflects our lack of simplicity, seeing many different paths when we're supposed to be only looking at the one ahead, since it leads in the direction we're supposed to be taking. There are various ways to simplify our lives, and one of those is chemical. Adderall helps us avoid the extraneous pulls on our attention. It gives us more confidence that our previously chosen direction is the correct direction.

Having written the above, I lack the confidence to continue on that path. I'm not sure I want to continue in any direction at all. I have in the past, taken this woman's point of view, asserting that ADD is not a disorder and thus not something to be treated medically. In so saying, I didn't mean that there aren't those who have difficulty focusing and could use help, perhaps via chemicals, to get on with their lives, but that the difficulty was not something wrong with them, say, a chemical imbalance, or a genetic spanner in the brainworks. In fact, I'm on both sides of the issue, except for the part where we call it a disease.

In the end, the need to select a single side of the issue is representative of the problem is is supposed to solve.