Greetings -
I am 43F, 5'9" 157 lbs, caucastion, large-ish bone structure. Current meds (taken the same ones for a number of years): adderall, bupropion, vestura. My problem pre-dates these medicines.
I have had slow GI movement since childhood. It bothers me because I often feel uncomfortable and bloated. Sometimes it's hard to pass anything. Hoping for some direction on speeding up GI movement, possibly for recommendations on books on the topic. I do not want prescription meds.
The issues with slow GI movement compounded when I gained quite a bit of weight as I crept towards my 40s. I decided to do something about my weight and size, so I embarked on a relatively rigid diet, vitamin/supplement, and exercise program. I lost over 90 pounds (yay). Even though I made great strides in decreasing my size and improving my general health, I still have slow GI movement! I am at a loss. If I want things to "move" I have to take exceptionally large amounts of magnesium. I'm talking between 1250-2000 mg in a day. Even in amounts that high I do not get diarrhea. I have never taken laxatives or stool softeners on a regular basis.
Yes, I have seen doctors about this. The doctors I see give me confused looks and don't have many answers for me because I eat right, exercise, drink lots of water, my weight and BMI are good, and my labs are excellent.
I just want to poop like a normal person and not feel bloated. :(
Here is a summary of my lifestyle:

• I started to use a food tracker app so I can stay within calorie/macro goals. I can tell you everything I have eaten/drank every single day of last 16 months.
• Weight loss was a journey - I played with my macros for months until I found a ratio that worked for me. My maintenance-weight macros are in the neighborhood of 40% fat, 35% protein, 25% carbs.
• I initially restricted calories to support weight loss but am now maintaining current weight with approximately 1500 calories per day.
• I take in about 3 liters of water per day.
• I do not eat gluten/bread - I don't have celiac's disease or gluten sensitivity. I did this because I found that eliminating gluten encouraged me to eat less carbs/less snacks.
• I rarely eat processed foods/things that come in a box or a package. I also tend not to eat at restaurants because it gets expensive.
• I do consume dairy products, including milk and cheese, but not in large quantities. I tried to eliminate dairy at times over the last few years and saw no difference with GI problems.
• I do moderate intensity cardio 5x per week and light weightlifting 2-3 times a week.
• I work a desk job, so getting steps AND a workout in is sometimes a challenge, but I try to get at least 5 thousand a day in addition to my workout.

Here are the supplements I can confirm I have taken for approximately the last three years, their amounts per day, and their purpose:
astaxanthin12 mgheart and skin health resveratrol180 mgcholesterol quercetin1000 mg antioxidant / inflammation turmeric curcumin500 mginflammation evening primrose1000 mginflammation niacin1000 mgcholesterol vitamin D310000 iubone health, immune function super Kvariousblood/bone health nmn1000 mgcellular repair women's probiotic 40 million digestion
The only thing I know I'm allergic to is Ashwagandha, an herb in many women's multivitamin supplements. Found that one out the hard way.
My labs are excellent - every measure is within range.
I welcome your thoughts.

Why is no one talking about self dosing and how it starts addiction. So I was taking Adderall IR 10 mg in the morning and 5 mg in the afternoon. For some reason my impulsive mind told me to see what it would like if I took another 10 in the morning making it 20. So it began I started taking another 5 too in the afternoon. I noticed that I was getting really sweaty taking extra and a smell was coming me too. Also I drank a Red Bull one day with all the medication and got really dizzy. So I stopped taking my Adderall prescription all together cold turkey. It was hard I could barely function so I started just taking 10mg again. I’m just scared I’m gonna do keep doing this. Does anyone have some advice or ideas to cope.

Hey guys!
So, I’ve been on Adderall for about 3 years now. My dosage has stayed pretty much totally consistent, and it’s done wonders for me. Whenever the shortage occurred, I wound up switching from major pharmaceutical retailers to a local boutique pharmacy who has yet to be unable to fill my prescription. Overall, it’s been a very smooth process.
A couple of appointments ago, my doctor (psychiatrist) told me he’d switched from paper prescriptions to computer-transferred prescriptions. Before the switch, he’d hand me three paper prescriptions, all of which had specific “fill at this date” instructions. I always would bring it in on that day or later. The first time we did it without the paper prescriptions, he texted me the three refill dates before leaving his office. Again, no issues.
This time, though, he didn’t send me the refill dates, and I didn’t think about it at all until now! This might sound stupid, but will I get in trouble/flagged if I reach out to either him or my pharmacy to clarify which day I need to run in and grab it? I think I’m just afraid of coming off as displaying “addict” or “seeking” behaviors.
What do you guys think?

I’m 16 weeks - I have been giving the okay by my OBGYN to continue to take Adderall. He even said he had done research and amphetamines have been found to be very safe during pregnancy. He sees no problem in me continuing.
We live in a small town so I had my pharmacist drop my prescription off to me today. He proceeds to tell me that he thinks I should reconsider taking it while pregnant because he has had friends who took it pregnant that have “kids with issues” but didn’t elaborate. But it really made me feel uncomfortable, especially since he dropped my medicine off to me at work and mentioned this in front of a coworker of mine.
I fully trust my OBGYN but the pregnancy hormones and anxiety have me spiraling and upset thinking I’m going to be known as someone purposely putting harm on my child and will be to blame if anything is wrong. Especially since I was “warned.”
It’s just made me feel super icky since that little interaction. As a first time mom, it’s hard to know what to do. Even doing my own research, that one comment has me questioning all of the other research that suggests it’s safe. I’m exhausted

Hi guys,
I took Wellbutrin for a brief period of time 5 years ago. The stuff changed my life, but after the prescription ended I decided to try to raw dog life. I unfortunately have found myself in another depressive state and have had to resort to anti depressants once more to keep myself stable, safe and afloat. My doctor prescribed me Wellbutrin, and on the prescription it said the words “Wellbutrin”. No other name, nothing. I even have a picture of it on my phone.
I go to fill out the prescription and the pharmacist asks me if I have any health insurance. I don’t, but I was willing to pay up front for it no matter how much it was. I get my prescription and take it…. 8 hours in I felt like I was going to simultaneously have a heart attack and vomit. I had hot flashes, an accelerated heart beat and nausea with stomach pains and had an anxiety attack.
This was an immediate red flag to me because Wellbutrin has never made me have side effects like that ever in the time I was on it. I read the bottle and realize the word “Wellbutrin” isn’t on it at all. Instead, it read “Teva bupropion”. I search it up and it’s the generic brand.
I was absolutely pissed the pharmacist did this without consulting me or without my consent. I called the pharmacy and asked why I was having all these side effects and the answer I got was “well you shouldn’t be having those side effects”. Great answer, Jack ass. I did some more research and found that these side effects are consistent with Teva Bupropion and that a lot of other people on Wellbutrin haven’t been able to handle the generic brand because it also gives them wierd side effects too.
I just want to know if the pharmacist was gaslighting me because he was a Jack ass for not warning me ahead of time and did this without my knowledge and he’s trying to save his own ass, or if anyone else has had the same experience. It honestly feels like I’ve taken 9 tablets of adderall and I feel like I’m going to die. Is this common?

It’s approaching month 3 of 10mg adderall XR and 5mg IR in the afternoon. Psych is upping me to 15mg XR but told me to take 2x 10 XR today until I can get my new prescription.
I take the XR + IR combo every day that I have work and as/if needed on weekends.
I have found that my emotional regulation is fine if I’ve had a busy and productive day. But if it’s a slow day at work, I’m having intense reactions to incredibly minor inconveniences and rejection reactions is 10x worse.
I’m hypercritical of myself, my relationship and my partner - knowing I don’t actually feel this way? But the only way to stop myself is to do something with my hands ie video games, crafts, keyboard. I genuinely love myself and my partner yet end up getting upset at either them or me for no actual reason?
Has anyone gone through this? What do you do to combat this? What coping strategies do you use?

Being rational maintains the win that K already has. I see a lot of leaps and reaches from EbonyPrince's tweets to CSA or assault.
So far, it seems like the only thing EP24 has mentioned:

• An altercation involving Christian Alvarez (not clear if he's victim, bystander, or something else) on 1/22/2023
  
• That some vague thing was said or done in the Caviar Kaspia on 7/27/2023
  

In other words, Ebony could just be trying to sell abandoned items of Drake's. The altercation could just be that Drake swore at a few hotel workers at 2am, in front of Christian Alvarez, a journalist who seems to remain a fan. As a result, it seems two staff were fired.
The W here is probably just that Drake didn't plant these, that the Ozempic, Z-drug, and Adderall are real prescriptions, and that Drake lied about feeding any information. This lie erodes his character and calls in question his many other statements.
Everything else is related to honoring the lives and tragic deaths of members of the Iconic House of Ebony. No assertion has been made about Drake's involvement in that, and instead it seems to be driving awareness of ongoing issues facing the LGBTQ+ folks. It's clear that EbonyPrince reps the house and wants to extend its notoriety and honor its queens.

TLDR: Timestamp for any OVhO who says we lost our minds and believed that EbonyPrince somehow amounted to pedo or daughter evidence. We didn't, it likely doesn't. Drake still lied.

i’m having hallucinations and i’ve never dealt with anything like this before.. i hallucinated rats in my apartment, realistic enough that i called my super to let him know we had rats. when i was waiting for him to come by i sat on the couch trembling and half crying, and suddenly thought to myself “what if i’m hallucinating? what if it’s just part of the brick? or shadows in the corner?”) i was scared shitless frozen to the couch, weird because i’m not even scared of rats and hallucinate a rat scurrying out of the brick and stopping to clean itself, you know like the downward face rub, and then just stays in place. vivid enough that i cover my mouth in shock. “we actually have rats….oh fuck WE HAVE RATS!!) i cry, shake, make eye contact with the one under this mirror in the living room, and get the courage to go up to the brick where there was the one from before and like 3 others. It doesn’t move away when I walk up. I look to the side of the brick, thinking that is how I’ll know of course, it hasn’t moved. Not a single rat to be found. All 20 something of these rats sending me into a panic attack were actually my kitchen scissors, various cracks in the wall etc. i realized what was happening and started to tremble more, and dart my eyes around. what i see is half formed hallucinations of rats back in their places. at this moment, i knew. and then my super showed up and couldn’t find a hole anywhere ofc, i tell him i’ll just let him know if i see one again, weird that there was no hole near the kitchen, etc. also this all happened like 20 mins ago. google is not helpful. telling me it’s stress, anxiety, etc. and then major stuff like schizophrenia and psychosis. obviously none of that. i take prescription wellbutrin and adderall xr, adderall really only on weekends to do work. i don’t really get anxiety often and literally just mild depression. how could it be a mental thing, you know? i’m really just scared and confused. experiencing hallucinations like this, coupled with confusion, dizziness, fatigue, disassociation, trembling, increased heart rate, and headache. does this match any cause you know of?
tldr: i am having very vivid hallucinations of rats in my apartment, currently experiencing confusion, fatigue, dizziness, headache, increased heart rate. never dealt with this before, before this i slept 16hrs. i take wellbutrin and adderall xr that play no role in this, i would be able to identify that. what the fuck is happening to me?

I use Walgreens but over the last year they have gotten progressively worse. Now with a controlled substance prescription every single month I go to fill it there is always some new issue and they give me the run around. I’m sick of dealing with the last minute stress of potentially running out and would love recommendations for a pharmacy in Raleigh that 1) has adderall in stock 2) does not make up a new bogus excuse each month as to why they can’t fill it (Not a drug seeker this is literally the only controlled medication I’ve ever been prescribed and no I don’t try to fill it before my 29-30 days)

I upped my prescription to 2, 20 mg instant release pills a few weeks ago. I would take one in the morning and one in the later afternoon. Everything was fine until this week. I wake up and go to bed with an intense headache once it wears off. I used to just take 2, 10 mg pills at the same time and this never happened. Anyways this morning I woke up with a splitting headache and just took a 10 mg pill and my headache was pretty much instantly gone. I don’t know what to do about this. These headaches are debilitating! Adderall just makes my life so much easier to mediate. I don’t want to go off them but I feel like I’m becoming super dependent on them ever since I upped my dose. Anyone else have this problem? I’ve also been drinking a lot less caffeine now that school is done and this could possibly be causing the headaches I just have no idea what to do.

This week I wrote an autobiographical account of my history with sleep paralysis, RLS, and hypnagogic hallucinations.
I was not sure where to share it. I added it and deleted it from a few subs. The only place it ended up was the creative writing sub, though.
And this appears to be the right spot! There are several themes but the hypnagogia is the focus. So it's quite long and probably no one reads it and that's fine. I just wanted to find somewhere to put it in case my experience could benefit someone.
⚠️ ⚠️ WARNING first part is scary and a bit gory... ⚠️ ⚠️

Childhood

The first time that I encountered sleep paralysis was when I was nine or ten. I woke up screaming, my mind gripped with the sensation of searing pain radiating from my left big toe. Though my mouth wasn't moving, I could hear my own blood-curdling cries, echoing through the darkness. An eerie orange glow spilled into the room, illuminating a sinister cauldron at the base of my bed, around which stood three squat witches. Their dark, smoky faces shifted and morphed constantly, eyes glowing red like embers recessed deeply into the shadows of their crawling flesh, jagged teeth gnashing along with their discordant laughter as roaches crawled from their mouths and disappeared into their black straw hair.
Each witch held their own dainty knife and fork, shaking along with their trembling bony hands, and one was slicing expertly down the center of my big toe with the impossibly sharp blade of their knife. I struggled to move my arms and legs, feeling as though I had freedom of movement, but my physical body remained paralyzed. Unfathomable terror washed over me as I realized that I couldn't scream for help; my mom wouldn't hear me, and I was powerless to stop these witches from feasting on my toes.
I lay there, unable to break free from the oppressive paralysis, forced to endure the excruciating pain as my toes were sliced off and consumed. The air buzzed with the witches' terrifying, joyous laughter, as if they delighted in my agony more than the taste of my flesh. Eventually, my body in a full state of terror jarred itself awake, heart beating more wildly than I had ever experienced, my lungs struggling to gasp more than the tiniest breath. After perhaps a full minute of gathering myself, I drew a deep breath and screamed into the night.
My mother came, of course, but was unable to understand the depth and terror of my experience. Her own reality did not include anything close; for her, it was an exaggeration born of childhood fear, and she became exasperated after a time with my refusal to admit that it was a dream, despite being an extremely caring parent.
The witches appeared to me several times between the ages of 10 and 15, their ghastly faces returning to torment me with each episode of sleep paralysis. Every time, I would be trapped in that terrifying limbo, my body frozen while my mind drowned itself in screams of agony and horror. I knew that they would feast on my toes, the slicing of their knives relentless, inexorable. They would smack their lips and toast each other with my blood-covered flesh as I watched.
During those years, restless legs syndrome (RLS) also began to plague my nights. As soon as I began to drift off to sleep, a discomfort would arise in my legs, like there was a swarm of fat round beetles exploring, searching for an exit. A quick kick would settle it down, but it would rise again in a cycle of building tension, acutely uncomfortable climax, and brief relief of a second or two would follow before it began again. My mother, again meaning well but busy and unfamiliar with RLS, told me it was leg cramps and made me eat more banannas. This didn't help.
It became an increasing problem, stealing precious sleep that my young body needed to thrive. The frustration of RLS merged with the terror of a potential visit from the witches. Without medication, I would lose entire nights to the relentless discomfort.
By the age of 15, the sleep paralysis episodes had occurred at least 10 times, each leaving me with the gut-wrenching memory of being eaten alive that I would carry all the next day in my gut like a sack of bricks. As I lay sleeping, every single night, I wondered if they would visit, and braced myself for an encounter.

Early adulthood:

I can't remember how many times the witches visited before I finally stopped panicking. It was after countless God awful nights when I finally accepted that no matter how terrifying or painful the ordeal felt, I would be whole once it was over. I had survived the agony a hundred times before and could endure it again. One night, when the eerie glow of the cauldron illuminated their shifting faces, I felt a calm settle over me. I saw the witches, but for the first time, I wasn't afraid.
They noticed my defiance, their laughter fading into an uneasy silence. Without fanfare, they stood up, collected their cauldron, and retreated into the darkness of my room. Though I still saw them occasionally at the foot of my bed, they became more present than threatening. Sometimes, at the start of an episode, they'd appear briefly before disappearing altogether. They had become inconsequential, and I couldn't even be sure if they were there half the time.
In my early 20s, I discovered that I could almost guarantee a bout of sleep paralysis simply by sleeping during the day. At first, nothing particularly unusual happened, but the paralysis always returned whenever I dozed off, particularly between the hours of 11am and 2pm. I was often sleeping during the day because by then, the restless legs syndrome (RLS) had grown so severe that many nights passed without sleep at all. My body felt like it was full of angry snakes now instead of beetles, desperate to escape. The sensation soon crept upward from my legs to my arms. The cycles of build up, climax, and agonizly brief relief increased in frequency and magnitude. I would often resort to sitting in the shower, flipping the water from icy cold to scalding hot all night, simply to keep myself alert enough to avoid the twitching and spasming until the blessed relief of dawn arrived.
With the daytime paralysis came a variety of hallucinations. Sometimes the witches stood at the foot of my bed, other times they'd disappear, leaving behind benign apparitions like tickling gnomes. There was nothing threatening about these visions, and I began to find a strange sense of comfort in them. I would relax into a dark place where I felt my own energy burning like a sun, present but without physical form. In this state, I felt euphoric, fully aware yet separate from myself. I started taking naps during the day and eagerly anticipated this odd experience.
Yet at night, my sleep remained troubled as RLS tormented me. Eventually, I began taking ropinirole to manage the symptoms, and it brought much-needed relief, helping me reclaim my nights and giving me several years of mostly not worrying about RLS unless I forgot to take my medicine, or the odd night where it bothered me but was still less severe.

New experiences:

I spent several years relishing those euphoric moments of peace, where I could feel the pure energy of being alive without a personal history or identity. In those moments, everything else faded away, and all that remained was a brilliant, infinite energy. My waking life was absorbed by study of comtemporary and historical teachings of non-duality, and with my family and progressing my career as a software developer. I was absorbing Eckhart Tolle and Gautama, Meister Eckhart and Seuhn Sang and integrating their teachings into my daily life. The feeling inside of me that reality ultimately made no sense had found an expression, and I dug in every waking moment for a clue as to the true nature of experience. Given this context, I especially looked forward to and found solace in the experience of being impersonal, boundless energy.
In my late 20s, I also experienced a new type of sleep paralysis hallucination. One day it began that there were no visions or hallucinations; instead, I simply lay in a state of paralysis, aware of the room as a darkened and monochrome version of itself. I entertained myself by trying to move my arms and legs against the paralysis, and developed the idea that I had two bodies; my physical body lay on the bed, while my energetic body struggled and flailed. It was like my energy body could move separately, creating a phantom limb sensation. I felt my energy arms and legs extend out, yet my physical body lay still. As my energy body reached further from my physical self, it would snap back as if held by a rubber band.
Intrigued, I began experimenting with this phenomenon, managing to build enough momentum to "pop" out of my body one afternoon. Suddenly, I found myself looking down at my own sleeping form, resting on my back and breathing gently beside my wife, who was playing a game (probably Candy Crush) on her phone in the bed. It was surreal, and I wasn't sure whether I was hallucinating or truly perceiving my own body from a different perspective. Regardless, it was a revelation, and I felt a new sense of exploration as I gazed down at myself.
That first time, I found myself drifting through the house, checking on my two young stepdaughters as they slept. I had recently married, and it was a quiet weekend afternoon with everyone napping peacefully. Once satisfied, I ventured outside, where I took to the sky and flew around the neighborhood, spying on my neighbors. Though it felt like I was limited in speed, I seemingly had no constraints on the continuity of this hallucination. Everything appeared as a perfect physical representation of Earth, and I could travel without interruption.
The landscape was strikingly accurate, but it appeared in monochrome hues — grays, blacks, and whites — with no bright colors. Letters and numbers were unreadable, reduced to blurred nonsense. Despite these distortions, the sensation of soaring above the rolling hills and rooftops was pure euphoria. I sped along at hundreds of miles per hour, basking in the freedom of movement, and immersed in the stunning view that stretched out below me. There did seem to be some sort of very generous limit to how far I could travel, but I thoroughly explored within the boundaries for hundreds of miles around my home.
Over the years into my early 30s, I tried to pursue this opportunity of flight and exploration every chance I could. But during that time, my restless legs syndrome also became more relentless. In the past, no matter how agonizing the night had been, dawn would bring relief like a cold bath washing over me. I would sit outside and watch the sunrise, and the sensation of snakes slithering through my body would finally calm down, perhaps due to circadian rhythms and dopamine regulation. The cycles now began to climax in totally involuntary movement, spasms that caused me to tense my whole body and draw in a sharp breath every time. It would be 5 seconds of rapid buildup, spasm, a second or two of relief, repeat.
Eventually, even the dawn failed to provide respite, and I struggled during night or day whenever I relaxed too long or became even a bit drowsy. Napping became impossible, depriving me of the euphoric dreams I had learned to look forward to. I switched from ropinirole to pramipexole, hoping for relief. The medication helped me sleep five or six hours a night on good nights, but I still missed one or two nights of sleep entirely each week and rarely could nap during the day, because I took the medicine only a couple hours before bed.
Even though my restless legs syndrome worsened, one out of every ten times, I'd still manage to avoid twitching and drift into that state of peaceful paralysis during the day when I dozed off involuntarily. I gradually lost interest in pursuing out-of-body travel and instead sought every time the burning energy of the sun inside of me — the sensation of being infinitely powerful and formless simultaneously. I would retreat into this boundless feeling whenever I had the opportunity.
During these rare occasions when I could sleep during the day, I stumbled across a third type of experience. It felt like I was being sucked into space at impossible speeds, zooming past the planets of our solar system and beyond until I reached a darker patch of space. This spot seemed like a vast, corrugated sewer pipe that swallowed me whole. I rocketed through the universe, traveling at what could only be the speed of light. Eventually, I would break into the atmosphere of some unknown world, drifting down to its surface sometimes, others crashing painfully into terrain. Sometimes, I would hear a loud sound like an explosion in mid travel, and suddenly aterialize on another distant world without any sort of entrace.
These journeys were exhilarating, and each new landscape presented a mystery, revealing worlds unlike anything I'd ever seen.

The Traveling Years:

One of the first journeys I had involved zipping through space before drifting down through a hole in the top of a greenhouse. The world was painted in shades of orange and brown, its dirt swirling in powerful winds like clay cyclones. The greenhouse itself was dirty and grimy, almost opaque with crusted dirt, and filled with dense green plants — ivy and other dark green foliage that covered every inch inside. Outside, the orange sky churned with the swirling clay, making visibility nearly impossible.
I made my way down a ladder and emerged outside, where I found a man and a boy standing beside a white pinto horse. They both wore hardened leather over rough potato sack-like clothing, their long hair dotted with bone jewelry, their noses and eyebrows profusely pierced with other fragments of bone adorned with feathers. The man seemed to be instructing the boy on something to do with the horse. I approached them cautiously, fully aware of my lucid dreaming state and retaining all my memories, reasoning, and thoughts. Everything about the scene was vivid, from the clay dust swirling around to the squinting struggle to see in the wind.
Unlike the man and the boy, I had no long hair, no mouth covering, and no leather visor shielding my face from the swirling clay-dust. As I tried to speak, it seemed like they couldn’t hear me, and I wondered if I might be invisible to them. Unconcerned, I reached out to pat the horse on its nose, but before I could make contact, the man swiftly drew a long knife from his belt and stabbed me. He struck again, and the intense pain and feeling of my own scalding hot blood streaming down my pants legs snapped me awake.
Not long after my experience in the greenhouse, I found myself learning more about the worlds I could explore, though the opportunities remained rare. One day, I was transported to a beautiful blue tropical world, crashing into the dunes of a pristine white beach. There, I encountered three women, each towering over me at seven or eight feet tall. Their long black hair framed their pale faces, with blood-red lips striking against their alabaster skin. But what stood out most were their fingernails — long and crimson, curling back upon themselves dozens of times like spiraling ribbons. They were two or three feet in length and added a surreal menace to their presence.
They asked me my name and the name of my father, along with other odd questions, and seemed absolutely intriqued with me. There was a certain sort of heavy molasses quality to their voices that was more than sound and impossible to describe. It had the effect of making me feel drowsy and stupid and slow to move.
As I stood there, they began touching me with their nails, tracing them across my body in elaborate, almost ritualistic patterns. I felt my energy drain with every stroke, a profound exhaustion seeping into my core. The sensation was so intense that I woke up feeling completely drained, my limbs heavy and my spirit sapped.
Another time, I appeared without explanation after my space travel in a cavern brimming with glowing fungi and luminescent crystals. I wasn't myself in this world but instead had taken the place of someone else. My father stood beside me, guiding me through the luminous landscape. He taught me how to identify the bizarre and fascinating flora surrounding us — lessons that etched themselves into my mind and last to this day despite the surreal, made-up nature of this world. The glowing crystals and fungi cast eerie shadows across the cavern walls as my father explained the properties and uses of each.
In real life, these experiences would last for about five to eight minutes, but in the dream realm, the passage of time was different. What seemed like mere minutes could stretch into hours or even days, and in rare cases, the dreams spanned much longer.

RLS becomes terrible:

I had a new busy career, an infant daughter, two active growing stepdaughters, and a wife with a hectic job, and I struggled hard through the years between 35 and 39. Each night was pure torture, as restless leg syndrome robbed me of sleep. Days of sleep deprivation left me barely functioning, often teetering on the edge of collapse while the disease gnawed away. The unrelenting discomfort made it impossible to fall asleep, even as my body craved rest. I had no choice but to continue, as I had yet to find a doctor that knew how to move past the ropinirole and pramipexole stage of treatment, and these medicines had almost entirely ceased to be effective for me. My love for my family drove me to conceal the intense effort that day to day living had become. I managed to keep up with my career by farming a prescription for Adderall. I don't have ADHD, so it had the effect on me of methamphetamine and allowed me to push through the God awful existence that life had become.
The toll became overwhelming. I couldn't escape the agony, even after days of desperate attempts to sleep. More than once, I ended up in the emergency room after going four or five nights without sleep. For some people, this will seem like an exaggeration; I assure you, it is not. I would be nonsensical, having conversations with people tha weren't in the room, drifting in and out of intense 1 second dreams before snapping awake with painful spasms. At the hospital, they would give me percocet, and the painkillers provided brief reprieve from RLS for some reason, allowing me one solid night’s sleep, but the relentless cycle quickly resumed, leaving me struggling once again.
Eventually, I found a neurologist who prescribed Neupro patches that provided temporary relief. For a few months, I managed to sleep more consistently, but the patches quickly lost their effectiveness. It wasn't until I added methadone to the treatment that I finally found more lasting relief.
During those difficult years, I immersed myself in non-dual philosophy. In that crucible of suffering, my conviction solidified: my true nature was more aligned with the energy hallucinations I experienced than with a body made of skin, bone, and brain. That transcendent energy, more real and enduring than the physical form I occupied, became my identity in daily life, watching peacefully as my body and brain navigated the situational complexity of life.
Approaching my 40th birthday, I found that I could sleep at night and dream during the day. My life was in good shape, I lost 60 pounds without effort, and I felt fundamentally and imperturbably peaceful. Suddenly, life was in the palm of my hands, every moment pristine and still and perfect. I felt weightless without the burden of needing to endure trauma every night.
Most importantly to this story, I worked from home and could nap on my lunch breaks.

Rapid learning through iteration:

Rarely, I would fail to nap at all due to RLS. Sometimes I would simply doze off and wake up 10 minutes later to my cell phone alarm. But three out of five times, I would travel.
I visited dozens of worlds in a matter of a few short months and quickly was able to confirm some rules that I had suspected were true from my previous adventures.
One rule is that no one I know in real life ever shows up in the travelling dreams. No matter the place or circumstance or strange beings that I encountered, there was never a familiar face.
Another rule was that no dream person ever had a name or a father. The absence of both seemed to be an unspoken universal truth among these dream world inhabitants. Once I had internalized the significance of this, I began introducing myself to most beings that I encountered as "John, son of Michael." It left a strong impression. My name and lineage seemed to set me apart, bestowing an almost mythical quality upon me that earned me a peculiar reverence among all that I met. This knowledge became the key to navigating the dream worlds with confidence and a consistent purpose of discovery.
I learned accidentally of a unique ability during my travels: a form of telekenesis that allowed me to project force from the palms of my hands. This development led to many episodes of paralysis spent ignoring exploration and instead hilariously and painfully attempting to master this ability for the purpose of travel. Over time, I refined my skill, learning to fly much like Iron Man, but solely through the focused propulsion from my hands. Without stabilization from my feet, I had to carefully control the angle of projection and the amount of force applied to control my trajectory and speed.
Mastering this ability took significant practice, but eventually, I could navigate obstacles with ease and travel great distances in short amounts of time. I also no longer crash landed, thankfully. Importantly, I could harness this power to overcome any threatening beings that I encountered. Previously, my best option was to hide or flee, and that did not always work out. Now I had this amazing sense of fearlessness and confidence that simply cannot be rivaled by real world experience. Every time I heard the buzzing sounds and felt the WUM WUM WUM of energy as I prepared to launch into space, I embraced the journey with eager anticipation, confident in my ability to protect myself and learn about whatever strange world awaited me.

To Present Day:

As I grew more confident in my ability to travel almost at will, I began to incorporate spirituality into my experimentation. One day, on a whim, I expressed to the universe that if there were a being that had my best interests at heart and loved me fully, then I gave them permission to guide my dreams and lead me to greater truths, even if they were uncomfortable. This openness led to a new experience immediately, and I began to preface many of my journeys with a similar, simple prayer.
That first time, I fell down instead of up -- into myself, into the infinite dimensionless darkness where I could spin and burn and bathe in the euphoric sense of my own eternal nature. But my peace was quickly interrupted by an intense feeling of pressure at the base of my spine, though I couldn't have pinpointed where the body was that the spine inhabited. Very, very slowly, with a CRUNCHA CRUNCHA CRUNCHA noise for every milimeter of ground gained, it crawled upwards towards my head.
As it climbed, the energy below it intensified, growing exponenentially as the surface area covered grew. It wasn't painful, exactly, but it was terrifyingly intense. That first time, I managed to stay calm long enough for it to reach my shoulder blades before it became unbearably frightening and I jerked myself out of it, sure that I would die if I allowed it to continue upward. Over the last few months I have vowed to myself that I would endure any level of discomfort to see what happens at the end, but I keep chickening out. I have let it go as far as the base of my skull, at which time my head started vibrating so much that I could feel my teeth chattering violently even in my paralysis.
Another time recently when I made this prayer, I went to space as usual, but when I entered the atmosphere of a lush Earth-like world, my telekenesis failed me for the first time ever. Instead, I was pulled like in a slow tractor beam down beneath the perfectly round canopy of a giant, unfamiliar kind of tree. I felt a great sense of calm and peace and simply meditated there for quite some time, maybe 9 or 10 hours of relative time, before I heard a voice from behind the tree.
The man who stepped out from there had his face hidden in shadows. He wore a long dusty leather coat and a huge cowboy hat that shrouded him. As I write this, I find that I am not yet prepared to write about what he said to me, or how I responded. But when we had spoken, he walked solemnly over to me and lay his hand upon my head, and I jerked awake in a state of perfect bliss, despite some conflicting emotions surrounding our conversation. I call him Cowboy Hat Man, and maybe I will write more about him later.
A third time with the prayer, right before I sped off to my normal adventures, I felt a cat jump onto my bed and snuggle against my left leg, purring. It curled up there, and I assumed that it was my actual cat in real life, although it would be very uncharacteristic for him. I actually thought to myself, "Wow, I guess Buddy Socks is my spirit guide today." However, when I awoke, I realized that my door was shut and the cat was not in the room. On that trip, I went to a world that was reminiscent in quality perhaps to 15th century Europe, except on a world where the surface was far more underneath water than on Earth.
I followed the invisible cat to an old man and asked him, "Do you know the truth?" He answered, "No." I followed the invisble cat to young boy and asked him, "Do you know the truth?" He also answered, "No." It was an odd one, really.
Every time I do this, I am setting an alarm for ten minutes. Sometimes the dreams last days in relative time, but I have never yet failed to wake up before that alarm goes off.

Present Day (like seriously earlier this week is what me want to write this):

I lay down eagerly for my lunch break nap, hoping to avoid the disappointment of an off-day. I flew into the atmosphere of a world that seemed to made of rock, with nothing growing on the surface. However, I caught glimpse on the surface of a bright spot, and when I descended, I found that somehow there was a relatively thin crust of sorts around a hollow inside-world.
I lowered myself slowly through a great opening in that crust, down into a lush jungle. It was beautiful but uncomfortably humid, and I quickly found a cool and dry cavern complex to explore rather than dealing with sweat and unfamiliar insects.
As I navigated through the cavern system, able to see somehow with dim light despite no obvious light source at times, I broke out into a very large open cave with a huge exit out into the jungle. I saw that it was dawn and realized that I had spent the night, however long it was on this world, in the caves.
Suddenly, my four year old daughter, Curly, with her naturally bleach-highlighted rings of long blonde hair and bright blue eyes, drifted slowly over my left shoulder and out towards the exit. She moved at a brisk adult walking pace, her back to the cave opening, her expression curious yet slightly concerned. She called out, "Dada?" in a tone that suggested wonder and slight confusion, but no real alarm in the presence of her father.
Reacting instantly, feeling my gut clench solid into a fist of rock, I used my telekinesis to close the gap between us and gathered her into my arms. She wrapped her legs around my waist and settled her butt onto my forearm, a ritual that we have practiced every day of her life. The force gripping her evaporated instantly, and suddenly, my darling girl was there in my arms, as real as any physical embrace. I could feel the tickle of her hair on my neck, the beautiful warmth of her skin, and was enveloped in her familiar scent.
Initially, I was filled with white hot rage, fueled by my instinctive reaction to the thought that some idiotic dream world inhabitant had decided to mess with my family and harm or kidnap her. But as I held her and she nuzzled her nose into my neck, the anger gave way to sheer amazement. For the first time in a decade of navigating these dreamscapes, someone that I knew from my waking life had entered the dream. This was a rule-defying moment that really rocked me, a serious breach of the established norms of these experiences.
A group of maybe 8 or 10 small winged goblins flew down from out of sight above the top lip of the exit and fluttered into the room, laughing in a very non-threatening way. They radiated a sense of innocent mischief, and my fear and anger subsided and gave way to annoyance. I whipped my right hand out and blasted a huge hole in the cavern wall to my right, startling Curly into a yelp. Unphased, I raised my voice and demanded, "Who is your King? I am John, son of Michael, and this is my daughter and she WILL NOT BE TOUCHED AGAIN."
The goblins scattered, their merriment giving way to concern that I might blast them into dust. Behind me, a deep chuckle seemed to rise from the ground itself. A voice echoed in the cavern, neither kind or cruel, full of what felt like wisdom, though that doesn't make sense in the waking world.
It spoke: "I am Eloxman, and I am their King." At hearing him announce his name, my head whipped around in the dream and in real life so hard that I woke immediately with a sprained neck that is still bothering me. I looked at my phone and saw that there were two minutes and fourteen seconds remaining in my ten minute window. I lay on the couch in shocked disbelief: Curly was in my dream, and someone had a name. As I replayed it over and over in my head, I realized that Eloxman was still speaking. I think he may have been preparing to provide the name of his father.

The End:

Sorry, that's actually it. I am going to just see if this continues somehow, but if it does not, then I might get creative with it and make up my own ending. I hope that you enjoyed this if you read this far!

I have to do a yearly drug test at my drs office to be able to keep my prescription for adderall. They do an oral swab. My test came back positive for THC and I do not smoke or eat edibles. The only exposure I have to marijuana is my husband smokes, but I am rarely around him when I do. I researched the lab they use for their drug screenings and they have horrible reviews for others getting the same in accurate results. I need advice on how to proceed with this issue because as of now I am no longer able to get my medication. I know I could just find a new doctor but I am 100% not using marijuana at all and do not want something like that on my record.

My sister visited my dad (60M) recently and she found a prescription bottle with my name on it in his bag. When I was 15 I was prescribed ADHD medication but I am 22 now. He has struggled with addiction in the past, and years ago I was aware of him taking my adderall. But I stopped using any ADHD medication when I was 17 so I figured he had no more access as (I thought) we had stopped refilling them.
I think he has been getting them refilled somehow because I don’t know how to explain the full bottles of my pills that are everywhere in his house. I moved to Florida 3 years ago and he lives in Las Vegas.
Is there a way to find out if he is getting my prescriptions filled? And what do I do? I’m just lost and have no idea what to do.

My sister visited my dad (60M) recently and she found a prescription bottle with my name on it in his bag. When I was 15 I was prescribed ADHD medication but I am 22 now. He has struggled with addiction in the past, and years ago I was aware of him taking my adderall. But I stopped using any ADHD medication when I was 17 so I figured he had no more access as (I thought) we had stopped refilling them.
I think he has been getting them refilled somehow because I don’t know how to explain the full bottles of my pills that are everywhere in his house. I moved to Florida 3 years ago and he lives in Las Vegas.
Is there a way to find out if he is getting my prescriptions filled? And what do I do? I’m just lost and have no idea what to do.

My sister visited my dad (60M) recently and she found a prescription bottle with my name on it in his bag. When I was 15 I was prescribed ADHD medication but I am 22 now. He has struggled with addiction in the past, and years ago I was aware of him taking my adderall. But I stopped using any ADHD medication when I was 17 so I figured he had no more access as (I thought) we had stopped refilling them.
I think he has been getting them refilled somehow because I don’t know how to explain the full bottles of my pills that are everywhere in his house. I moved to Florida 3 years ago and he lives in Las Vegas.
Is there a way to find out if he is getting my prescriptions filled? And what do I do? I’m just lost and have no idea what to do.

My sister visited my dad (60M) recently and she found a prescription bottle with my name on it in his bag. When I was 15 I was prescribed ADHD medication but I am 22 now. He has struggled with addiction in the past, and years ago I was aware of him taking my adderall. But I stopped using any ADHD medication when I was 17 so I figured he had no more access as (I thought) we had stopped refilling them.
I think he has been getting them refilled somehow because I don’t know how to explain the full bottles of my pills that are everywhere in his house. I moved to Florida 3 years ago and he lives in Las Vegas.
Is there a way to find out if he is getting my prescriptions filled? And what do I do? I’m just lost and have no idea what to do.

97 days ago I quit drinking. I’ve tried to really explore ways to do this that will give myself the best shot. I do AA, SMART, and started therapy at Kaiser. After lots of research I knew that CBT was what I’m after therapy wise but kept getting the runaround from Kaiser until eventually they put me in the addiction medicine department.
I’m working with a guy who I’m liking less every week. I don’t feel like I’ve received a single insight or tool to help from him as our sessions just feel like “how’s AA going?” Check ins and hard sells (even though I go on my own and need no selling). Let me be clear, I really value AA, but it’s definitely not something I need health insurance for. I’m looking for research based stuff from my doctors that frankly is a gap left for me with AA I need filled.
I find in recovery circles people tend to be biased towards whatever program they worked and are closed off to other paths. I’m not a perfect AA attendee as I consume very small, infrequent amounts of weed and I’m unconcerned and unapologetic about it. It’s never been problematic for me.
Although it’s been six weeks since I had half a gummy this guy still brought it up several times during my session today. I had two major ruminating life issues in my brain really stressing me out and I never felt like there was a window to talk about it. I definitely wasn’t asked about how I was feeling. Just “Love that you’re doing AA, but you better quit weed”.
I know the obvious answer is just “get rid of this guy!” But I feel really touchy about it because getting in with anyone at Kaiser was a nightmare and I can’t afford this without my insurance. I also take adderall and have a weird feeling if I left he would recommend that prescription change. I feel trapped. This also feels kinda stupid after typing it all out lol.

97 days ago I quit drinking. I’ve tried to really explore ways to do this that will give myself the best shot. I do AA, SMART, and started therapy at Kaiser. After lots of research I knew that CBT was what I’m after therapy wise but kept getting the runaround from Kaiser until eventually they put me in the addiction medicine department.
I’m working with a guy who I’m liking less every week. I don’t feel like I’ve received a single insight or tool to help from him as our sessions just feel like “how’s AA going?” Check ins and hard sells (even though I go on my own and need no selling). Let me be clear, I really value AA, but it’s definitely not something I need health insurance for. I’m looking for research based stuff from my doctors that frankly is a gap left for me with AA I need filled.
I find in recovery circles people tend to be biased towards whatever program they worked and are closed off to other paths. I’m not a perfect AA attendee as I consume very small, infrequent amounts of weed and I’m unconcerned and unapologetic about it. It’s never been problematic for me.
Although it’s been six weeks since I had half a gummy this guy still brought it up several times during my session today. I had two major ruminating life issues in my brain really stressing me out and I never felt like there was a window to talk about it. I definitely wasn’t asked about how I was feeling. Just “Love that you’re doing AA, but you better quit weed”.
I know the obvious answer is just “get rid of this guy!” But I feel really touchy about it because getting in with anyone at Kaiser was a nightmare and I can’t afford this without my insurance. I also take adderall and have a weird feeling if I left he would recommend that prescription change. I feel trapped. This also feels kinda stupid after typing it all out lol.

97 days ago I quit drinking. I’ve tried to really explore ways to do this that will give myself the best shot. I do AA, SMART, and started therapy at Kaiser. After lots of research I knew that CBT was what I’m after therapy wise but kept getting the runaround from Kaiser until eventually they put me in the addiction medicine department.
I’m working with a guy who I’m liking less every week. I don’t feel like I’ve received a single insight or tool to help from him as our sessions just feel like “how’s AA going?” Check ins and hard sells (even though I go on my own and need no selling). Let me be clear, I really value AA, but it’s definitely not something I need health insurance for. I’m looking for research based stuff from my doctors that frankly is a gap left for me with AA I need filled.
I find in recovery circles people tend to be biased towards whatever program they worked and are closed off to other paths. I’m not a perfect AA attendee as I consume very small, infrequent amounts of weed and I’m unconcerned and unapologetic about it. It’s never been problematic for me.
Although it’s been six weeks since I had half a gummy this guy still brought it up several times during my session today. I had two major ruminating life issues in my brain really stressing me out and I never felt like there was a window to talk about it. I definitely wasn’t asked about how I was feeling. Just “Love that you’re doing AA, but you better quit weed”.
I know the obvious answer is just “get rid of this guy!” But I feel really touchy about it because getting in with anyone at Kaiser was a nightmare and I can’t afford this without my insurance. I also take adderall and have a weird feeling if I left he would recommend that prescription change. I feel trapped. This also feels kinda stupid after typing it all out lol.

If this isn’t supposed to be posted here and you know where it belongs please let me know
Age - 24
Sex - Male
Height - 6’0’’
Weight - 130
Race - White
Location - USA
Current medications - Adderall IR
Hello, I have severe ADHD and thankfully was recently able to get a prescription over telehealth in my home state. My starting dose wasnt working well and my doctor wouldnt up it. I was struggling bad and unfortunately I felt like I needed to go up to be able to continue to function so I panicked and got another precsription in another state through another telehealth company. I have no idea how it got filled because at first the pharmacy said that there was a flag for the first prescription, but then I called again and it was cleared somehow. I wanna continue with the first doctor but Im sure she will see the second prescription at my next appointment. If it’s just a refill though, do they still run a pdmp check? Would just being honest here with the doctor help my case here at all? And if so should I message her now or wait until the appointment?

If this isn’t supposed to be posted here please let me know a better sub
Age - 24
Sex - Male
Height - 6’0’’
Weight - 130
Race - White
Location - USA
Current medications - Adderall IR
Hello, I have severe ADHD and thankfully was recently able to get a prescription over telehealth in my home state. My starting dose wasnt working well and my doctor wouldnt up it. I was struggling bad and unfortunately I felt like I needed to go up to be able to continue to function so I panicked and got another precsription in another state through another telehealth company. I have no idea how it got filled because at first the pharmacy said that there was a flag for the first prescription, but then I called again and it was cleared somehow. I wanna continue with the first doctor but Im sure she will see the second prescription at my next appointment. If it’s just a refill though, do they still run a pdmp check? Would just being honest here with the doctor help my case here at all? And if so should I message her now or wait until the appointment?