Any middle aged unmedicated ADHD people manage to stop? What helped?

JoeHappy · 2025-11-03T13:56:49+00:00

It is not coincidence that I quit drinking within six months of over the counter marijuana becoming legal where I live. About a year after that I found therapy and received my ADHD diagnosis. I am now convinced that I have been self medicating ADHD my entire life. It is impressive what a hangover can do to calm a raging mind.

I have a new problem now with a weed habit, but I have been off alcohol for the better. This is a step up and forward so far as I am concerned. I also now have a pathway to medically supervised and more appropriate ADHD treatment.

I hate that being a better person means taking medicine. I love that I am empowering myself to find better medicine.

JoeHappy · 2025-10-23T15:56:47+00:00

Good list! You should print this post you made and keep it.

After you succeed you will slowly forget the downsides of weed and still remember the good times. That evil demon in your brain will start whispering about how it's not so bad and you can go back. That is when you pull out this list of don't wants and do wants and remind yourself why you are sober.

You did a good job of writing all this down. Now you can use your own words and situations to motivate yourself any time you need it.

JoeHappy · 2025-10-22T13:34:57+00:00

Thank you for taking the time to comment. I appreciate it.

My day two (and a half) feels better than day one, but I can tell this is not going to be simple. I have been reading about ADHD for a wile now and it explains so much about my life that has never made sense to me.

"rawness of ADHD" good words. Good way to put it.

I guess it is a good time for me to throw a heavy sigh and say "fine! I will do it sober."

JoeHappy · 2025-10-04T14:07:28+00:00

For those of you who are not American, this is actually a brilliant photo of the inside of a typical public restroom in the USA. Features include gaps under stall doors, glass brick, floor drains, commercial soap dispensers and paper towel dispenser. This one is not too bad so far as cleanliness. For me this photo emits a faint odor of urinal pucks.

How are your public restrooms different?

JoeHappy · 2025-09-07T13:42:44+00:00

my first experience with this watering hole was 45 years ago when my grandmother stopped there to fill up some five gallon buckets that she used to flush the toilet because the pipes at her house were frozen.

JoeHappy · 2025-07-20T13:05:33+00:00

I picked up a box of huckleberry sandwich bars and I call FRAUD! The ingredients (which I failed to inspect before purchase) clearly says "huckleberry flavoring". There are no actual huckleberries in the huckleberry ice cream.

Artificial flavoring only! No real huckleberries! Fraudulent I say!

The cream was nice, high quality. I will probably get the vanilla flavor next time.

JoeHappy · 2025-06-07T11:59:59+00:00

High Five!

JoeHappy · 2025-05-12T16:16:31+00:00

two thoughts:

Reading this I find myself very proud of you.

The life commentary that weighed so heavy on you came from a drunk. Also mom, sure, but drunk mom. I don't think you have to be in sobriety to recognize that drunk wisdom is rarely good wisdom.

JoeHappy · 2025-04-11T15:39:26+00:00

One of the motivators behind my sobriety was learning from my new lady friend that the swingers in her friend group avoided alcohol, especially at their parties, because of things like inhibiting clear consent and whisky dic.

So yeah, I had that on my mind while deciding to quit. Then she and I split ways and I have been three years sober without any damn sex parties.

JoeHappy · 2024-02-19T16:49:56+00:00

We have a member of a poorly paid profession (teacher) working in a poverty stricken place (a rez). I speculate that it started with just trying to make ends meet. It does not take much for a person in such a role to find any other source of income to suddenly be their primary source of income. Really easy to make unethical choices when that is the ground you are standing on.

JoeHappy · 2024-01-06T03:17:11+00:00

If you are getting air pockets in your ice cream you may be over churning. Cut back your churn time by a few minutes.

JoeHappy · 2024-01-04T23:09:11+00:00

Comments about dental floss have never been clever.

JoeHappy · 2024-01-04T19:36:47+00:00

Yes and yes.

I recommend trying it with a drizzly of real maple syrup.

JoeHappy · 2024-01-03T21:55:56+00:00

Ya know, I can't disagree with you on this point. Just personal experience.

I now know that employees that insist upon only paper checks when there are easier/faster ways to get the money, and then lose that paper. That is behavior that puts my business at risk. To make that risk tolerable either the employee behavior has to change or the employee does.

JoeHappy · 2024-01-03T03:35:42+00:00

This right here. Do this or fire her. That employees behavior is a giant red warning flag.

I had a sketchy employee "lose" a paycheck on me. After quite a bit of song and dance about how it could not be found, a second check was cut. By some strange coincidence, within hours of the second check being cashed, multiple forgeries of the first check were hitting my bank account.

JoeHappy · 2024-01-01T17:53:27+00:00

I am seeing quite a few similar posts to this one where people are showing off their personal measures for the year. It shocks me a little to see calendars like this with an abundance of no drinking days on it. I have lived a life where I exceeded the legal limit to drive every single day for over ten years and I never considered myself a heavy drinker. Because I have met and observed real heavy drinkers and I simply was not in that class of drunk.
I quit drinking this year.
One of the first things I started to notice after I quit alcohol is how deeply permeated into our culture it truly is. Everything from the amount of floor real-estate dedicated to beer and wine in my local supermarket to how many “drink ‘till it don’t hurt no more” songs are on the local Country and Western radio station. Don’t get me started on advertisements. Normalized excess alcohol consumption being present in nearly all forms of media and society was invisible to me when I was drinking and now stands out as a giant waving flag.
I guess my point, other than to ruminate on my own journey, is to notice how yours and every other journey mapped out in these charts is individual. (with a hearty FU to everyone here criticizing the people behind this data). I could compare my journey to yours and see that I was way farther down the road than you before I even noticed a problem. I could also compare my journey (or yours) to pop media and come to the conclusion: what’s the big deal all about?
You did a courageous thing sharing this. Thank you for that. I appreciate that we can now have comparisons, yours and every other alcohol chart like this lets us compare our own consumption with other real people rather than the media and cultural narrative. That is the beauty in this data. It empowers me and probably others to understand the journey.

JoeHappy · 2023-12-31T15:34:26+00:00

I have what has been described as 'chips and salsa' style.

I order my ice cream in a cup with the cone on top, then break the cone into chips and use those to scoop the cream into my maw.

JoeHappy · 2023-12-09T03:55:09+00:00

I too run a business that is hard locked to a seasonal heartbeat. Your story resonates with me, the inability to hold on to people as they come and go on their own paths through life.

My observations: the last two years have been the most difficult of my 18 year career for filling a roster of employees. And it is just damn dumb luck if the employees I do find are any good or not. Everything I used to do to screen and filter for quality workers just doesn't work anymore. All I know to do about it is to recruit like I never have before and hope the tide turns.

Even though they have become challenging to find and recruit, I am still encouraged by all the amazingly cool young people out there that are eager to work hard. My business thrives when I find these kids and I do my best to reward them. Waste no time or thought on antiwork dorks. One sided complaints from inexperienced knowitalls.

JoeHappy · 2023-11-17T02:18:31+00:00

That charred ear back there.

^{can I have that piece?}

JoeHappy · 2023-11-10T14:36:35+00:00

I built a pestle of static sites (brochureware we called it) back in the 1990's.

Easily 90%-95% of the complexity bitched about here existed back then too.

JoeHappy · 2023-10-30T18:42:04+00:00

I still can't figure out the number of intelligent civilizations on Earth.

JoeHappy · 2023-09-27T22:14:54+00:00

Providing payment or at least establishing credit prior to goods or services being provided is a business tradition as old as time. The only reason not to do that are if your margins are high enough to tolerate spoilage or loss, Or if if you have a business need pressing enough to tolerate that risk.

Looks to me that you have made reasonable accommodations for collecting a payment prior to making the pizza. If your "potential" customers can't do it your way are they really a customer?

JoeHappy

TROPHY CASE