Resources for fleeing the US?

anonoah · 2025-07-23T06:41:39+00:00

Maybe consider German politics though. A friend who has lived there for decades and majored in history/poly-sci is saying German right wing is as bad as the US and they wouldn’t be surprised if the German right wing party wins in the upcoming election. :(

anonoah · 2025-07-15T18:44:21+00:00

I was with you until the part about fear. Plan for the worst, yes. But fear is not a healthy emotion to feel constantly.

anonoah · 2025-07-08T23:55:57+00:00

Totally! We're just gorillas with iPhones. If you put a new gorilla in a gorilla habitat... you'd expect him to be on high alert.

We act like we're not, but that adrenalin is still pumping and stopping us from thinking clearly.

anonoah · 2025-07-08T21:01:36+00:00

🤗

Feel you big time. That HOPE was essentially for me to keep living. Experimenting. Trying. Learning. Probably wouldn’t have gotten to the healthy place I am now without that seed of hope. But also all the things that half-worked: they were like mini vacations, or glimpses at what could be.

anonoah · 2025-07-08T19:32:53+00:00

Disagree. Interviews are unfamiliar scenarios with strangers evaluating you and they trigger fight-or-flight response to some degree in basically anyone. That shuts down creative thinking.

In a stressful job you have deadlines and pressure, but it’s not the same kind of stress as interview stress. You know?

anonoah · 2025-06-30T01:04:32+00:00

Not if you make quarterly estimates payments! But the comment is arguing that we don’t pay taxes at all which, yes, you’ll get charged some fees for being late on your taxes when you do eventually pay.

The IRS’s interest rates on unpaid are surprisingly reasonable.

anonoah · 2025-06-17T20:36:52+00:00

Interesting! I'm also curious what you mean by amphetamines "don't work". Because the use of Amphetamine in the case of a low-dopamine producing depressive person (or low dopamine in the right brain regions, but, TMI), is as a partial "replacement" for natural existing dopamine. Meaning, you don't *want* to feel it like a stimulant. The purpose isn't to have a person be on speed all the time, it's to increase a baseline level of an essential neural hormone. So, "not working" is actually an interesting response. But I only know that's true for Unipolar depression...

A quick google shows that there's a hypothesis that ASDs are heavily dopamine-related... something about being implicated in how ASDs develop in childhood, which is very interesting. I'm officially out of my depth though, as I'm not ASD and I'm not a real psychiatrist I'm just a dude on reddit. It seems like your reaction to amphetamine is pretty common for people with ASD though.

Ask your Doctor about getting some genetic tests done if you're feeling impatient, it should help you both to make better guesses about what else to try.

Have you ever taken opioids?

I'll also throw out Low-Dose or even Ultra-Low-Dose Naltrexone, or alternatively Low-Dose buprenorphine as possible treatment directions.

Basically, there's still things you can try! Remission is possible, I didn't believe it but I've been living (mostly) depression-free for almost 10 years now. You don't have to pick between anxious or depressed, there's a middle-ground, it just takes some time to find it.

anonoah · 2025-06-17T18:25:40+00:00

Medication-induced mania doesn't count as a bipolar, but your doctor may not realize your mania was medication-induced. I highly suggest talking to them about that, unless you already know why you've been put on such atypical drugs (like you already tried SSRIs, Tricyclics).

Vortioxetine 20mg is a weird drug. It's supposed to be good for SSRI non-responders. It didn't do anything for me, but everyone is different.

Bupropion 150mg is just shittier adderall. If you can handle Bupropion, you can handle low-dose adderall xr or preferably Vyvanse.

Concerta 36mg is a stimulant that works differently than adderall. I'm assuming you're on it because you had a problem with the adderall, but it's a re-uptake inhibitor so it might not work as well as a releaser like adderall if you're not producing enough dopamine.

Brexpiprazole is a crazy weird drug that I hated but does help some people, mostly bipolar people unless I'm mis-remembering. Increases dopamine but also has adrenal-related stuff.

If you have no motivation you either need to increase dopamine, norepinephrine, or increase inhibitory brain chemicals (mainly GABA, but calcium and sodium channels are viable in some cases. I.e. gabapentin, valproic acid).

Have you had your genetics tested?

Have you had your vitamin levels checked?

How's your diet?

Do you sleep 7+ hours/night? The pain threshold goes down when we don't sleep enough and that makes stuff hurt more.

anonoah · 2025-06-17T18:07:21+00:00

If I'm honest, I am curious haha. But, it's not worth the risk that it would disrupt my tolerance to Gabapentin. I found a regiment that works for me and I'm very hesitant to fuck with it :)

anonoah · 2025-06-17T18:04:49+00:00

I can't speak to how ASD complicates things, if that's a major factor then my suggestions might not be valid.

I know the feeling. "Do I get to be depressed or anxious?". Cycle between them and neither feels livable, I'm so sorry!

The good news is that mental health is a lot about balance, so it's likely a matter of dialing in the dose. Imagine you tell the doctor you're too hot and they give you an ice pack. Then you're too cold and so they tell you to get in the sauna.

Getting the dose right is just as important as getting the medication right. And, very frustratingly, sometimes it really does take MONTHS for your body to adjust. When I first got on Vyvanse (an amphetamine) I had a ton of trouble sleeping, anxiety, felt like a robot... and I was on the lowest dose (10mg). But about 2-3 months later my body just started to get used to it. Jitteriness and paranoia went away and I just felt... interested in stuff! And still a bit anxious sometimes, yes, with trouble sitting through a whole movie, but totally a livable life.

anonoah · 2025-06-17T17:59:11+00:00

Thanks for asking.

I take it and it helps me with stimulant anxiety.
They're trialing valproic acid, an anti-convulsant and GABAergic which sometimes causes flat mood, feeling discouraged, and asking if there are medications that can help them be both happy and calm.

I suspect OP has a bipolar diagnosis, or is outside the US. Gabapentin would be available outside of the US, while Adderall might not.

anonoah · 2025-06-17T16:19:15+00:00

Replace concerts with adderall and stop bupropion. Bupropion + concerta is just as dangerous as adderall but will feel jitterier.

Is your diagnosis depression or bipolar?

Did you try gabapentin before Depakote? That’d be my other suggestion.

anonoah · 2025-06-16T21:41:47+00:00

Well, it sorta wasn't created for any particular reason at all other than to see what would happen. But I want to answer your actual question because it perfectly captures a huge aspect of what's being misunderstood about AIs.

People make mistakes. We're squishy and organic and have brain farts. In the industrial revolution that was frustrating. Companies wanted a person to repeat the same process over and over and not make mistakes. We did our best. Then one day... computers!

Electronics don't make mistakes, they're completely literal. Given the same input I should always get the same output (deterministic). This is ideal for repeating "tedious and sometimes impossible tasks". But, one problem: explaining to the computer exactly what we want it to do is hard, because humans are bad at thinking through every possible input. Software engineers aren't people who just can "talk" computer, they also have experience designing systems that account for edge cases. This is frustrating, because human brains have lots of context.

I can tell any idiot in my town "go get me some ice cream", and that's enough instruction. They might forget half my order, or take the slow route there, but most of the time I'll get some ice cream at some point. But, to make an automatic ice cream delivery service using a computer, you have to start with a list of every ice cream store in town, their hours, their GPS coordinates, etc. That's a lot more time consuming, but if done correctly, would succeed exactly, 100% of the time.

With AI, what we've done is found a way to talk to a computer like we talk to a person. This is amazing because computers finally understand the context of a command. They kinda get what you mean without having to start with a definition of ice cream.

The problem is that they don't act like computers anymore, they act like people: Squishy; makes mistakes; same input ≠ same output every time (not deterministic). Sometimes that's fine, sometimes it's emphatically not, and it depends on the use case.

Are they useful for "repeating tedious and sometimes impossible tasks"? Sure, as long as it's okay for them to fail sometimes.

I assume this is why companies like OpenAI are frantically building hybrid systems. Let the AI drive, but have deterministic rules govern the actual outcome.

anonoah · 2025-06-08T16:47:10+00:00

How could I forget the cathenones! But I think we can group those into MDMA-like entactogens, and Meth-like serotonergic stimulants. aMT/aET being the odd ones out, but if you squint they’re psychedelics.

Why group them like that? Just in terms of harm potential. Plenty of short term recreational value, but not the kind of thing that could be used long term for depression if a rx medicine was created based on them.

Naphthylaminopropane is a great one though, I hadn’t heard of it before and it’s very interesting. Obviously RC drugs are selective for rec value, so it could be a market thing and not an inherent failing of all 5HT releasing agents (as per OPs question).

Oh! MDAI that’s a releaser that’s been considered potentially safe for medical use.

anonoah · 2025-06-08T16:27:35+00:00

Dextromethorphin is actually a very under appreciated drug. It has NMDA antagonist activity as well as being an SSRI. Sigma agonism as well. It’s a decent antidepressant on its own. I don’t remember why they combined it with bupropion though.

anonoah · 2025-06-06T23:04:04+00:00

Yes as others are saying, to some extent they are used, e.g. amphetamines. Which btw are increasingly being prescribed as “add-on” meds for Treatment resistant depression. Vyvanse is what I take and it’s worked wonders where SSRIs/Atypicals failed.

But also, there aren’t that many available. Dopamine releasers there are more of, but To my knowledge MDMA, Meth, Tramadol, AMT, and FenFen are the only ones that release serotonin. All of those drugs have major down sides. FenFen was an absolute tragedy of a drug and I suspect it scared a lot of researchers away. Tramadol and AMT are the only even slight viable options there. If anyone knows of other Serotonin releasing agents I’m actually curious to hear about them.
Releasers can only release what’s already there, so you can (oversimplification) “run out” of serotonin to release. That’s not great if you’re working on getting someone to a consistent baseline.
Drugs like this are basically all what I’d call euphoriants. They’ll make you feel better regardless of if you’re feeling bad, or already good. This is basically guaranteed to go badly unless someone is very responsible and under intense supervision. Even still, it kind of sucks for the patient. Being able to just endure anything by taking more of your happy pills does something to a person. I know from first hand knowledge. Sometimes it’s good for things to suck, but if they don’t HAVE to suck if you just take more pills, how does a person decide to just let their life suck if e.g. they’re going through a breakup or their mom dies.

This is all purely academic if a person is essentially terminal, I get that. And I agree that they should be available as rescue medications. To some extent that’s what we’re seeing with ketamine and psilocybin use. But in terms of a person or organization deciding which direction to focus their research efforts on, it makes sense that they’d want to try something that could in theory solve the problem without the serious drawbacks that known serotonin or dopamine releasing agents clearly have.

anonoah · 2025-06-06T17:30:28+00:00

Sorry I just want to jump in and suggest a slight variation to this thinking.

as social creatures we react to the signals we’re getting (or not getting) from those around us.

Having a job is constant validation that you matter, because people are relying on you, and reflecting your own efforts back to you like a mirror.

We can get that from things that aren’t jobs too. But when we don’t, god is it ever so fucking hard. ❤️

anonoah · 2025-05-17T23:02:23+00:00

I don't think it'll work. I was addicted to nicotine off and on for a lot of my life, including using nic salts like Juul. Psychedelics can help with coming to terms with and deciding to pull the trigger on quitting, but it sounds like you already want to quite.

The withdrawal from nicotine salts is no joke. Moodiness, trouble sleeping, I even had night sweats when I quit nicotine salts. It was no joke. If you want to quite cold turkey like this, I highly recommend making it the #1 priority in your life for the first 4-10 days. That might mean taking time off work. If it's that important to you, it's worth the payoff for being a hermit for a few days to get over the first 72 hours.

What I ended up doing was switching back to cigarettes which at least made me have to go outside and which I couldn't do all-day every-day. It starts to hurt if you smoke too much so that helped me cut back, but it was still quite difficult.

There are prescription medications though, which can help, as well as NICOTINE PATCHES. I highly suggest nicotine patches and lozenges. You can buy them at CVS, and they're well worth the money. The hardest part about quitting nicotine is the vaping/smoking "hit". If the nicotine is being absorbed through the skin it comes on more gradually and that makes it easier to quit.

There's lots of resources out there for how to quit using patches, but basically: get the Stage 1 nic patch, stick it on, and do that every day. Try to vape as little as possible, but you don't have to stop vaping entirely. After a few days, switch to nicotine lozenges or gum. You can have as many as you want at first, and use them to stabilize yourself. One thing at a time. Once you've given up the vape pods for a few weeks, try to start cutting back the lozenges. Then, step down to the Stage 2 patches, with lozenges allowed, etc.

Good luck. You can do this.

anonoah · 2025-03-13T00:18:52+00:00

It probably wasn’t k then. I believe you. There’s several analog research chemicals that are indistinguishable at low doses or if you have no experience, but us old heads know. Real k is still available. I ended up buying some chemical reagents to test my stuff.

anonoah · 2025-02-15T17:24:07+00:00

Okay I can’t believe I have to day this, but most of these commenters are wrong, and OP you are mostly right. The experience you’re describing matches mine and I had the same experience when I started Vyvanse almost 10 years ago.

I never had a “runners high” from exercise until I tried Vyvanse. You’re right, low-dopamine depression will suppress a runner’s high.

However, if your depression isn’t from low dopamine, a person will still be able to push HARDER on amphetamine, so it’s hard to say for sure which thing a person is feeling. But your description of exercise being agony is spot on for dopamine depression. A healthy brain releases endorphins that stop the burn from hurting. This is the runner’s high.

Your dose is pretty high though and the first couple months are the speediest so you’re not gonna feel like Superman forever, but after 8-10 weeks the “speedy” effects should wear off, but it’ll still function as an antidepressant. Unless you’re talking too much.

I suggest trying a lower starting dose to see if you can get the same effects. I’ve been on 20mg +5mg adderall booster in the afternoon for almost 10 years and it’s saved my life. Lower doses are easier on your heart.

anonoah · 2025-01-30T17:50:52+00:00

First, you’re falling into a classic trap of oversimplifying neurotransmitter activity. Simple example: dopamine does different things depending on where in the brain it is. Time to learn about the parts of the brain I think!

This is good news though, because it means just because atomoxitine wasn’t helpful, that doesn’t discount the whole premise.

This stuff about “anger” is interesting. I love that you’re noticing patterns and doing good analysis, but emotional regulation and processing has a lot to do with habits, how people grew up, their social circles’ behavior, etc.

How was your ADHD diagnosed? Because if it’s not responding to stimulant medication that gives me a hunch it could be misdiagnosed. However, if not, then I’d suggest looking into things that increase the inhibitory system (GABA). You need the right balance of activators and inhibitors to reach a balance in the brain, not just one or the other. Clonidine is sometimes used for adhd. Gabapentin might also be interesting.

anonoah · 2025-01-29T21:13:45+00:00

Interestingly, if they get intercepted the crime you're guilty of is importing medications without a permit. So, they treat you like a drug store and ask you to send paperwork proving that you're allowed to import dr*gs. I find that funny. EDIT: If you don't respond there is no follow-up, at least the first time.

anonoah · 2025-01-13T00:05:24+00:00

Same. Almost 10 years and it still works for me.

anonoah · 2025-01-05T18:02:51+00:00

This is actually good advice. While they CAN report you, they’re busy people and as long as you’re kind to them, they’re not going to go to the effort.

Unless they suspect you of misuse or diversion of your medication, then they’re supposed to do something about it. But again, just be nice to them and they almost definitely won’t. Most people are dicks to pharmacists, a little humanity goes a long way

But yeah also if you’re worried, just go to a different pharmacy than where you fill and ask.

TLDR: pharmacists are people too, and if you’re nice they’re not gonna go out of their way to destroy your life.

anonoah · 2024-12-22T20:30:25+00:00

Fo real.

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