This is off the top of my head, so no citations, but d-methamphetamine is something like 30% more potent than d-amphetamine. The fact you're taking Adderall makes the comparison more complicated though because you're not taking d-amp. In general d-amp is 3-4x more cognitively powerful than l-amp. So we can consider l-amp to be about 25% the potency of d-amp, except IIRC the 75:25 d-amp:l-amp ratio of adderall synergizes a bit, so let's say that d-amp is ultimately 2.5-3x as strong as l-amp.
Your 20mg of XR addy is equivalent to 10mg IR and another 10mg taken roughly 4 hours after, but let's forget the XR part and just assume it's a 20 IR for convenience (it doesn't change the math anyway, just the pharmacokinetics).
20mg IR Adderall is 15mg dextroamphetamine and 5mg amphetamine. That's about 17mg dextroamphetamine equivalent. Given my estimate of d-meth being 30% more potent than amphetamine, you're taking an equivalent of about 13mg of d-methamphetamine a day.
> In either case, I've never experienced anything like a euphoric high, but I have experienced the kind of "uselessly driven"/tweaker sort of side of it. And, let me tell you, I do not like it when that happens.
See you're amphetamine tolerant. Give your 20mg dose to an amphetamine naive individual, and they will get the euphoria for the first couple days at least of taking it. The euphoria quickly fades, though.
You are correct that when you overdose and aren't stimulant naive, you often end up with mostly the downsides with little upside. There's not too much value in pushing the body past its "equilibrium" level of stimulation (in your case 20mg XR).
> Although I'm in no hurry to find out, I honestly find it hard to imagine what the high must actually be like in order for people to voluntarily subject themselves to the negative effects of this drug. And, I don't even exceed the therapeutic range when this happens!
> I wish there was some way to actually understand why people abuse meth without actually smoking meth myself, which I'm unwilling to do, for obvious reasons.
Have you ever done MDMA? That makes it easy if you have, because MDMA is like a way gnarlier version of methamphetamine: it's shorter lasting and releases WAY more serotonin while still being very dopaminergic. Methamphetamine, taken in oral doses enough to get you slightly tweaking but not at a crazy level, is kind of like 10% of the sensation of "rolling" (rolling means being quite high on mdma) while feeling like a smoother, less physically tweaky version of Vyvanse, which itself is a smoother, less physically tweaky version of adderall.
(For context, when comparing adderall to dexedrine to vyvanse, adderall is by far the tweakiest due to the l-amp. Personally, I'm a dextrorotatory supremacist so I won't touch the l enantiomer with a 10-foot pole)
If you've never done methylynedioxy-methamphetamine, and you clearly haven't done regular methamphetamine, you likely don't "know" what serotonin feels like, unfortunately. But the TLDR is methamphetamine is a smoother and somewhat more dopaminergic version of amphetamine, with the added bonus of some minor (significant when you're smoking it though) serotonin release as well, whereas amphetamine has almost no interaction with serotonin to the best of my knowledge.
I hadn't expected anyone would answer my comment, much less that anyone would provide a concrete reference point that was actually within my experience. I have used MDMA and experienced the high you're describing. For reference, I was high enough that I felt it certainly would not have been a good idea to try driving my car anywhere, but not so high that I felt taking my dog for a walk around the block would have been at all risky.
I found it pleasant, and wished it would last longer, but I don't think it's anything I'd go for if i were only 10% as intense and came with all the twitchy/tweaker effects. The jaw clenching I got from MDMA was more than enough of that.
But, as far as this:
> See you're amphetamine tolerant. Give your 20mg dose to an amphetamine naive individual, and they will get the euphoria for the first couple days at least of taking it. The euphoria quickly fades, though.
When I said "never," I meant "never." I didn't experience it the first time I took amphetamine, the second time, or this morning.
I have experienced some mild euphoria from prescribed dosages of opioids in the past, and, as I mentioned, I've experienced the high of MDMA, so, I think I have some sort of reference point here, although I'm sure they're very different highs.
Maybe it's because the starting dosages my doctors had me trying out initially were very small. Maybe it's because that initial dosage was 10-15 years ago, and I don't really remember it well (which would imply it wasn't very memorable). Or, maybe I did experience some euphoria, but just couldn't classify it as such because of my limited drug experience thus far.
In any case, as you said, I am not amphetamine-naive anymore and certainly don't get high off my medication at prescribed dosages, or even somewhat higher than prescribed dosages.
Again, thank you for helping me understand a bit of the appeal of smoking meth, without actually smoking meth. :-)
> but I don't think it's anything I'd go for if i were only 10% as intense and came with all the twitchy/tweaker effects. The jaw clenching I got from MDMA was more than enough of that.
While we don't know the exact MoA of the jaw clenching, it's likely a form of excitoxicity, presumably a result of excess glutamate firing. This is why high-bioavailability magnesium, such as a chelated magnesium glycinate, helps a lot with the jaw clenching while rolling.
In other words, it's not the serotonin itself that causes the jaw clenching, AFAIK. The "10% of rolling" was me describing just the serotonin dimension of the mdma vs meth experience, not that it would be 10% of the rolly feeling with 100% of the clenching etc :P
> When I said "never," I meant "never." I didn't experience it the first time I took amphetamine, the second time, or this morning.
Very interesting! I definitely have experienced the euphoric high before, but only when starting prescription amphetamines. Yeah, it may have been that you started with a low enough dose, or just that your neurochemistry is pretty resistant to it.
The reason I mentioned the tolerance thing is because there's a common ADHD myth that if someone has ADHD that amps won't get them a euphoric high, and rather will just "calm them down". But in truth anyone can get the euphoria, and most of the "difference in how ADHD people respond to stims" is just an artifact of them having tolerance. It is of course true that ADHD medication can and often does make ADHD people feel more "calm" due to the greater cognitive control etc, but it's not necessarily true that they/we can't actually get "high" off it.
> Again, thank you for helping me understand a bit of the appeal of smoking meth, without actually smoking meth. :-)
Any time :P I've never smoked it myself but having taken it orally for years, as well as having vaporized DMT many a time, I think I have a pretty good imagination for what it would feel like :P
Your 20mg of XR addy is equivalent to 10mg IR and another 10mg taken roughly 4 hours after, but let's forget the XR part and just assume it's a 20 IR for convenience (it doesn't change the math anyway, just the pharmacokinetics).
20mg IR Adderall is 15mg dextroamphetamine and 5mg amphetamine. That's about 17mg dextroamphetamine equivalent. Given my estimate of d-meth being 30% more potent than amphetamine, you're taking an equivalent of about 13mg of d-methamphetamine a day.
> In either case, I've never experienced anything like a euphoric high, but I have experienced the kind of "uselessly driven"/tweaker sort of side of it. And, let me tell you, I do not like it when that happens.
See you're amphetamine tolerant. Give your 20mg dose to an amphetamine naive individual, and they will get the euphoria for the first couple days at least of taking it. The euphoria quickly fades, though.
You are correct that when you overdose and aren't stimulant naive, you often end up with mostly the downsides with little upside. There's not too much value in pushing the body past its "equilibrium" level of stimulation (in your case 20mg XR).
> Although I'm in no hurry to find out, I honestly find it hard to imagine what the high must actually be like in order for people to voluntarily subject themselves to the negative effects of this drug. And, I don't even exceed the therapeutic range when this happens!
> I wish there was some way to actually understand why people abuse meth without actually smoking meth myself, which I'm unwilling to do, for obvious reasons.
Have you ever done MDMA? That makes it easy if you have, because MDMA is like a way gnarlier version of methamphetamine: it's shorter lasting and releases WAY more serotonin while still being very dopaminergic. Methamphetamine, taken in oral doses enough to get you slightly tweaking but not at a crazy level, is kind of like 10% of the sensation of "rolling" (rolling means being quite high on mdma) while feeling like a smoother, less physically tweaky version of Vyvanse, which itself is a smoother, less physically tweaky version of adderall.
(For context, when comparing adderall to dexedrine to vyvanse, adderall is by far the tweakiest due to the l-amp. Personally, I'm a dextrorotatory supremacist so I won't touch the l enantiomer with a 10-foot pole)
If you've never done methylynedioxy-methamphetamine, and you clearly haven't done regular methamphetamine, you likely don't "know" what serotonin feels like, unfortunately. But the TLDR is methamphetamine is a smoother and somewhat more dopaminergic version of amphetamine, with the added bonus of some minor (significant when you're smoking it though) serotonin release as well, whereas amphetamine has almost no interaction with serotonin to the best of my knowledge.