My first significant break from Concerta

Tomorrow will mark my first significant break from Concerta. I need a refill but my doctor, who I might change due to the inconvenience of traveling to her office, is out until Thursday. So I have to call that morning to ask when I can pick it up. Hopefully, that can be Thursday afternoon. Worst case is Friday afternoon, I suppose.

Tomorrow, I expect to feel tired. And I worry that I will feel especially moody. In one sense, the best case is that I don't feel any different. But, then, that would mean that the medication isn't working. So, I have to at least feel less focused. Or maybe I'll crave dopamine and want to skydive.

The one thing I can control, though, is sleep, and I'm sleeping early tonight to feel my natural best tomorrow and be somewhat productive.

My sleep patterns

I've started using the Zeo Sleep Manager, which uses an EEG machine to record and analyze sleep patterns and wake you up at an optimum time. I love it! Before this, I used WakeMate and liked it a lot, too, for the same reasons. It's a little weird waking up with red square spots on my forehead, but I'll tolerate the fading tattoo for the ability to wake up refreshed on as little as 5 hours of sleep.

Speaking of that, in December, I averaged:

Total sleep: 6:41
Deep sleep: 1:24
REM sleep: 2:08
Time awake: 0:03
Times woken: 1

In January:

Total sleep: 6:33
Deep sleep: 1:19
REM sleep: 2:05
Time awake: 0:03
Times woken: 1

Also, the week of 1/8-14, I slept at 11:45 PM on average, while the week of 1/1-7, I slept at 1:05 AM! I think I usually sleep around 11:30 PM these days. Also, the average guy between 30 and 39 years old sleeps at exactly midnight on average. Oh, and I appear to get more deep and less light sleep than average for some reason. Of course, I've been lifting weights lately, so I would expect a lot of sleep time to be allocated towards physical recovery and rebuilding.

Lastly, here is what my sleep looked like last night. Light green is REM, dark is deep, grey is light, and red is awake.

One Busy Break

I haven't posted anything to this blog lately because I've actually been productive for a change and have been flooded with so many ideas that, between work, school, and personal projects, I'm amazed I'm still sleeping at night.

What's happened since my last update on October 27?

1. Started working on a decade-old idea to convert between music and art
2. Started a project management class for work
3. Resumed making iPad art
4. Resumed making iPhone art, mostly iPhone photo art and iPhoneography
5. Started making music on the iPad and iPhone!
6. Started this new website with Squarespace, to improve maintenance and centralize creative activities

I think that qualifies as busy. I know it qualifies as the happiest, most focused, and frustrated about lack of time I've been in a long while. But, overall, it feels good to be productive.

I'm not sure if I can blame Concerta for the ideas. It may be that, and hopefully is part of it or I'm just wasting money, but I think it also coincided with being busy at work and realizing that I could make progress on my conversion idea. Because of my work on this conversion, I've learned and experimented with a ton, and I will be updating that blog soon to reflect that.

The only problem I've found, which I do associate with Concerta, is another way of talking about what my prescribing doctor warned me about, which is that increased focus doesn't imply better decision making. I've found that I can focus for a long time, really in the "zone," but the downside is not having enough time to finish and not making enough time for other things. Fortunately, I haven't shriveled to a stick for lack of eating. I'm actually working out harder than ever right now with the help of a coworker.

The only frustrating thing about being on a medication getting to the end of a prescription. My doctor went on vacation or leave for a whole month in November and I'm almost out of those ingenious little time-released capsules. And I have to call tomorrow to make sure I can pick up a new prescription before I leave for holiday vacation next week. Not fun.

New research on methylphenidate

I ran across a great website for finding and participating in clinical trials. It's http://www.clinicaltrials.gov. Here is a recent one involving methylphenidate:

A Placebo-Controlled, Double-Blind, Parallel-Group, Dose-Titration Study to Evaluate the Efficacy and Safety of CONCERTA in Adults with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder at Doses of 36 mg, 54 mg, 72 mg, 90 mg, or 108 mg per day

What I learned

• This study was sponsored by Johnson & Johnson, makers of Concerta.
• Concerta was found effective at 36-108mg. Can't tell which dose worked best. But I guess that depends on the severity of ADD/ADHD and genes.
• Most common side effects:
  • decreased appetite (25.5%)
  • headache (25.5%)
  • dry mouth (20.0%)
  • anxiety (16.4%)
  • nausea (12.7%)
  • blood pressure increased (10%)
  • insomnia (9.1%)
  • initial insomnia (7.3%)
  • heart rate increased (7.3%)
  • bruxism (6.4%)
  • irritability (6.4%)
  • muscle tightness (6.4%).
• "The mean change in weight from baseline to the Final Visit (LOCF) was -2.2 kg in the All CONCERTA group and +0.2 kg in the placebo group." That's -4.85 lbs for the metrically-challenged. I can't tell from the study how long this weight loss took.

And, because I like visuals, here is one quickly showing the side effects:

Quick update

I've decided to stay at 36mg because I felt more nausea on 54mg. This is unfortunate because I felt more productive on 54mg. Although, that could be coincidence. And the difference wasn't drastic.

But even on 36mg, I feel nausea sometimes. I feel slightly nauseous now. I need to figure out what contributes to it or why it happens at all. Google hasn't helped me so far, but I'll look again.

Overall, though, this week at work I was very productive, so I'm glad Concerta seems to be working.

Oh, and I didn't drink as much caffeine this week, which is good for my heart! And no noticeable withdrawal.

Finally, I should note that I slept a fair amount this week, more on average than last week and more consistent.