For me it was very obvious on day 1, both on Xaggatin (an offbrand concerta copy) and ritalin prolonged release. There was just a feeling of a bit more energy, clarity and drive - it was kinda how I felt on a really good day premeds, if I had a day where I was cheerful and excited about something, then the adhd symptoms weren’t as bad as usual. On my meds, that’s basically everyday now.

But I was on concerta for a while in between the other two, and found that they did very little for me. Even though Xaggatin and concerta are meant to be the same, and I was on the same dose, the concerta didn’t really work for me at all (despite being more expensive!).

Picture an 4 way intersection.

For me every single car just went about their way all willy nilly like it was nothing.

Occasionally a semi hauling triple trailers flys through grinding every else to a halt when everyone is trying to get through.

There’s no order, the lights don’t work, and almost no one wants to yield.

The cars were ideas, things I saw, and things I needed to do. The semi is my latest hyper obsession. The non functional traffic lights were my ability to regulate my thoughts.

When I took my meds it was like the lights started working suddenly. At first they were really strict, one car at a time like a highway on ramp. But then things amped down a bit as I got more used to the meds. I even went up to 60mg atomoxetine from 40mg where I started as things ramped too close to chaos again.

I hope that made sense.