Table of contents:
Background Info | About the Experiment | Daily Logs | Experiment Conclusion & Takeaways
TL;DR
7/19/17 – I am SO glad I decided to go on this experiment! It’s been a few weeks since I started it and I’ve had some incredible results. Namely: being able to focus consistently without my meds, some weight lost, no more excessive sweating, creating some healthy new habits as alternatives to unhealthy old ones, and the possible disappearance/reduction of my sleep apnea (where I stop breathing) and loud snoring, to name a few. You can check out the full breakdown in the Experiment Conclusion & Takeaways section.
Background Info
I have been on prescription ADHD medication (methylphenidate, which is what’s in Ritalin, Concerta, and others) for ~12 years now. And on top of that, I’ve kept a steady stream of coffee coursing through my veins for more or less my entire adult professional life.
Lately, I’ve felt a sense of liberation and empowerment from conducting dietary experiments and observing how I feel as a result. Generally this is oriented around cutting out food that I know is not great for me. So basically this feeling of being able to affect my mood has intertwined with a long-time feeling that a lot of my dependence on stimulants in order to focus could be directly tied to my diet. I grew up as a picky eater who would mostly eat mac ‘n cheese and pizza, and then eventually became an adult who would eat other things as well, while still eating a lot of pizza. More recently, I’ve arrived at a point where I might eat overtly sugary things a couple of times a week, and bready things around 3 times a week. I first noticed the effects my dietary choices had on my ADHD years ago when I observed that if I went for pancakes & syrup for breakfast, it would counteract my ADHD medication for that day. In other words, it would be as though I never took my pills, even though I did.
The main symptoms I associate with feeling ADHD-y are…
- Distractability
- Forgetfulness and needing to exert a huge amount of mental effort to keep track of what I plan to do in the next 10 minutes or so
- And worst of all…. the brain fog! Where it feels like my eyes are having trouble focusing and I’m just bumbling along through life in a funk
I’ve continued to take my medicine and drink coffee for years because they work so well, with no apparent major side effects. But the other day, while looking at my overly-sweaty armpits in the mirror, I started to wonder if that might be related to the stimulants somehow, and after doing a little research, it would appear they might be linked. And thus, I decided that at long last, it would be worth detoxing for a brief period as an experiment to see how I feel.
About the Experiment
I’ve maintained a balance of stimulants for long enough to know that certain foods cause me to need them more. So when laying out the grounds for experimentation here, I feel it’s important to be sure to do away with those trigger foods as well. After all, that’s really what the experiment is about — it’s not about seeing if I can kick my ADHD meds and coffee; it’s about seeing if I can do it in a sustainable way that still allows me to perform at work and feel like myself. Every time in the past that I’ve stopped taking my meds, I didn’t change anything about my carb-heavy diet, and so it’s not very surprising that I would feel really ADHD-y as a result.
In my experience, the biggest trigger foods for my ADHD symtoms are:
- Sugar
- Things that quickly break down into sugar
So that’s where the bread, corn, and rice come from. I mostly eat cheese on my bread anyway (i.e. pizza) so why not kick that as well, right? It’s no secret that dairy isn’t great for you. I’ll also be avoiding fruit, to be on the safe side.
There are a few of exceptions here worth noting. The first one is that I will be needing to wean myself off rice. One of our staple dishes we cook in my house is yellow curry, and I just find it so weird to eat curry with no rice, so I gotta get used to it. And the second thing to note is that for now, I plan to have sweet potatoes with my high-fat meals, like in the yellow curry. If I feel later that I’m not seeing the results I want, I may cut that out as well. And lastly, I’ll be still having probiotic yogurt with my breakfast, at least to start.
Also, I have noticed historically that exercise tends to be helpful for mitigating ADHD symptoms, so I will be logging physical activity as well, and aiming to do some exercise daily if possible.
I’m aiming to maintain this for a couple weeks with daily logs, and then publish the results for you to see. I am hoping that with good dietary modification, I’ll be able to feel great without stimulants.
Daily Logs
Here you’ll find a recap of each day of the experiment. I will include notes about what I ate and how I feel. I’ve been using the “mySymptoms” app (I’m on Android) for a while to track my food and symptoms, so my logs here will basically just be an extension of what I log there.
Day Negative 1 (6/25/17)
I wanted to start this daily log with the day before I started the experiment, because my decisions here greatly affected how shitty day 1 was. Knowing this would be my last opportunity to have pizza and sugar for a while, I made a point to stuff myself with both.
What I ate:
- Breakfast: Eggs, thyme, salt, coconut oil, probiotic yogurt
- Lunch: Yellow curry (chicken, coconut milk, onion, sweet potato, curry paste, fish sauce) with white rice
- Dinner: Pizza, balsamic reduction salad with some other sweet things in it, diet coke
- Snack: Macarons, pineapple
Physical Activity:
- 6pm – Tennis for an hour or so
How I felt:
I felt fine, but of course I would, as I hadn’t started the experiment yet, and thus had had my ADHD meds and coffee that morning.
Day 1 (6/26/17)
Here we are: the actual start of the experiment. And boy, was it a doozy!
What I ate:
- Breakfast: Eggs, thyme, salt, coconut oil, probiotic yogurt, avocado
- Lunch: Yellow curry (chicken, coconut milk, onion, sweet potato, curry paste, fish sauce) with about 1/3 the white rice as usual
- Dinner: Carnitas (pork, garlic, onion, apple, cinnamon, coconut oil, cumin, salt)
Physical Activity:
- 11am – 30 min bike ride
How I felt:
Shitty. But that’s to be expected, given how poorly I ate the day before. However, today’s meal choices will hopefully set me up for a better day tomorrow. I managed to get a little bit of work done, but everything I tried to do today was a massive slog to get through — nothing was at all effortless or easy. I noticed having to eat a huge amount of curry to get full; not sure if it’s because of the reduction in the amount of rice, or the poor nutrients in my body from yesterday, or maybe a bit of both.
Day 2 (6/27/17)
What I ate:
- Breakfast: Eggs, thyme, salt, coconut oil, probiotic yogurt, avocado
- Lunch: Dope-ass chicken salad (lettuce, balsamic vinaigrette, chicken, thyme, rosemary, garlic, onion, salt, coconut oil)
- Dinner: Carnitas (pork, garlic, onion, apple, cinnamon, coconut oil, cumin), fried sweet potatoes (sweet potatoes, garlic, onion, rosemary, thyme, salt)
Physical Activity:
- 11:00am – 30 min strenuous bike ride
How I felt:
I woke up feeling good and clear-headed, which is a great sign. AND I was able to get the beginning content for this blog post mapped out successfully, which is another great sign. I have been thinking a little further about the yogurt I have with my breakfast, and I’m thinking I will cut that and go for an all-out dairy elimination as well. What got me thinking about it is that my girlfriend has noticed that depression comes up for her when she eats dairy — including the probiotic yogurt, and has stopped eating it. So it’s possible that it affects my brain in an ADHD way, and as long as I’m cutting out everything that I think might affect my ADHD, it seems like this would be wise as well.
12:12pm – I want to amend what I said earlier and make it clear that I am actually feeling GREAT today! It seems like the worst of the effects from all the junk food I ate on Sunday were cleared out after just one day.
2:48pm – I am noticing today in the afternoon that ADHD-y feelings have surfaced. I have a suspicion that it could be linked to the iced tea I have been drinking that I have sweetened with stevia. I have read that any sweet taste, regardless of whether or not it’s actually sugar, stimulates insulin release, and I wonder if that is tied to my feelings of ADHD/brain fog. Perhaps in the coming days I will experiment with cutting out artificial sweeteners as well. It could also be coming from the yogurt I had with my eggs this morning.
Day 3 (6/28/17)
What I ate:
- Breakfast: Eggs, thyme, salt, coconut oil, avocado
- Lunch: Carnita Salad (pork, garlic, onion, apple, cinnamon, coconut oil, cumin, lettuce, avocado, apple cider vinaigrette, sunflower seeds), fried sweet potatoes (sweet potatoes, garlic, onion, rosemary, thyme, salt)
- Dinner: Naked Beast Burger (3 beef patties, lettuce, caramelized onion, beast sauce (essentially a spicy mayo), bacon, tomato), a few french fries
Physical Activity:
- 9:45am – 15 min light yoga & stretching
How I felt:
I feel pretty good again upon waking up — a bit foggy though. I had a night of fitful sleep last night, which I hear can be one of the withdrawl symptoms of either the coffee or the meds; can’t remember which.
As the day went on, my exhaustion really set in, and some feelings of depression and overwhelm emerged, as well as having second thoughts and feeling like this experiment may have been a bad idea. I took a short nap in the afternoon (something I never was able to do with the coffee and ADD meds) and felt a bit better. Overall, the day has once again passed in a bit of a blur that I felt as though I wasn’t truly present for. However, I did end up having a great focused work session on my app in the afternoon for 3 hours or so.
Day 4 (6/29/17)
What I ate:
- Breakfast: Eggs, thyme, salt, coconut oil, avocado
- Lunch: Naked Beast Burger (3 beef patties, lettuce, caramelized onion, beast sauce (essentially a spicy mayo), bacon, tomato)
- Dinner: Carrots & hummus
Physical Activity:
- 10am – 30 min standard bike ride
How I felt:
Generally fine; nothing super noteworthy. Minimal brain fog, but still not getting loads of work done yet.
Day 5 (6/30/17)
What I ate:
- Breakfast: Eggs, thyme, salt, coconut oil, avocado
- Lunch: Indian chicken salad (lettuce, balsamic vinegar, coconut oil, avocado, korma powder, onion, pork, garlic, sunflower seeds, green pepper)
- Snack: Carnitas (pork, garlic, onion, apple, cinnamon, coconut oil, cumin)
- Dinner: Beef steak (ribeye), french fries, salad bar salad (a bunch of random stuff I don’t remember), Italian dressing, a tiny taste of dairy & sugar (I tried a fingertip taste of the ice cream dessert they brought us with our bill)
- Snack: Red Wine
Physical Activity:
- 10am – 30 min standard bike ride
How I felt:
Generally fine once again. Very tired though from poor sleep, which made it a difficult day to be away from stimulants. Went out for anniversary dinner and had wine, which I could see affecting me the next day. Also had a small taste (like…. 1/8th of a teaspoon) of the ice cream bon bon things they brought us with our bill at dinner, which I would think would be a negligible amount, but it’s worth logging.
Day 6 (7/1/17)
What I ate:
- Breakfast: Carnitas (pork, garlic, onion, apple, cinnamon, coconut oil, cumin)
- Snack: Matcha latte (coconut milk, almond milk, vanilla extract, stevia, matcha)
- Lunch: Carnitas (pork, garlic, onion, apple, cinnamon, coconut oil, cumin)
- Early Dinner: Naked Beast Burger (3 beef patties, lettuce, caramelized onion, beast sauce (essentially a spicy mayo), bacon, tomato), a few french fries
- Snack: Yellow curry (chicken, coconut milk, onion, sweet potato, curry paste, fish sauce) with about 1/3 the white rice as usual
Physical Activity:
- 10am – 30 min standard bike ride
How I felt:
Generally quite good. A little bit of brain fog at one point, which could have had to do with the wine the night before, or the matcha lattes today.
Day 7 (7/2/17)
What I ate:
- Breakfast: Eggs, thyme, salt, coconut oil, avocado
- Lunch: Carnita Salad (pork, garlic, onion, apple, cinnamon, coconut oil, cumin, lettuce, avocado, balsamic vinegar, sunflower seeds, cashew nuts)
- Early Dinner: Carnitas (pork, garlic, onion, apple, cinnamon, coconut oil, cumin), Yellow curry (chicken, coconut milk, onion, sweet potato, curry paste, fish sauce)
- Dinner #2: Carnitas (pork, garlic, onion, apple, cinnamon, coconut oil, cumin), Yellow curry (chicken, coconut milk, onion, sweet potato, curry paste, fish sauce)
Physical Activity:
- None
How I felt:
Today was the first day since starting this whole thing that I really made a point to actually get some work done in a focused manner. Everything up until now has either been brief work sessions, or working while watching TV in the background or something. And I must say, it feels so great being able to work efficiently and brain-fog-free without my meds!
End of day recap: I just got done doing some client work I wasn’t especially interested in doing, and I even managed to get into a good flow state with it. So overall, I’ve gotta say, I’m just so blown away by how well I can focus off my meds. And further blown away that I can get myself to do work that I don’t want to do, without even having to cajole myself too much. That’s always been what, to me, best demonstrates the necessity of the ADHD meds: the massive pain it has always been to get myself to do work that I have to do, but don’t want to do. But it was no problem today. We’ll see how things keep going, but I’m feeling very good and hopeful about it.
Day 8 (7/3/17)
What I ate:
- Breakfast: Eggs, thyme, salt, coconut oil, avocado
- Lunch: Salad at a restaurant (lettuce, French dressing (I suspect this may have had dairy and/or sugar) chicken, bacon, avocado, sunflower seeds, almonds, purple cabbage
- Snack: Matcha latte (coconut milk, almond milk, vanilla extract, stevia, matcha)
- Dinner: Carrots & hummus
Physical Activity:
- 8:00am – 40 min standard bike ride
How I felt:
Generally very good, but had trouble getting lots done today. Had a really focused morning working on my app, but then had to go pick up my motorcycle from the shop and got lunch with a friend, and had a really hard time focusing when I got home. I notice that however I start my day tends to be how I continue and end it. So when I snap out of bed and get kick-ass work done first thing, I tend to have a day that’s equally focused. But when I bumble along and have scattered meetings, I have an incredibly difficult time getting any valuable work done when I only have blocks of an hour or two in which to do it.
I am growing in my suspicion of these matchas. It could have been the salad dressing, but I am not sure. Something caused me to feel ADHD, and it’s almost definitely one of the two.
Day 9 (7/4/17)
What I ate:
- Breakfast: Chorizo, eggs, thyme, salt, coconut oil, avocado
- Lunch: Carnita Salad (pork, garlic, onion, apple, cinnamon, coconut oil, cumin, lettuce, avocado, balsamic vinegar, sunflower seeds, cashew nuts)
- Dinner: Carnitas (pork, garlic, onion, apple, cinnamon, coconut oil, cumin), fried sweet potatoes (sweet potatoes, garlic, onion, rosemary, thyme, salt)
Physical Activity:
- 7:40am – 10 mins of stretching & yoga
- 8:00am – 20 min normal bike ride
How I felt:
10am – I am feeling utterly exhausted today. Low energy has been a recurring theme on this dietary experiment, but today hits a new low. Too much Harry Potter last night I guess. (Nearly done watching the whole series!)
Day 10 (7/5/17)
What I ate:
- Breakfast: Eggs, thyme, salt, coconut oil, avocado
- Lunch: Carnita Salad (pork, garlic, onion, apple, cinnamon, coconut oil, cumin, lettuce, avocado, balsamic vinegar, sunflower seeds)
- Snack: Matcha latte (coconut milk, almond milk, vanilla extract, stevia, matcha)
- Dinner: Carnitas (pork, garlic, onion, apple, cinnamon, coconut oil, cumin)
Physical Activity:
- None
How I felt:
Not having the best day, to be honest. Feeling a bit depressed and not really driven to do anything. None of my work sounds interesting to me. And I am also craving pizza a lot. I believe that my armpit sweat spots have decreased in size since being off my meds + coffee, but they haven’t gone away completely. So maybe I am just a sweaty dude. (It’s worth noting that these sweat spots happen when I am indoors with the fan on and I am at the ideal temperature.)
Day 11 (7/6/17)
Happy Birthday, Zach!
What I ate:
- Breakfast: Eggs, thyme, salt, coconut oil, fried sweet potatoes (sweet potatoes, garlic, onion, rosemary, thyme, salt)
- Lunch: Dope-ass chicken salad (lettuce, balsamic vinaigrette, chicken, thyme, rosemary, garlic, onion, salt, coconut oil)
- Dinner: Naked Beast Burger (3 beef patties, lettuce, caramelized onion, beast sauce (essentially a spicy mayo), bacon, tomato), 6x french fries
- Snack: “Fake birthday cake” (almond milk, arythritol, butter, coconut flour, coconut milk, coconut oil, egg, rice flour, stevia, tapioca starch, vanilla extract)
Physical Activity:
- 8:00am – 30 min standard bike ride
How I felt:
When I was initially laying out my experiment, it was a little bit of a bummer for a moment to consider having a birthday with no cake. Fortunately, my girlfriend is not only super sweet, but is also a baller gluten-free, dairy-free, et cetera-free baker, and made me an awesome “fake” cake for my birthday.
Note on 7/19 – From here on out in the experiment, I just felt more or less good, with the exception of some gassiness coming up as a consequence of Beast Burger fries, hummus, and occasionally carrots (even when I have ’em without hummus). I’ve since stopped having fries when I go to BB, and have some probiotics on the way to hopefully help get my gut into a good situation so that I’m not gassy from things like carrots. So for the remainder of the days, I stopped logging the “how I felt,” as I just felt generally good, at least from the standpoint of ADHD-related symptoms, unless you see something stating otherwise.
Day 12 (7/7/17)
What I ate:
- Breakfast: Eggs, thyme, salt, coconut oil
- Lunch: Naked Beast Burger (3 beef patties, lettuce, caramelized onion, beast sauce (essentially a spicy mayo), bacon, tomato), 5x french fries
- Dinner: Carrots & hummus
Physical Activity:
- None
Day 13 (7/8/17)
What I ate:
- Breakfast: Eggs, thyme, salt, coconut oil
- Lunch: Carnita Salad (pork, garlic, onion, apple, cinnamon, coconut oil, cumin, lettuce, avocado, balsamic vinegar, sunflower seeds)
- Snack: “Fake birthday cake” (almond milk, arythritol, butter, coconut flour, coconut milk, coconut oil, egg, rice flour, stevia, tapioca starch, vanilla extract)
- Dinner: Naked Beast Burger (3 beef patties, lettuce, caramelized onion, beast sauce (essentially a spicy mayo), bacon, tomato), 6x french fries
Physical Activity:
- 11:00am – 30 min strenuous bike ride
How I felt:
Note on 7-19: I noticed gassiness this evening, and I seem to recall this being when I was first starting to draw the sad conclusion that both french fries and hummus are things that are not super easy for my body to digest. It’s a big bummer about the hummus because I love it, and had made some really good homemade hummus. My hope is that I can buy some garbanzos and sprout them myself to have an easier time digesting them.
Day 14 (7/9/17)
What I ate:
- Breakfast: Bacon, sausage, & eggs at a restaurant
- Lunch: Carnita Salad (pork, garlic, onion, apple, cinnamon, coconut oil, cumin, lettuce, avocado, balsamic vinegar, sunflower seeds)
- Snack: Chorizo, carrots, mixed nutes
- Dinner: Carnitas (pork, garlic, onion, apple, cinnamon, coconut oil, cumin), sweet potato with butter, cinnamon, and coconut milk
Physical Activity:
- None
How I felt:
Generally good, but had some gas in the evening, and some ADHD hyperness (but not brain fog) around lunchtime. My assumption is that the bacon (or maybe the sausage) at breakfast probably had some sugar in it.
Experiment Conclusion & Takeaways
7/20 – As I mentioned at the top of the page, I am very glad to have conducted this little experiment. As I move forward, it will be interesting to re-introduce things and see how my brain and body react to them. As it is, I’ve re-introduced rice and occasional fruit — both without any noticeable side effects in terms of the ADHD brain fog that I believe comes as a consequence of sugar consumption. As it stands, I occasionally will feel a small amount of that brain fog every few days (maybe like a 2 out of 10 in terms of intensity) but it is very manageable. Additionally, I have had a few small pieces of dark chocolate on two different occasions without having noticeable ADHD repercussions.
My biggest takeaway is that it’s been super liberating seeing that I’m still “me” after getting off the meds. Prior to launching into this experiment, I started to wonder what personality traits of mine came from the medicine vs. my own natural Zach-ness. For example, I was pretty sure that my ability to laser-focus in on something that interests me and get into a good flow state was thanks to the pills — or at least largely influenced by them. But as it turns out, that’s an ability I possess just as much now as I did when I was medicated!
Additionally, it’s been cool seeing the difference in sweatiness — I may remind you, the sweatiness was one of the key experiences that precipitated this experiment in the first place. Here’s a before & after shot to show the huge difference in sweatiness that I have experienced. Keep in mind that the shirt I was wearing in the “after” picture is sweat stained to begin with, so it’s not actually even as bad as it looks there. What a difference, right?! These were both taken when I was at a perfectly comfortable temperature and had been for some time.
Beyond the sweatiness, there was a back-burner concern about the fact that my heart rate is always higher on the meds, and it seems to me that making my heart work harder all day every day maybe isn’t the best idea, even if there aren’t any studies (that I know of) published on the long-term heart health consequences of long-time ADHD medicine prescriptions.
Distractability is certainly more of a problem without the meds, but it’s not anything insurmountable. I find that scheduling out my tasks for the day while also being sure to keep a detailed log in trello or todoist of everything I want to get done is incredibly helpful — and I dare say necessary — to ensure that I don’t forget things, and that I actually do the things I set out to do.
The jury’s still out on the sleep apnea thing. I did an experiment two nights ago where I slept without my CPAP on and recorded it, and I didn’t hear myself snoring in the recording, but the fan was perhaps too loud to capture it. And then last night I did another CPAP-free night and recorded it, and I did snore. However my girlfriend tells me she didn’t notice me doing the sleep apnea thing where I stop breathing — just the snoring. So as I say, it’s hard to know on this one, and frankly, that wasn’t even part of the goal of this experiment. So I’ll explore that later down the line and publish results there separately.
In terms of weight loss, it also wasn’t a goal of mine with this experiment, so I didn’t do any measurements or weighing before or after. I can tell you I have certainly lost some weight though. I would venture a guess that I probably lost about 5 pounds? Not especially surprising, really — it’s not exactly news to anyone that cutting out the foods that make you fat would cause you to lose weight. 😉
Hopefully this post has been helpful for you — it’s sure been a beast to write. Share your thoughts in the comments if you’ve had any good takeaways or have any questions for me as it pertains to your own ADHD situation.
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