 I just finished watching the brand new Netflix documentary called Take Your Pills, which is about Adderall use in the United States. So in this video, I'm going to review this documentary and make sure that you stay tuned. And right at the moment, the opiate, Dr prescribed opiate abuse epidemic is taking center stage. But I'm telling you, Adderall is right below the threshold of the opiates. What's up everybody? It's Chris from the Rewired Soul, where we talk about the problem, but focus on the solution. And I forgot that this documentary was coming out. So I stayed up late watching it, made some coffee, and let's do this thing. So some of you might have saw my trailer reaction to this documentary. And now here is the full review. And man, like I can honestly say, I can honestly say this, like, after watching this documentary, like, I am severely bummed out. I'm very bummed out. For those of you who are new here, like first off, make sure you subscribe to my channel. I make videos about mental health, addiction and all sorts of stuff. So those of you who haven't met me yet, I'm a recovering drug addict and alcoholic. And my primary drug of choice was prescription pain medications. So when it comes to medications, especially narcotic medications, once they can become addictive, like, this is something that I have to talk about a lot. And because there's just so much stuff going on in the country, you know, when it comes to this thing. And this documentary really shed a light on what's really going on. So by the way, like, there's going to be some spoilers in here, but it's not like some, you know, it's not a regular like movie where there's like plot twists and things like that. So like, if you want to watch it, you know, go watch it, come back or whatever. But if you just want to like kind of a brief recap, stick around. Let's talk about this thing. So anyways, the documentary, it follows quite a few different people. There's like, maybe not a dozen to a dozen people. Some of them are people on Adderall. Some are people who have gotten off Adderall. Some of them are doctors, neuroscientists, psychologists, and all sorts of people in here. Okay. So one of the first things to start talking about is like the use of Adderall on college campuses. And it talks about like this hyper competitive environment, right? And one of the first things that kind of blew my mind is that, like, on these college campuses, they're like selling trading Adderall, like left and right, like, they're showing like these Facebook groups where people are just like, yo, does anybody got any Adderall? Hey, I'll get some, like, they're just doing this so nonchalantly. And something that one of the young women who's in college talks about like, it doesn't really connect for them like this is a drug, right? Like she makes the analogy like, this isn't heroin, you know what I mean? But like, think about it, different types of prescribed opiates, those are prescription heroin. You know what I mean? Adderall is prescription methamphetamine. Like there's only one component that's different and it's a very slight difference based on the chemistry of it. So like they're doing it and they're seeing this as like this competitive advantage and it's helping them study, it's helping them do these things, right? And they don't see it as this drug, even though it is an addictive substance, it does trigger the dopamine systems and that's what creates an addiction because that's our pleasure system. That's a system in our brain that says, I want more of this thing. But young people are not associating with this. And you know, it goes on and they talk about, you know, there's this, he's a financial analyst for Wall Street and, you know, he was taking Adderall, you know, as part of his career so he can work longer hours. He was doing like 16-hour days. And a guy who was working on a project was like, had a seizure and things like that. But towards the end of this documentary, they talked to one of the young women who is, you know, so focused on her grades and she's got to get these good grades and like, and it really saddened me because she was like, you know, like, after college is over, I think my relationship with Adderall is just going to be done. And I'm sitting there putting together this guy who's, you know, in his career still taking Adderall. He's in his 20s and this young woman who thinks that all of a sudden, now that she's out of college, she's not going to have to take it anymore. But the reality is, is like that competition, that drive, that need to be the best, still continues after that in the workplace, especially with jobs and careers demanding more and more and more and more and more. So anyways, there's some great authors who are also in this documentary. And like, it was interesting seeing the history of it. So real brief history of this, like they started giving it to soldiers in World War II. They started seeing that it helped them focus better, it helped them be the best soldiers that they can be, right? But then they started seeing the addictive qualities, especially when it started hitting the mainstream back in the United States. So it was crazy to me. It was nuts. I never even knew this was a thing. So these amphetamines, they were giving it like this nasal spray, right? And they were just being marketed like, we're talking like the 1950s and the 1960s, like housewives and musicians and artists and like in songs back in the 1950s that were singing about it. But back then it was called, I believe it was called like Benzedrine. And then they even talk about the Beatles and they have this song called Dr. Something. And it's about this doctor who would prescribe this amphetamine to like celebrities and rock stars and things like that. And what they ended up seeing was like, you know, this thing is highly addictive. They were giving it to employees and stuff to make them work and work and work. And this is actually like one of the first drug laws that came out. And they had to change this to a legal substance without a prescription. And you needed to meet all these criteria just to get it. And that happened in around 1970 or so. So we went from prescribing eight billion Adderall per year or Benzedrine. By 1972, it dropped down to 400 million. So what ended up happening, there was this, I believe he was Swiss or Swedish, the scientist, he was trying to create something to help his wife out, make her better at tennis, make her lose some weight, make her a little bit more peppy, right? Her name, her name was Rita, right? So he decided to call it Rita Lean, right? But then when the pharmaceutical company picked it up, they took off the E called it Ritalin, all right? Well, anyways, the United States right around this time, I believe it was in the 80s or so, they decided that they want to do some tests on this. So they ordered like the barrels, like by the barrels, they ordered all this stuff and then want to see what happened. And they have one of the scientists who actually first worked on it, his name was Keith Connors. So Keith Connors was a scientist that was like pretty much heading up these studies, right? So this lead scientist, Keith Connors, he would just basically go to a school and they back then you could just walk up to the principal, basically say, yo, we got this new drug, we think it might help kids, you know, calm down, focus more in school. And like the principal be like, yes, like anything you could do to make these kids chill. So like they were just doing these massive tests, just giving these pills to kids, right? And they were seeing like these immediate results, like the doctor Keith Connors, he actually talks about how like, you know, there was this immediate results where like parents were saying like the very next day, like, wow, my kids are completely different person, completely different person, right? And then that's when they start massively prescribing this medication. And I mentioned it in my first reaction video about the trailer, like the United States and New Zealand are the only two countries, the only two countries where they can directly market these type of drugs to consumers, these addictive medications. So there was this huge push, all of these ads everywhere, that's just like, oh, like it would be like a mom saying like, Oh yeah, I gave my kid Adderall and now he takes out the trash, or hey, I gave my kid Adderall and now he's an A student, you know what I mean? So it's being marketed to these parents and they're just supplying it to these kids, like in insane ways. So we saw this massive drop in the prescribing of these medications and then just sky rockets. Again, now it's at a level where it's, it's more than it ever was. And as you saw from that intro clip, like the issue is, is that the opioid epidemic is, it's the main focus right now, but right behind it is Adderall. Like what I, what I really want people to understand is that the opioid epidemic started from Purdue Pharma, who has been sued for millions upon millions upon millions of dollars for the way that they marketed these drugs. Now, one of the reasons that the opioid epidemic is getting a lot more spotlight than the Adderall problem is because opioids are killing people left and right. Now, when it comes to Adderall, we're having these other health issues, but people are kind of brushing it to the side. Okay. And a lot of it's because they're looking at it as these like performance enhancers, right? But something that they discuss in this documentary is like, where do you kind of draw that line? One of the guys, one of the authors who brought up this interesting subject and actually made me like think for a second, like he talked about like, you know, say you have, you have two students, right? One family can afford an SAT tutor. The other one can't. So is the SAT tutor? Is that a performance enhancer? Like what if the other kid's only option is to take something like Adderall? It's like, man, like, I get it. I get it. And that sucks. But again, like a lot of it is this false idea that, you know, you know, these careers and these other things are, they're, they're going to make us happy, right? And like, I'll do a whole another video about college and college students. I get a lot of college students who asked me to make videos. And I really need to something that they bring up in this documentary is something called human capital value. Okay. Like they talk about how like, from the second that you're, you're even conceived and you're in your mommy's belly, right? Your parents and others are already thinking about your human capital value. Like what is the maximum amount of value that we can get from this person, right? So parents are like already thinking like, what are they going to be when they grow up? Are they going to be successful? Are they going to do this? How much money are they going to make? All these things. And like you see it too, like preschool applications, right? Like getting kids into these private, risky schools, all these things to push them towards this quote unquote, successful future. You know what I'm saying? Like we're constantly like looking at these kids and saying like, what is their maximum value going to be? And that's one of the reasons why I mentioned in my last video about Jordan Peterson. Like I feel that people like Jordan Peterson and Gary Vaynerchuk are on the rise because like so many parents have these really poor value systems of what a successful child is. Like as a parent myself, like a successful child to me is if my son's happy doing what he loves to do. You know what I mean? Like too many parents project their views of success on their children. And that's one of the many reasons, one of the many, many, many reasons where we have so many depressed and anxious young people these days. One person that they follow in this is an NFL player, former NFL player. His name is Eben and he played for I believe the Philadelphia Eagles. And he had a herniated disc and somebody's like, Hey, I got some out of all, you want to take it? And because of, you know, drug testing and stuff like that, like you need this exemption. So he went and got diagnosed with ADHD. And like even his wife was like, Oh, I guess it's cool. Like you're doing the dishes now and you're doing this and he was performing better. He was, uh, he was talking about how, how he could like almost see the plays before they happened. He was just hyper focused. And what happened to him was one day he ran out of his Adderall prescription and he ended up taking Ritalin, which resulted in him failing a drug test, getting a suspension and things like that. But he acknowledges like how it became a problem. Like he became dependent on this thing. He was taking like a 70 milligram time release. He was supplementing it with 20 milligram pills throughout the day. And then he had to take other things to go to sleep at night. It was this constant cycle. And he was talking about like the crashes and the depression and all these other things. And, um, he ended up becoming an author. But part of this segment was talking about how like we had an Olympian, um, just the other year who popped dirty for Adderall on her test. And like more and more athletes are starting to do this. When I was in the professional esports scene, like a lot of, uh, you know, the gamers were starting to do this as well. And I'm not too in touch with that anymore, but I wouldn't be surprised if that's still a thing. Now, one of the things that made me really happy was my man is former NFL player. Like he's talking about how now he meditates. You know what I mean? And like, this is the thing that I can't stress enough. Like as I'm watching this and I'm seeing these people justify their Adderall use and, uh, you know, parents justifying it, all these things. I'm sitting there. I'm like, every result you're looking for has been proven to happen via meditation. Like there's, there's so much science behind it, you know, but we're just throwing these pills. You're just throwing them at kids. The last thing I want to talk about is one, uh, recent study they did, uh, not too long ago was they took two different groups of students, right? And they told them, like, we're giving you performance enhancing drugs. Okay. To some of the, uh, students to one group of the students, they were giving them Adderall to the other ones they gave a placebo. And over this course of time to see how much they were learning, how much they were improving, they were identical. They were the exact same. So what they're finding is like these pills don't actually make you smarter or anything like that, but the idea, the confidence behind them, like, don't get me wrong, these medications do like intensify your focus. But when it comes to success, like a lot of it just has to do with this confidence and believing in yourself and what you could do. Like that's what's so interesting about these placebo studies. But anyways, like the, the ending of this documentary, it bummed me out more than the rest. It was just kind of talking about like the state of our society, the, how hyper competitive we are. And, you know, one of the last people to talk in this document was basically just like, you know, when we're doing this, like we're losing like this, this human component, you know what I mean? It takes away from creativity and like emotions and things like that. And, you know, along with like the joy and love that we feel for each other, you know, unfortunately, like there comes grief and loss and pain and all those other things. But that's part of the human experience. And, you know, with these, with these performance enhancing drugs, like we're trying to turn ourselves into these things that we weren't meant to be. You know what I mean? Like, I don't know if any of you have seen that movie Equilibrium back in the day, Old School Christian Bale. But like, they lived in this society and there's other like dystopian, you know, novels and movies that do this were like everybody's medicated to turn them into these like perfect human beings. And like, I don't know, it kind of scares me where we're where we're headed in the future when it comes to medications. Like, I just, you know, I just don't see why we're trying to run away from this this human experience. But I'm going to do some more videos just about like college and success. Like, I will link up in the info cards and other videos I've done on happiness versus success and things like that. And I hope you watch them. Like, like a lot of this comes down to our value systems. I don't mean to offend anybody with this right here, but a lot of it comes down to lazy, lazy parenting. You know what I mean? Like, I don't want to spend time with my kid. I don't want to, you know, sit down and work with my kid and and learn how to properly navigate through their emotions with them. I don't want to do any of that. I just want to throw a pill at them and have them be the kid that I imagine. Like, that's what worries me the most. That worries me so, so, so much. I was just talking to my friend about that. I'm like, you know, I'm watching this and I'm so worried that, you know, this kid we know is going to get prescribed this medication because he has a neglectful parents. You know what I mean? Like, that's that's what really worries me. And the way that we justify the use of these medications. Like, I don't know. But anyways, take your pills. It is out on Netflix right now. If you want to check it, I would love to know your thoughts down in the comments below, whether you check it out or not. I really, really, really hope that you share this video. Like, let's spread some awareness about what's going on with these medications because, you know, in this perfect world, the opioid crisis is going to be taken care of, but right on its heels is this amphetamine crisis. You know what I mean? So please share this video. Let's get some awareness out there. All right. But anyways, if you like this video, give it a thumbs up. If you're new here, make sure you hit that subscribe button. I'm always making videos about mental health as well as addiction. All right. If you want to check out some other videos, click or tap on the thumbnail right there. Okay. But thank you so much for watching. I love you all and I'll see you next time.