I joined is because I want to educate myself

[CosmicKitten]

I only joined a... few weeks ago I think? But I just now became active here.
The main reason why I joined is because I want to educate myself, since I am currently unable to attend a worthwhile college. I was going to a community college but I wasn't learning anything so I quit... I know, sounds outright foolish because now it means I can't transfer (and I don't see why the school insists that you have 60 credits before you can even ATTEMPT to transfer) but from the way things were going my chances of transfer were nil anyway plus the time spent sitting in class listening to lectures was nothing short of STUPEFYING... now before anybody calls me stupid I was in National Honor Society in high school (can't calculate my GPA, been to 2-3 different high schools depending on whether the junior high I went to for 9th grade counts), scored 34 composite on the ACT (35 math, 33 science, 34 English, 33 reading, only 75 percentile on the essay but if anybody doubts my writing skills I can link you to an essay for a first-place writing scholarship I won), and at the one four year college I went to (I actually went to 3 different colleges in the 2 and a half semesters I have been in school) I was getting A's in that basic level physics class without even doing the homework or paying attention (they didn't have physics majors so it wasn't even worth staying), and they were making me take a math course that I had already taken in high school (which was 2 and a half years prior but I still remembered everything, I scored as high on the placement test as they will possibly let you so it wasn't like I had to retake algebra or trig like some of my classmates who were fresh out of high school) and the college I went to before that was another community college that didn't have any physics or math classes appropriate for physics majors, just a chemistry class that was supposedly geared for science majors but I remembered EVERYTHING from high school that they taught in that class and it wasn't even an AP course I had in high school... and I was the only student to get an A (well A minus but I tend to space out on lab assignments)...
So anyway sorry for the long story but at this point I feel that I am better off studying on my own. I care more about learning than about credits. Call me crazy, foolish, delusional, I don't care. I have been out of college for a year and I am now studying PDE's on my own (I was only in calc 2 when I left the college)... when I can concentrate that is. I have severe ADHD, see, on top of Asperger's syndrome and perhaps depression/PTSD from living with a cruel foster parent. I take a small dose of Adderall for it, not sure that it's helping but I feel the effects all day... I tutor math usually twice a week to make a bit of pocket money (I am now freeloading off of my dad) and I hope to someday go to a college (a good large one with physics research and study abroad opportunities and the like) that doesn't strictly require me to earn 60 credits before transferring. I want to major in physics and math and chemistry and maybe neuroscience even though I'm talented at art and writing as well but I don't see any reason to go to school for such subjects. And I have tons of ideas that I'm not sure about and I don't have any mentors in real life that I can intelligently discuss my ideas with or to help me do independent research that might impress Stanford admissions (maybe if I showed them my art, told them I was going for an art major and switched as soon as they let me in) so any help with that would be appreciated ^^

 

[turbo]

Welcome, CK! You might want to format your posts with reasonable-length paragraphs, etc, so that people can parse them more easily. Just a suggestion.

 

[CosmicKitten]

Sorry, even the relevant portions of my life story are impossible to sufficiently explain in a succint fashion, on top of my difficulty with writing paragraphs as opposed to novels...

 

[camjohn]

This is a good place to come for advise -- I'm glad that you did. First of all, you might want to edit the beginning a bit because it comes off a bit defensive (the whole if any of you think I'm stupid thing and then listing off your achievments) because I assure you that no one will assume that you're stupid. People here are smart enough to go off more than a silly thing iike GPA for intelligence. Also, the first paragraph also has a lot of run ons you might want to get rid of (I say this because people get very easily bored by lengthy sentences and pargraphs and tend to look elsewhere on PF after reading them).

As for the advice, I have a form of ADD as well (EFD -- executive function disorder) so I can relate. I spent most of high school being a social guy and basically slacking off in classes. I was always intellectual (continually participating in class discussions, debating students and teachers, engaging in the material) in my classes and towards the teachers outside of class, I just tended to not do a lot of homework. I got good grades in classes for which I possessed a sizable interest (science, math, politics), and not so good grades in classes for which I didn't (SPANISH, christian family values, world cultures etc.).

Anyways, sounds like you're a similar type of person. You didn't get fantastic grades in high school because you had a hard time focusing, but you had excellent test scores (it's because of my SAT scores that I got into a great college). So my question is: to which schools did you apply initially? I can gurantee that a 34 ACT can get you into a top 100 school like that. That is an excellent score, so I'm wondering why you went to community college, especially given the fact that people with learning disorders tend to DESPISE community colleges. The strucuture of CCs is terribly constructed for the needs of kids with ADD which is why I wasn't surprised at all when you said that you hated it.

What are your goals now? To get into Stanford? If that is your only and primary goal, I'd consider changing it. I always try to be optimistic when it comes to academics, colleges, double majoring etc. because I think that it's a productive, constructive attitude, but that sounds a bit unrealistic. It doesn't sound unrealistic because you aren't smart enough (know some kids who go to schools like that who have peanut brains), it sounds unrealistic because admissions at Stanford is incredibly superficial and well... D-bag(ish). They're very elitist over there, so they would probably be unlikely to sympathize with someone in your situation. Was Stanford your only goal?

 

[CosmicKitten]

Well that's my main concern is that they will ignore me because of my lack of connections. My other options are to go to another Ivy League school or out of state and out of state is too expensive. I imagine I have to all but win the Nobel prize to get into such a school without straight A's.
Now I got mostly A's in high school, if I got a B it was... well I always got B's in PE, sometimes also in English class, not because I'm bad at English, quite the reverse obviously... I think that one time it was because of not knowing MLA format? And the other time because I flunked a quiz or something about a story that we read, quizzing the kinds of details I usually skim over because I read so fast...
Now Spanish I got A's in without even trying. I'm good at languages apparently, just not that interested in learning unless it's made fun like through music or anime or the like, and I know I will want to study them more someday because I very much desire to travel the world, particularly Europe.
Mind you I didn't apply to ANY schools initially... my foster parent just made me go to the community college ... TWO years after I graduated. She wouldn't let me use the internet or apply anywhere and she put me down and called me stupid and retarded, and did the same to my twin sister who is far more disabled than I am, she's not even good at math, and is still stuck with her because my father that I live with now had a stroke and feels he cannot handle both of us...
GLAD you understand the thing about community colleges! I transferred right out after my foster parent threw me out (the month before I turned 21, yeah she 'adopted' me so she could continue to sponge government payments off of me until I turned 21) but the 4 year school was inadequate, only basic physics classes and then my dad came back into my life and I moved there... although I was from out of state (my foster parent moved me out of state right before senior year) they let me in the community college for free, waiver for being a former California foster kid, but I was getting bad grades despite knowing everything, the disability services wouldn't help me until it was too late (lost the paperwork see), I was trying to set up the AMATYC math competition and a physics club and transfer to UCSD (the transcripts didn't come in time to secure a transfer admission guarantee so I had to get in the hard way) and eventually I was driven to... not attempt suicide, no, but the entire report was confabulated and so I was sent to the psych ward for 2 days. Not fun.
But yes, see the decision to leave (until I become 'stabilized' they say) was in fact mutual.
This past year I've been tutoring math for spare pocket change, reading books from the library, and giving antidepressants unsuccessful test runs (the Wellbutrin did next to nothing, the Zoloft made me too lazy and unmotivated and immune to caffeine, and the Strattera was the WORST, gave me horrible, super-fast mood swings where I didn't know WHAT or HOW I was feeing, they went away and a few days later came back... and again... and it didn't help my concentration at all but made it worse, I ran out of the library crying...) so now I'm just on Adderall which I took as a little kid but they stopped because I refused the larger 10mg dose, it had a funny side effect on me... I think it makes my mind a little more active, but also gets me more stuck in ruts, more hyperfocused, but at least I AM studying... I still can't make myself study for longer than an hour though, when I feel like I've gotten somewhere I decide to take a small break but the hyperactive thoughts come back and I forget what I was doing and get stuck doing stupid stuff on the computer... at least it isn't harming me, just some dry mouth and appetite loss but I was eating too much junk anyway.
And as always, I am hyper all day and will suddenly crash at night, which is too bad because that's when I finally wind down into a study mood.
I find valerian tea doesn't help much for sleep at all, in fact it makes me stay up, sleepy in the head but restless of body all night, sleep for only a few hours and then lay in bed drowsily for a bit in the morning. It helps my mood though; I haven't had a temper tantrum/cry spell in the week or so I've been drinking it.
This book on PDE's (by Walter A. Strauss), I found it was very ADHD-friendly, far more so than the Schaum's outlines, so I checked it out for a second time just yesterday... I am only so far on chapter 3.4, I think. Been reading it and nothing else for three weeks or so... is that bad? Mind you I don't work on the problems until I understand the material in my head better, I tend to do worse in classes with required homework because they train you to focus more on getting assignments done than just learning the stuff and that I think inhibits semantic long-term consolidation, as does listening to a lecture where it all goes into episodic memory and plus they're yakking too loud for you to think... lectures are great for history and foreign language classes, but math and science? Seriously?
Anyway the state colleges here, the ones I can go to with just a Pell grant and a small loan, don't accept anyone with fewer than 60 credits to transfer yet they won't let you dump your credits into the toilet and start over as a freshman, so yeah, I'm royally screwed. I don't like UCSD anyway... I just get a bad vibe about it... and that was before they called the campus police on me for giving some lady working there a dirty look...

 

[Nano-Passion]

I only joined a... few weeks ago I think? But I just now became active here.
The main reason why I joined is because I want to educate myself, since I am currently unable to attend a worthwhile college. I was going to a community college but I wasn't learning anything so I quit... I know, sounds outright foolish because now it means I can't transfer (and I don't see why the school insists that you have 60 credits before you can even ATTEMPT to transfer) but from the way things were going my chances of transfer were nil anyway plus the time spent sitting in class listening to lectures was nothing short of STUPEFYING... now before anybody calls me stupid I was in National Honor Society in high school (can't calculate my GPA, been to 2-3 different high schools depending on whether the junior high I went to for 9th grade counts), scored 34 composite on the ACT (35 math, 33 science, 34 English, 33 reading, only 75 percentile on the essay but if anybody doubts my writing skills I can link you to an essay for a first-place writing scholarship I won), and at the one four year college I went to (I actually went to 3 different colleges in the 2 and a half semesters I have been in school) I was getting A's in that basic level physics class without even doing the homework or paying attention (they didn't have physics majors so it wasn't even worth staying), and they were making me take a math course that I had already taken in high school (which was 2 and a half years prior but I still remembered everything, I scored as high on the placement test as they will possibly let you so it wasn't like I had to retake algebra or trig like some of my classmates who were fresh out of high school) and the college I went to before that was another community college that didn't have any physics or math classes appropriate for physics majors, just a chemistry class that was supposedly geared for science majors but I remembered EVERYTHING from high school that they taught in that class and it wasn't even an AP course I had in high school... and I was the only student to get an A (well A minus but I tend to space out on lab assignments)...
So anyway sorry for the long story but at this point I feel that I am better off studying on my own. I care more about learning than about credits. Call me crazy, foolish, delusional, I don't care. I have been out of college for a year and I am now studying PDE's on my own (I was only in calc 2 when I left the college)... when I can concentrate that is. I have severe ADHD, see, on top of Asperger's syndrome and perhaps depression/PTSD from living with a cruel foster parent. I take a small dose of Adderall for it, not sure that it's helping but I feel the effects all day... I tutor math usually twice a week to make a bit of pocket money (I am now freeloading off of my dad) and I hope to someday go to a college (a good large one with physics research and study abroad opportunities and the like) that doesn't strictly require me to earn 60 credits before transferring. I want to major in physics and math and chemistry and maybe neuroscience even though I'm talented at art and writing as well but I don't see any reason to go to school for such subjects. And I have tons of ideas that I'm not sure about and I don't have any mentors in real life that I can intelligently discuss my ideas with or to help me do independent research that might impress Stanford admissions (maybe if I showed them my art, told them I was going for an art major and switched as soon as they let me in) so any help with that would be appreciated ^^

Are you sure you got your information right? Most schools allow you to transfer before you get an associates in my area. In fact, that is how I transferred.

Where do you live?

Edit: I just read your other post now so never mind -- you sound pretty sure. That is a pretty awkward setup.

 

[Nano-Passion]

Well that's my main concern is that they will ignore me because of my lack of connections. My other options are to go to another Ivy League school or out of state and out of state is too expensive. I imagine I have to all but win the Nobel prize to get into such a school without straight A's.
Now I got mostly A's in high school, if I got a B it was... well I always got B's in PE, sometimes also in English class, not because I'm bad at English, quite the reverse obviously... I think that one time it was because of not knowing MLA format? And the other time because I flunked a quiz or something about a story that we read, quizzing the kinds of details I usually skim over because I read so fast...
Now Spanish I got A's in without even trying. I'm good at languages apparently, just not that interested in learning unless it's made fun like through music or anime or the like, and I know I will want to study them more someday because I very much desire to travel the world, particularly Europe.
Mind you I didn't apply to ANY schools initially... my foster parent just made me go to the community college ... TWO years after I graduated. She wouldn't let me use the internet or apply anywhere and she put me down and called me stupid and retarded, and did the same to my twin sister who is far more disabled than I am, she's not even good at math, and is still stuck with her because my father that I live with now had a stroke and feels he cannot handle both of us...
GLAD you understand the thing about community colleges! I transferred right out after my foster parent threw me out (the month before I turned 21, yeah she 'adopted' me so she could continue to sponge government payments off of me until I turned 21) but the 4 year school was inadequate, only basic physics classes and then my dad came back into my life and I moved there... although I was from out of state (my foster parent moved me out of state right before senior year) they let me in the community college for free, waiver for being a former California foster kid, but I was getting bad grades despite knowing everything, the disability services wouldn't help me until it was too late (lost the paperwork see), I was trying to set up the AMATYC math competition and a physics club and transfer to UCSD (the transcripts didn't come in time to secure a transfer admission guarantee so I had to get in the hard way) and eventually I was driven to... not attempt suicide, no, but the entire report was confabulated and so I was sent to the psych ward for 2 days. Not fun.
But yes, see the decision to leave (until I become 'stabilized' they say) was in fact mutual.
This past year I've been tutoring math for spare pocket change, reading books from the library, and giving antidepressants unsuccessful test runs (the Wellbutrin did next to nothing, the Zoloft made me too lazy and unmotivated and immune to caffeine, and the Strattera was the WORST, gave me horrible, super-fast mood swings where I didn't know WHAT or HOW I was feeing, they went away and a few days later came back... and again... and it didn't help my concentration at all but made it worse, I ran out of the library crying...) so now I'm just on Adderall which I took as a little kid but they stopped because I refused the larger 10mg dose, it had a funny side effect on me... I think it makes my mind a little more active, but also gets me more stuck in ruts, more hyperfocused, but at least I AM studying... I still can't make myself study for longer than an hour though, when I feel like I've gotten somewhere I decide to take a small break but the hyperactive thoughts come back and I forget what I was doing and get stuck doing stupid stuff on the computer... at least it isn't harming me, just some dry mouth and appetite loss but I was eating too much junk anyway.
And as always, I am hyper all day and will suddenly crash at night, which is too bad because that's when I finally wind down into a study mood.
I find valerian tea doesn't help much for sleep at all, in fact it makes me stay up, sleepy in the head but restless of body all night, sleep for only a few hours and then lay in bed drowsily for a bit in the morning. It helps my mood though; I haven't had a temper tantrum/cry spell in the week or so I've been drinking it.
This book on PDE's (by Walter A. Strauss), I found it was very ADHD-friendly, far more so than the Schaum's outlines, so I checked it out for a second time just yesterday... I am only so far on chapter 3.4, I think. Been reading it and nothing else for three weeks or so... is that bad? Mind you I don't work on the problems until I understand the material in my head better, I tend to do worse in classes with required homework because they train you to focus more on getting assignments done than just learning the stuff and that I think inhibits semantic long-term consolidation, as does listening to a lecture where it all goes into episodic memory and plus they're yakking too loud for you to think... lectures are great for history and foreign language classes, but math and science? Seriously?
Anyway the state colleges here, the ones I can go to with just a Pell grant and a small loan, don't accept anyone with fewer than 60 credits to transfer yet they won't let you dump your credits into the toilet and start over as a freshman, so yeah, I'm royally screwed. I don't like UCSD anyway... I just get a bad vibe about it... and that was before they called the campus police on me for giving some lady working there a dirty look...

How much of a passion do you have for physics and mathematics? I can't say I have ADD for sure but I am getting tested in a few days. One thing I have found is that I have a very hard time focusing on things that I don't like but I can hyperfocus on things that I love. So for me it is more or less easy to "hyperfocus" on physics and mathematics with the aid of Piracetam (non mainstream medication in America but popular in other countries) and caffeine. I can't seem to focus in social conversations though because they bore me if there is no intellectual discussion. I'm still prone to very stupid mistakes (actually they are quite embarrassing too at times, especially when posted on the forum ahah). And not all physics and mathematics interests me at one point which is where I pull my hair out to get the task completed (quite frustrating actually).

One thing I have realized is that there is a difference for having a passion for the concepts of physics, and another for solving problems in physics and mathematics. You will fair out better if you develop a genuine interest for solving problems in general.

If your not interested in PDE but your just doing it for the sake of improving your prospective application then I can assure you that you will have a hard time focusing. What I have learned is that it is very important to take advantage of external motivation along with internal motivation for things you don't absolutely love. Either way I don't think that you making the best of your time by self studying PDE.

Why are you studying PDEs?

 

[CosmicKitten]

Yes, I checked, and even if I lied to them and said I didn't have any credits (and I'd have an easy enough time of that, seeing how long it took for my transcripts to come in) they would find out when they process my financial aid application (which I can't file anyway, since my foster-sorry, ADOPTIVE parent is required to sign it, and the appeals process is a ridiculous pain to go through and even if I got through it which is unlikely considering all the references are on the other side of the country, they would probably pull some other rule out of their *** for why I cannot be independent on the FAFSA)
And I am studying PDE's because it's part of the maths one needs to know to study physics. I already know enough about calculus and ODE's and linear algebra to get at least a C in those classes, very likely better, I find I understand it better if I study the more advanced stuff that it's applied to. What I find about most physics classes (at least at my schools, it may be different at more prestigious places) is that the math used in them is well below the math that is "prerequisite" to take the courses, and the courses thus teach little that one can't learn in high school physics; they throw more equations at you, big deal, ooh don't forget that big scary integral sign... and to anyone who knows the basic rules of calculus, it's intuitive, for example, that momentum is the derivative of kinetic energy with respect to velocity, work is force integrated over a distance, etc., and I was never tested on that... seriously, why bother to teach physics until one knows higher mathematics so you can teach it at a higher level? First year physics is nothing more than basic algebra in disguise and I can already do basic differential equations in my sleep...
As for my passion... I could care less about lab assignments that one can find the answers to in a textbook. I HATED labs as a matter of fact, though I got an A in the lecture I only got a C in the lab, I would cry and get frustrated unless I had a coffee to numb me up emotionally. Plus my teammates were always cliquey jerks that tended to exclude me from working with them. I tried to discuss N-body dynamics with the lab assistant but the teacher just wanted me to work on the damn assignment even though I clearly wasn't wanted or needed.
I like solving problems that nobody has solved yet, and brainstorming theories and inventions and being creative about it. I think I like solving problems in general, seeing that I have an addiction to online chess (even though I'm quite terrible at it but I don't let that deter me, I AM getting better), and I tend to get sucked into stuff such as sudoku puzzles, I sometimes do the really hard ones in less than an hour and without even writing clues in the squares, I just figured out my own little tricks to narrowing down options and such.
I don't have a problem understanding anything if I concentrate well enough. What I do is read through where they're working out the problem and do the steps in my head as I do and if something doesn't add up for me I'll be stuck over it until I figure it out (and it quite often will be something that you aren't even required to understand... for instance I kept on trying to figure out how they solved that problem with the e^-x^2 and then I looked it up and found out about the error function, how there is no simple way to solve it and what it sums up to over an infinite interval.
So yes I understand everything very quickly, it's all a matter of reading it and not getting distracted if I'm stuck over one small detail even though it might be the key to truly understanding it instead of memorizing it to the degree that you'll recognize it on the test and solve it... I think that much of school is just psychology, as in, the problem might be something you are completely familiar with but if it's worded wrong, and/or if you're in the wrong state of mind, a failure complex might express itself... I never had test anxiety before. NEVER. Then last year I break down crying in the middle of a test being too dumb to solve the simplest problems that somebody probably showed me how to do before (it tends to stick better if I just solve it myself, but if they word it in a ridiculous way then you will need to have it explained...)

 

[Nano-Passion]

Yes, I checked, and even if I lied to them and said I didn't have any credits (and I'd have an easy enough time of that, seeing how long it took for my transcripts to come in) they would find out when they process my financial aid application (which I can't file anyway, since my foster-sorry, ADOPTIVE parent is required to sign it, and the appeals process is a ridiculous pain to go through and even if I got through it which is unlikely considering all the references are on the other side of the country, they would probably pull some other rule out of their *** for why I cannot be independent on the FAFSA)
And I am studying PDE's because it's part of the maths one needs to know to study physics. I already know enough about calculus and ODE's and linear algebra to get at least a C in those classes, very likely better, I find I understand it better if I study the more advanced stuff that it's applied to. What I find about most physics classes (at least at my schools, it may be different at more prestigious places) is that the math used in them is well below the math that is "prerequisite" to take the courses, and the courses thus teach little that one can't learn in high school physics; they throw more equations at you, big deal, ooh don't forget that big scary integral sign... and to anyone who knows the basic rules of calculus, it's intuitive, for example, that momentum is the derivative of kinetic energy with respect to velocity, work is force integrated over a distance, etc., and I was never tested on that... seriously, why bother to teach physics until one knows higher mathematics so you can teach it at a higher level? First year physics is nothing more than basic algebra in disguise and I can already do basic differential equations in my sleep...
As for my passion... I could care less about lab assignments that one can find the answers to in a textbook. I HATED labs as a matter of fact, though I got an A in the lecture I only got a C in the lab, I would cry and get frustrated unless I had a coffee to numb me up emotionally. Plus my teammates were always cliquey jerks that tended to exclude me from working with them. I tried to discuss N-body dynamics with the lab assistant but the teacher just wanted me to work on the damn assignment even though I clearly wasn't wanted or needed.
I like solving problems that nobody has solved yet, and brainstorming theories and inventions and being creative about it. I think I like solving problems in general, seeing that I have an addiction to online chess (even though I'm quite terrible at it but I don't let that deter me, I AM getting better), and I tend to get sucked into stuff such as sudoku puzzles, I sometimes do the really hard ones in less than an hour and without even writing clues in the squares, I just figured out my own little tricks to narrowing down options and such.
I don't have a problem understanding anything if I concentrate well enough. What I do is read through where they're working out the problem and do the steps in my head as I do and if something doesn't add up for me I'll be stuck over it until I figure it out (and it quite often will be something that you aren't even required to understand... for instance I kept on trying to figure out how they solved that problem with the e^-x^2 and then I looked it up and found out about the error function, how there is no simple way to solve it and what it sums up to over an infinite interval.
So yes I understand everything very quickly, it's all a matter of reading it and not getting distracted if I'm stuck over one small detail even though it might be the key to truly understanding it instead of memorizing it to the degree that you'll recognize it on the test and solve it... I think that much of school is just psychology, as in, the problem might be something you are completely familiar with but if it's worded wrong, and/or if you're in the wrong state of mind, a failure complex might express itself... I never had test anxiety before. NEVER. Then last year I break down crying in the middle of a test being too dumb to solve the simplest problems that somebody probably showed me how to do before (it tends to stick better if I just solve it myself, but if they word it in a ridiculous way then you will need to have it explained...)

Please separate your paragraphs with a couple of 'enters' -- much easier on the eye.

It doesn't seem as if your really enjoying PDEs. If you really enjoy it you should be able to "hyperfocus" a bit more than 1 hour.

There is something I disagree with you here. I don't think studying higher level mathematics at this point is what will be optimal. Reason being is because your going to learn these things anyways and in context. Differential equations are relatively boring -- they feel like cook books. You do this and you get that. Sure studying PDE will make you better at solving PDEs, but what then? There is so much more to physics and mathematics to solving PDEs.

Reason I am saying this is because you don't sound too strong for your foundations. You said you know enough about LA, DE, and Calc to get a C. This is not the goal for a physics major. Those are the bread and butter and you should master them. LA is particularly very important for physics itself and a C does not merit a good understanding.

I have studied some DE, it was fun for a while but it didn't help too much. One thing I have noticed is that there is a self similarity between most of your classes in physics and math. Whatever class you are in you always need good problem solving skills. What I like to do is (when I have the time at least) do the tougher problems and proofs. This doesn't apply to all of classes of course. Usually for Linear Algebra and Calculus, some of the last problems in the section are the ones that will help you the most in later classes.

However, you are entitled to do whatever you want. You can do it out of interest but I am not sure it is what is most efficient. It would be efficient if you are very comfortable with problem solving, but seeing how you said that you would get a C in these three classes I think you should reconsider.

If you are very unmotivated with tackling the tougher problems in LA and calculus, then I suggest you pick up some LA while you are studying PDEs and learn some Quantum Mechanics -- it can be quite fun. One other thing you can do is learn the mathematics for differential geometry and study general relativity.

Best of luck!

 

[CosmicKitten]

I probably WOULD get an A if I just memorized a bunch of terms and equationssuch...
I already studied linear algebra and quantum mechanics. I was able to concentrate on that really well for some reason, and I read like more than half the book just sitting on the bus for an hour or so getting to my tutoring appointments, even though I had checked out the book quite a few times before and yet was unable to concentrate well enough to get past the first chapter, mainly because the internet is too damn distracting which is why I don't study often on MIT open course ware and why I leave the house so often... and yet I can't concentrate when I'm out because I've got to worry about catching the bus home or eventually going home sometime and just having pragmatic chores on my mind totally disrupts my concentration and sends me into a state of idle ADHD thoughts.
I think the period of super good concentration was because I had just gotten on Zoloft? But eventually that weird effect went away and I got to being too lazy to pick up a book or even shower and it didn't kill my "depression" but rather masked it but when it came out it was maybe worse than before? So I told the doc and suggested I just try Adderall to make me too busy concentrating to feel depressed.
I am really good with matrixes, and like I said if I study the harder stuff I will understand the easier stuff better. Oddly I just understand it better if they present the full details behind it. Actually I understand it better period if I just don't have to sit through a lecture. My mind is so much clearer since leaving college...
I was reading Schaum's guide to tensor calculus to help me with general relativity but like I said Schaum's aren't very ADHD friendly. Another thing is if I understand the material (and like I said, I usually understand it right away) I will be unmotivated to go through it to make sure I memorize the equations and procedures and can do the problems without making lots of errors. I just go through the problems in my head to make sure I understand how to go through the procedures instead of doing them most of the time, which I'm afraid is going to bite me in the *** someday but I was always frustrated with math that even if it was simple had a lot of steps where errors could easily be made, I never really got the hand of long division I just did the problems my own, slightly longer brute-forcey but easier to understand and thus less prone to errors kind of way. Now if one goes through the procedures in their head then it makes it easier to understand than if they just write them down and confuse themselves by putting it in their faulty motor memory... I think... well all I can say is the reason why I became so good at mental math is because I was always too lazy to pick up a pencil!
And I tend to understand it better if it's been in my head for a long time, unlike other people who can't remember anything from their classes they took years ago... I suspect because they put all the emphasis on rote memorization instead of understanding it?

 

[Nano-Passion]

I probably WOULD get an A if I just memorized a bunch of terms and equationssuch...
I already studied linear algebra and quantum mechanics. I was able to concentrate on that really well for some reason, and I read like more than half the book just sitting on the bus for an hour or so getting to my tutoring appointments, even though I had checked out the book quite a few times before and yet was unable to concentrate well enough to get past the first chapter, mainly because the internet is too damn distracting which is why I don't study often on MIT open course ware and why I leave the house so often... and yet I can't concentrate when I'm out because I've got to worry about catching the bus home or eventually going home sometime and just having pragmatic chores on my mind totally disrupts my concentration and sends me into a state of idle ADHD thoughts.
I think the period of super good concentration was because I had just gotten on Zoloft? But eventually that weird effect went away and I got to being too lazy to pick up a book or even shower and it didn't kill my "depression" but rather masked it but when it came out it was maybe worse than before? So I told the doc and suggested I just try Adderall to make me too busy concentrating to feel depressed.
I am really good with matrixes, and like I said if I study the harder stuff I will understand the easier stuff better. Oddly I just understand it better if they present the full details behind it. Actually I understand it better period if I just don't have to sit through a lecture. My mind is so much clearer since leaving college...
I was reading Schaum's guide to tensor calculus to help me with general relativity but like I said Schaum's aren't very ADHD friendly. Another thing is if I understand the material (and like I said, I usually understand it right away) I will be unmotivated to go through it to make sure I memorize the equations and procedures and can do the problems without making lots of errors. I just go through the problems in my head to make sure I understand how to go through the procedures instead of doing them most of the time, which I'm afraid is going to bite me in the *** someday but I was always frustrated with math that even if it was simple had a lot of steps where errors could easily be made, I never really got the hand of long division I just did the problems my own, slightly longer brute-forcey but easier to understand and thus less prone to errors kind of way. Now if one goes through the procedures in their head then it makes it easier to understand than if they just write them down and confuse themselves by putting it in their faulty motor memory... I think... well all I can say is the reason why I became so good at mental math is because I was always too lazy to pick up a pencil!
And I tend to understand it better if it's been in my head for a long time, unlike other people who can't remember anything from their classes they took years ago... I suspect because they put all the emphasis on rote memorization instead of understanding it?

Okay good, sounds like your doing pretty good then. Study what you think is interesting at this point, don't force yourself onto anything because that is what will make it so hard to focus. Do it purely out of interest. You can leave the subjects that you don't like for when school starts -- a bit of external motivation will kick in.

It sounds like you read quantum mechanics but didn't do the problems? Correct me if I'm mistaken.

 

[CosmicKitten]

I did some of the problems on paper, but I like to do them in my head first to make sure I solidly understand the procedures. Doing them on paper first without being given time to think it through I think is what has caused me so many errors in the past. In high school I always got low A's and A minuses in math because of that, and once a semester I got a C on a test but it was generally dropped. Oftentimes I won't really understand the problem then, just have a working knowledge of how to work it out with maybe a few errors, and some stuff I wouldn't understand at all... I never studied, see. I only listened to the teacher. That was a mistake... but then maybe a year or more later I would find that I just suddenly know how to do that stuff I didn't understand before.
During my junior year I studied all the science I could but it was all layperson's science, see they didn't have any calculus based physics books at the school library, and very few calculus books period. Same my senior year... I once checked out a quantum mechanics book over the interlibrary loan system, but it was too advanced and I didn't understand it... might understand it now though.
When I was 19 or so my foster parent let me check some books out from the public library -- I checked out a book on nuclear physics, a book on vector calculus, and a book on molecular spectroscopy. I understood them all very well, especially the vector calculus book where I learned a lot of linear algebra, multivariable calculus and even some differential equations, and from the other two I learned some quantum mechanics. I only had the books for two weeks though (mind you I had nothing else to do at the time, nothing else on my mind, my room was bare except for the television and I was to stay in there all day except when I was forced to go in the backyard for "fresh air"... oh yeah and I was hungry all the time, and had a very poor diet of cornflakes for breakfast and mosty noodles for dinner and if I was lucky I would get lunch, usually a white bread peanut butter sandwich and chips...) and I was able to concentrate very well but then when it came time to take them back I was told not to check out any more math books and I had to check out some garbagety young adult fiction instead. These days I usually prefer writing fiction to reading it...
But when I left and was free to resume my studies it all came back to me very well. I don't trust that I will ever get into a proper school though... so I feel that I must bear the full responsibility of my education. Plus how is one meant to learn anything whilst being lectured? It puts one in the wrong brainwave state to solve problems...

 

[Nano-Passion]

I did some of the problems on paper, but I like to do them in my head first to make sure I solidly understand the procedures. Doing them on paper first without being given time to think it through I think is what has caused me so many errors in the past. In high school I always got low A's and A minuses in math because of that, and once a semester I got a C on a test but it was generally dropped. Oftentimes I won't really understand the problem then, just have a working knowledge of how to work it out with maybe a few errors, and some stuff I wouldn't understand at all... I never studied, see. I only listened to the teacher. That was a mistake... but then maybe a year or more later I would find that I just suddenly know how to do that stuff I didn't understand before.
During my junior year I studied all the science I could but it was all layperson's science, see they didn't have any calculus based physics books at the school library, and very few calculus books period. Same my senior year... I once checked out a quantum mechanics book over the interlibrary loan system, but it was too advanced and I didn't understand it... might understand it now though.
When I was 19 or so my foster parent let me check some books out from the public library -- I checked out a book on nuclear physics, a book on vector calculus, and a book on molecular spectroscopy. I understood them all very well, especially the vector calculus book where I learned a lot of linear algebra, multivariable calculus and even some differential equations, and from the other two I learned some quantum mechanics. I only had the books for two weeks though (mind you I had nothing else to do at the time, nothing else on my mind, my room was bare except for the television and I was to stay in there all day except when I was forced to go in the backyard for "fresh air"... oh yeah and I was hungry all the time, and had a very poor diet of cornflakes for breakfast and mosty noodles for dinner and if I was lucky I would get lunch, usually a white bread peanut butter sandwich and chips...) and I was able to concentrate very well but then when it came time to take them back I was told not to check out any more math books and I had to check out some garbagety young adult fiction instead. These days I usually prefer writing fiction to reading it...
But when I left and was free to resume my studies it all came back to me very well. I don't trust that I will ever get into a proper school though... so I feel that I must bear the full responsibility of my education. Plus how is one meant to learn anything whilst being lectured? It puts one in the wrong brainwave state to solve problems...

Wow, I really despise your foster parents by the way. Make sure you get good nutrition from now on, what do you think your brain runs on? You can run your motor on good oil and renew it regularly or you can run on dirty oil, its a choice that each individual has to make.

At any rate, I don't like lectures either. I think they are quite stupid. In all of my classes the professors are just repeating what is in the book. What the heck I can read the book myself? Its so stupid, it wastes time because the lecture goes either way too slow or too fast. When you teach yourself then you go at the perfect pace.

What lecturers should be for is to make new connections for the bigger picture. I don't want someone going over what is in the book its so stupid!

--

I was like you too, I would stare at these books for so long and I understood little to nothing. I had this graduate Quantum Mechanics book and I would sit there stubbornly trying to understand it lmao. I had no idea what knowledge was missing all of the time -- and that is what spends the most time -- when you don't know what you don't know. At the very least I loved to just look at the cool looking equations lol.

Edit: I have been off my medication for the adhd appointment coming in the next few days. I have been trying to write this lab report a experimental physics class -- such a pain in the *** without medication! Hours has passed without that much done lol, not to mention I keep ending up back here.

 

[CosmicKitten]

Well that's better than me being on Facebook all the time (my friends are all people I meet over the internet, mostly people that pretend to be video game characters on Facebook, as I do, and who befriended me over my fanfiction and videos and artwork).
Well since I went on Adderall my appetite's been low but smoked salmon is now a dietary staple of mine, and I also eat lots of sushi and frozen yogurt with fresh fruit on it and occasionally pasta with tuna in it and I drink lots of tea, mostly green tea and also valerian tea for my mood, and sometimes I go out to get coffee. I usually have a lot of acai energy drinks and canned espresso in the refrigerator because I find caffeine is good for my mood but not right now I'm afraid, I lost a bag of groceries on the trolley (Adderall hyperfocus is to blame, me dinking around on my phone) and so I'm short on food stamps this month...
And I'm also working on MS Paint art projects, I'm designing fairies to personify the chemical elements. So far I did a bit of work on Lithium and Magnesium and have tons of ideas for many of the others (I plan on eventually doing all 100+ of the known elements)... and yes I can paint super realistic stuff with my pinkie on the fingerpad. I'm also working on a picture of my cat...
Usually I am good at seeing the big picture for myself. Also in my experience they cover stuff that's not in the book and then expect you to rotely memorize it for the test. Just working out some problem that is a bit beyond the level of the class so unless you study way beyond the class you cannot figure it out in the time you get to take the test. I could have gotten extra time to take the test and correct ADHD errors but it seems unfair because I get a higher grade than the other students even with all the errors, plus all the paperwork one has to go through to get that done is enough of a deterrent when you have ADHD.
I would sit with a book and my thoughts would wander to anything and everything else. If I would concentrate on the book I would usually understand it or at least understand why I don't understand it but I'm afraid I've always had a problem with skimming while my mind is on something else, is probably why I did poorly on quizzes for literature in English class (rather than test you on your general understanding of the themes of the story, they quizzed me on trivial details and though I got an A overall in the class -- largely due to an inordinate amount of extra credit I earned from skimming Wuthering Heights for vocab words, a large part of 12th grade English was memorizing vocab -- but I got F's on the quizzes although my class mates got A's... they probably reread the modern English version of the story on SparkNotes, I noticed I got A's on the quizzes after I tried that -- but I mean, really? The kinds of questions they asked... I swear, if the color of Hamlet's underwear turned up in the story, it would be a question on that quiz).
I procrastinated SO BAD on my lab report, I had a hearing with the teacher to discuss my report, just like the other students, but I'm afraid I had no report to discuss during that hearing, I just asked some questions to become more clear on what he wanted... I think I did well on it though? I don't know if it was that or the final or both I did badly on, all I know is that I got a C in the class and I NEVER get C's... now if it were a report on an experiment that I designed myself to test my own discoveries, something I took pride in, then I would gladly learn how to do the lab report and all.
I noticed that though my mind cleared up with better diet my mood got worse... I imagine not eating enough causes the neurotransmitter levels to drop, which sort of causes the same effects as antipsychotic medication -- I was on Risperdal as a child but the foster parent took me off, either to make her look like a good foster parent who doesn't want the kids drugged or because she didn't want to bother with the hassle of taking us to the shrink and risking us telling the shrink about her evil ways, or because she didn't like it making me wake up at night and just stand there like a zombie, or because just restricting our food intake and making up BS excuses that we have Prader-Willi syndrome as an excuse was a better way to control our behavior...

 

[Nano-Passion]

Well that's better than me being on Facebook all the time (my friends are all people I meet over the internet, mostly people that pretend to be video game characters on Facebook, as I do, and who befriended me over my fanfiction and videos and artwork).
Well since I went on Adderall my appetite's been low but smoked salmon is now a dietary staple of mine, and I also eat lots of sushi and frozen yogurt with fresh fruit on it and occasionally pasta with tuna in it and I drink lots of tea, mostly green tea and also valerian tea for my mood, and sometimes I go out to get coffee. I usually have a lot of acai energy drinks and canned espresso in the refrigerator because I find caffeine is good for my mood but not right now I'm afraid, I lost a bag of groceries on the trolley (Adderall hyperfocus is to blame, me dinking around on my phone) and so I'm short on food stamps this month...
And I'm also working on MS Paint art projects, I'm designing fairies to personify the chemical elements. So far I did a bit of work on Lithium and Magnesium and have tons of ideas for many of the others (I plan on eventually doing all 100+ of the known elements)... and yes I can paint super realistic stuff with my pinkie on the fingerpad. I'm also working on a picture of my cat...
Usually I am good at seeing the big picture for myself. Also in my experience they cover stuff that's not in the book and then expect you to rotely memorize it for the test. Just working out some problem that is a bit beyond the level of the class so unless you study way beyond the class you cannot figure it out in the time you get to take the test. I could have gotten extra time to take the test and correct ADHD errors but it seems unfair because I get a higher grade than the other students even with all the errors, plus all the paperwork one has to go through to get that done is enough of a deterrent when you have ADHD.
I would sit with a book and my thoughts would wander to anything and everything else. If I would concentrate on the book I would usually understand it or at least understand why I don't understand it but I'm afraid I've always had a problem with skimming while my mind is on something else, is probably why I did poorly on quizzes for literature in English class (rather than test you on your general understanding of the themes of the story, they quizzed me on trivial details and though I got an A overall in the class -- largely due to an inordinate amount of extra credit I earned from skimming Wuthering Heights for vocab words, a large part of 12th grade English was memorizing vocab -- but I got F's on the quizzes although my class mates got A's... they probably reread the modern English version of the story on SparkNotes, I noticed I got A's on the quizzes after I tried that -- but I mean, really? The kinds of questions they asked... I swear, if the color of Hamlet's underwear turned up in the story, it would be a question on that quiz).
I procrastinated SO BAD on my lab report, I had a hearing with the teacher to discuss my report, just like the other students, but I'm afraid I had no report to discuss during that hearing, I just asked some questions to become more clear on what he wanted... I think I did well on it though? I don't know if it was that or the final or both I did badly on, all I know is that I got a C in the class and I NEVER get C's... now if it were a report on an experiment that I designed myself to test my own discoveries, something I took pride in, then I would gladly learn how to do the lab report and all.
I noticed that though my mind cleared up with better diet my mood got worse... I imagine not eating enough causes the neurotransmitter levels to drop, which sort of causes the same effects as antipsychotic medication -- I was on Risperdal as a child but the foster parent took me off, either to make her look like a good foster parent who doesn't want the kids drugged or because she didn't want to bother with the hassle of taking us to the shrink and risking us telling the shrink about her evil ways, or because she didn't like it making me wake up at night and just stand there like a zombie, or because just restricting our food intake and making up BS excuses that we have Prader-Willi syndrome as an excuse was a better way to control our behavior...

Sounds like your eating healthy, one important thing is the nutrients and minerals that you are taking in. People tend to overlook that actually.

"I noticed that though my mind cleared up with better diet my mood got worse.."

Your mood got worse when you cleaned up your diet? Your mood is a byproduct of a lot of factors and I can't name a lot of them. But I'm sure eating good food won't lessen your mood. Maybe you just weren't eating food that you found appealing.

 

[Evo]

Cosmic, please space between paragraphs. Also, Academic Guidance isn't for general chichat, please limit discussion here to strictly questions about school.

Thank you.

 

[CosmicKitten]

It's because when I started eating healthier I was making more of the neurotransmitters, and not being used to all those neurotransmitters, I got symptoms of mood disorder and my ADHD got worse. And I only eat food that I find appealing, which for me right now is the healthy stuff I mentioned. The mood swings clear up with the valerian however.

And I DO space between paragraphs... well I press enter anyway, what do I have to do double space?

It appears I picked the wrong forum to discuss in... can we move it somewhere else before the moderators ban me? My cat got banned from the forums on Chess.com because he... threatened to bite others I guess?

 

[Nano-Passion]

It's because when I started eating healthier I was making more of the neurotransmitters, and not being used to all those neurotransmitters, I got symptoms of mood disorder and my ADHD got worse. And I only eat food that I find appealing, which for me right now is the healthy stuff I mentioned. The mood swings clear up with the valerian however.

And I DO space between paragraphs... well I press enter anyway, what do I have to do double space?

It appears I picked the wrong forum to discuss in... can we move it somewhere else before the moderators ban me? My cat got banned from the forums on Chess.com because he... threatened to bite others I guess?

Generally what we mean is to press double enter, not enter once.

Like this.

"It appears I picked the wrong forum to discuss in... can we move it somewhere else before the moderators ban me? My cat got banned from the forums on Chess.com because he... threatened to bite others I guess?"

Loll.. they won't ban you, you can always give me a message to chat. Or if you would like to create a topic just for discussion of random things then there is an appropriate forum for that around here. In this forum topics should be more or less about academic guidance -- hence the name of the forum.

 

[micromass]

I've moved this to General Discussion.

 

[CosmicKitten]

Cool, thank you ^^

And I told my cat he can has a new account on his birthday this month... that is if he is willing to learn to speak proper English and behave instead of acting and talking like a retarded LOLCAT (he's not the only cat on that website you know...)
His name on that site is WeisseSchachlade2109 by the way...

So does anybody have any thoughts on nuclear fusion... say, sparked by cosmic rays? Perhaps the error in the original cold fusion experiment was a stray proton that hit the hydrogen in the palladium? Perhaps the crystal network of palladium hydride... would it be possible to make a FUSION chain reaction? How would it work if it were supercooled?

I have also been thinking about the N-body problem... I am probably very ignorant here... perhaps if, instead of tracking the motion of the bodies themselves, we tracked the motion of the centers of mass? Now I know that such a system has only ONE center of mass, but say we viewed it as each body having the force at anyone instant pulling it in a different direction... the lines along these directions of force for each body don't all intersect at the same point if the bodies have different masses, do they?

Or never mind that... let's say there is for each body there is an equation of motion, that is a function of the initial positions, velocities, forces, etc. of each of the other bodies, and we can regard it as a virtual particle that the corresponding body is gravitationally drawn toward but that isn't gravitationally drawn toward said body itself, it would be some sort of tractrix equation?
And perhaps one would have to invent new laws of motion to describe the movement of these "virtual particles", one for each body, such that each body's motion can be traced as just a function of following that particle around and it will come out the same as if you worked out the physics through repeated Euler method and such to find out where each of the particles would wind up (I actually stumbled upon the Euler method while thinking of how this would work, without having studied it before; I was studying differential equations instead of the lower classes I was taking at the community college and I paid for it afterward) and well... maybe a generalized solution for the N-body problem in such a way? And it would require some laws that explain how the virtual particles move in relation to each other... maybe they would sort of fall down toward each other... sorry if this makes no sense...

 

[FalseVaccum89]

I just tended to not do a lot of homework. I got good grades in classes for which I possessed a sizable interest (science, math, politics), and not so good grades in classes for which I didn't (SPANISH, christian family values, world cultures etc.).

Anyways, sounds like you're a similar type of person. You didn't get fantastic grades in high school because you had a hard time focusing, but you had excellent test scores (it's because of my SAT scores that I got into a great college). So my question is: to which schools did you apply initially? I can gurantee that a 34 ACT can get you into a top 100 school like that. That is an excellent score, so I'm wondering why you went to community college, especially given the fact that people with learning disorders tend to DESPISE community colleges. The strucuture of CCs is terribly constructed for the needs of kids with ADD which is why I wasn't surprised at all when you said that you hated it.

Wow, this is remarkably similar to my experience in school! Especially high school.

 

[CosmicKitten]

Wow, this is remarkably similar to my experience in school! Especially high school.

Oh is it? What kind of school did you wind up going to? I am going to try extension courses at the local university. I will have to take out a personal loan to pay for them though because you cannot get financial aid... That's the payoff for loopholing out of their stupid 60 credits transfer committment.

I looked at some graduate level chemistry assignments on MIT open courseware and they look challenging but doable for me, provided I have the textbook to clarify what the terminology is. I would probably only be competent so far at upper division undergrad physics and math though. Chemistry is oddly easier for me than math or even physics...

 

[FalseVaccum89]

Oh is it? What kind of school did you wind up going to? I am going to try extension courses at the local university. I will have to take out a personal loan to pay for them though because you cannot get financial aid... That's the payoff for loopholing out of their stupid 60 credits transfer committment.

I looked at some graduate level chemistry assignments on MIT open courseware and they look challenging but doable for me, provided I have the textbook to clarify what the terminology is. I would probably only be competent so far at upper division undergrad physics and math though. Chemistry is oddly easier for me than math or even physics...

Right now, I'm going to a local community/tech college for a A.S. transfer degree. I did try going to a university in Utah a couple of years back, but that was a disaster. However, I've got my feet under me this time and am doing well (as in probably-gonna-get-straight-A's-this-semester good).

 

[CosmicKitten]

Right now, I'm going to a local community/tech college for a A.S. transfer degree. I did try going to a university in Utah a couple of years back, but that was a disaster. However, I've got my feet under me this time and am doing well (as in probably-gonna-get-straight-A's-this-semester good).

Oh so in your case the four year wasn't your style? I had an easier time there actually, but I still hated it because it was too small and easy. The community college on the other hand was so easy it was hard, as in hard to pay attention. They put too much emphasis on homework which for some reason overdrives my short term memory and shuts off my long term memory, and so I was in danger of getting straight B's. That is not good enough to transfer, especially when my transcripts came too late and I couldn't get a transfer admission guarantee... I really don't know how I went wrong, all I know is I flipped out and left under mutual agreement, and U have BJ intentions of giving them a second chance.

Lower division courses are no better than high school courses. The entire institution in fact operates under the assumption that everyone forgets everything they learned in high school. Not so for I, given my fantastic long term memory, so I intend in skipping out of such courses if possible.

I am curious, how was the four year school disastrous for you? Maybe a better four year uni would be more your style?

 

[FalseVaccum89]

Oh so in your case the four year wasn't your style? I had an easier time there actually, but I still hated it because it was too small and easy. The community college on the other hand was so easy it was hard, as in hard to pay attention. They put too much emphasis on homework which for some reason overdrives my short term memory and shuts off my long term memory, and so I was in danger of getting straight B's. That is not good enough to transfer, especially when my transcripts came too late and I couldn't get a transfer admission guarantee... I really don't know how I went wrong, all I know is I flipped out and left under mutual agreement, and U have BJ intentions of giving them a second chance.

Lower division courses are no better than high school courses. The entire institution in fact operates under the assumption that everyone forgets everything they learned in high school. Not so for I, given my fantastic long term memory, so I intend in skipping out of such courses if possible.

I am curious, how was the four year school disastrous for you? Maybe a better four year uni would be more your style?

Yeah, well I just found out I have Asperger's with a possible side of Manic Depression. I've been on meds now for a few months for anxiety and mood swings. Back in 2010, I had no help at all for these things. So, it wasn't so much the school itself as it was me. Actually, Weber State is a great school. It's a "teaching university", i.e. it's focus is on teaching the undergraduates and not research, and they take it seriously.

But yeah, the CC level is generally boooooring. I have a math prof who likes to intersperse a bit of higher mathematics in at times, and this helps. And my English prof is just crazy; she's a hoot to listen to. I don't have to try to pay attention in my English class at all. Plus, that class is super easy, because I've had a measured college reading level since the sixth grade. :P

I've found that the only way I can pay attention to math is to do math. I don't want to sit around all day hearing about it, but that's just me. In physics, I'm pretty much the opposite. I love to think about the concepts and then do the associated math.

 

[CosmicKitten]

Yeah, well I just found out I have Asperger's with a possible side of Manic Depression. I've been on meds now for a few months for anxiety and mood swings. Back in 2010, I had no help at all for these things. So, it wasn't so much the school itself as it was me. Actually, Weber State is a great school. It's a "teaching university", i.e. it's focus is on teaching the undergraduates and not research, and they take it seriously.

But yeah, the CC level is generally boooooring. I have a math prof who likes to intersperse a bit of higher mathematics in at times, and this helps. And my English prof is just crazy; she's a hoot to listen to. I don't have to try to pay attention in my English class at all. Plus, that class is super easy, because I've had a measured college reading level since the sixth grade. :P

I've found that the only way I can pay attention to math is to do math. I don't want to sit around all day hearing about it, but that's just me. In physics, I'm pretty much the opposite. I love to think about the concepts and then do the associated math.

Oh well I've been diagnosed with Aspergers since I was eight years old, and ADHD for longer, and lately I've been exhibiting manic depressive symptoms myself (my mom is actually bipolar). I was unmedicated for many years though, again if you read back what I wrote about the cruel foster parent...

Since my little trip to the nuthouse I've been put on Wellbutrin, which helped at first but not much... And then I switched to Zoloft, which made me too calm and lazy and unable to feel a caffeine high and fake happy but still sometimes very depressed. And for a month I was also on Strattera but that was a nightmare, it not only made my ADHD worse but gave me unpredictable super rapid mood swings. I had strange unfamiliar emotions and thoughts and felt tense and anxious and confused most of the time... Then the side effects went away... And came back.

So now I am only on very small dose Adderall. I was on it as a kid, and did quite well on it, but they took me off because I refused to take the larger dose, it made me feel funny. 5 mg even today lasts all day for me. It actually does little if anything to help my focus (it makes me even more creative and hyper in the head I'm afraid!) But it makes my mood stable, I actually feel less depressed, and I feel more motivated to study and enjoy it more. Even though three quarters of the time I'm not studying so much as fighting my wandering thoughts, however relevant to the material they might be.

Yeah so you don't like lectures for math either? I really don't get that. How are you supposed to think with their yapping? I just need to solve the problems in my head (because I'm too lazy to use a calculator) while reading the book and I'm good. I'm studying PDE's now and I was I'm calc II back at the C.C. The teacher I had had a rep for being a tough grader; I think he flunked as many students as possible on purpose just so they would withdraw and he would have less work to grade.

Yes my school had very limited support services and I lost the documentation that showed I was disabled so they made the accommodations too late. What I REALLY needed was to be excused from the stupidass lectures. Oh and I had to be high on coffee just to tolerate a lab. I hate labs. I would cry for no reason during lab time.

English class, I had a college reading level at least since 8th grade, and a sixth grade reading level in kindergarten. I wasn't good at math until high school though. I don't know why they make us put up with such crap while special little rich children thy can't even spell get all the AP credit -_-

 

[Nano-Passion]

Oh well I've been diagnosed with Aspergers since I was eight years old, and ADHD for longer, and lately I've been exhibiting manic depressive symptoms myself (my mom is actually bipolar). I was unmedicated for many years though, again if you read back what I wrote about the cruel foster parent...

Since my little trip to the nuthouse I've been put on Wellbutrin, which helped at first but not much... And then I switched to Zoloft, which made me too calm and lazy and unable to feel a caffeine high and fake happy but still sometimes very depressed. And for a month I was also on Strattera but that was a nightmare, it not only made my ADHD worse but gave me unpredictable super rapid mood swings. I had strange unfamiliar emotions and thoughts and felt tense and anxious and confused most of the time... Then the side effects went away... And came back.

So now I am only on very small dose Adderall. I was on it as a kid, and did quite well on it, but they took me off because I refused to take the larger dose, it made me feel funny. 5 mg even today lasts all day for me. It actually does little if anything to help my focus (it makes me even more creative and hyper in the head I'm afraid!) But it makes my mood stable, I actually feel less depressed, and I feel more motivated to study and enjoy it more. Even though three quarters of the time I'm not studying so much as fighting my wandering thoughts, however relevant to the material they might be.

Yeah so you don't like lectures for math either? I really don't get that. How are you supposed to think with their yapping? I just need to solve the problems in my head (because I'm too lazy to use a calculator) while reading the book and I'm good. I'm studying PDE's now and I was I'm calc II back at the C.C. The teacher I had had a rep for being a tough grader; I think he flunked as many students as possible on purpose just so they would withdraw and he would have less work to grade.

Yes my school had very limited support services and I lost the documentation that showed I was disabled so they made the accommodations too late. What I REALLY needed was to be excused from the stupidass lectures. Oh and I had to be high on coffee just to tolerate a lab. I hate labs. I would cry for no reason during lab time.

English class, I had a college reading level at least since 8th grade, and a sixth grade reading level in kindergarten. I wasn't good at math until high school though. I don't know why they make us put up with such crap while special little rich children thy can't even spell get all the AP credit -_-

What are the main differences between Aspergers and ADHD?

You should ask your psychiatrist to try out Vyvanse. It's adderral's new cousin. You will get less of the hype, its quite smooth throughout the day.

 

[FalseVaccum89]

What are the main differences between Aspergers and ADHD?

You should ask your psychiatrist to try out Vyvanse. It's adderral's new cousin. You will get less of the hype, its quite smooth throughout the day.

Asperger's is a autistic-spectrum syndrome, which makes it difficult to relate to others, pick up on emotional cues, and deal with change.

 

[Nano-Passion]

Asperger's is a autistic-spectrum syndrome, which makes it difficult to relate to others, pick up on emotional cues, and deal with change.

Hmm, I see.

One of the side-effects of Asperger's may very well be success as

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_figures_sometimes_considered_autistic. It just depends on how it is used.

I have ADHD. Personally for me, its a blessing and a curse. But if I had to pick having ADHD or not then I would choose ADHD. I can imagine being an everyday citizen without it, how boring would that be! I would probably be studying to be a doctor or some other normal thing just to conform to society if I didn't have ADHD.

 

[CosmicKitten]

What are the main differences between Aspergers and ADHD?

You should ask your psychiatrist to try out Vyvanse. It's adderral's new cousin. You will get less of the hype, its quite smooth throughout the day.

Oddly, I take Adderall INSTANT release and it IS very smooth throughout the day. I don't feel a spike in activity or attention or anything. It only lasts 4 hours for some people so I wonder how it lasts so long for me... oh and if I have an off day (which the psychiatrist recommends every week so I don't develop tolerance) my mood will be poor that day and the day after, like it takes a while to build up or something. It made my mood worse when I started it, and then after a while I got used to that effect and it made my mood better, but now it's like if I skip a day I have to reset my mood again. I'll ask about splitting a pill between two days instead of just skipping one...

Vyvanse I fear will be too slow-release for me, seeing that Adderall is unusually slow for me; however, after looking up the differences in effects between levo- and dextroamphetamine I find that the levo- enantiomer is noradrenergic while the dextro- enantiomer is dopaminergic, and my experience with Strattera suggests that I don't need any more norepinephrine; indeed, the slight noradrenergic effect of Adderall might be why I react badly to a larger than small dose. Vyvanse, on the other hand, only metabolizes into dextroamphetamine so it would have more selectively dopaminergic activity on me, and with less noradrenergic activity it might actually improve my concentration (recall that Strattera made my concentration worse, much worse, which suggests that the norepinephrine is making my concentration worse) and thus I would be able to take the optimum dose for the level of dopamine I need without overdoing it on the norepinephrine. Yes the conflict of dopamine versus norepinephrine activity would explain why I report that Adderall makes my concentration better and worse at the same time.

However, the slow action effect of Vyvanse makes me reconsider... either dissolve it in something that hydrolyzes the amphetamine from the lysine, or just get a prescription for Dexedrine instead... I am very curious as to what is so different/unique about my physiology that the Adderall has that kind of long slow effect on me? As a matter of fact I think my concentration is better in the evening though I take it in the morning.

 

[Evo]

Since this theread is about mental issues, I have moved it.

 

[Nano-Passion]

Oddly, I take Adderall INSTANT release and it IS very smooth throughout the day. I don't feel a spike in activity or attention or anything. It only lasts 4 hours for some people so I wonder how it lasts so long for me... oh and if I have an off day (which the psychiatrist recommends every week so I don't develop tolerance) my mood will be poor that day and the day after, like it takes a while to build up or something. It made my mood worse when I started it, and then after a while I got used to that effect and it made my mood better, but now it's like if I skip a day I have to reset my mood again. I'll ask about splitting a pill between two days instead of just skipping one...

Vyvanse I fear will be too slow-release for me, seeing that Adderall is unusually slow for me; however, after looking up the differences in effects between levo- and dextroamphetamine I find that the levo- enantiomer is noradrenergic while the dextro- enantiomer is dopaminergic, and my experience with Strattera suggests that I don't need any more norepinephrine; indeed, the slight noradrenergic effect of Adderall might be why I react badly to a larger than small dose. Vyvanse, on the other hand, only metabolizes into dextroamphetamine so it would have more selectively dopaminergic activity on me, and with less noradrenergic activity it might actually improve my concentration (recall that Strattera made my concentration worse, much worse, which suggests that the norepinephrine is making my concentration worse) and thus I would be able to take the optimum dose for the level of dopamine I need without overdoing it on the norepinephrine. Yes the conflict of dopamine versus norepinephrine activity would explain why I report that Adderall makes my concentration better and worse at the same time.

However, the slow action effect of Vyvanse makes me reconsider... either dissolve it in something that hydrolyzes the amphetamine from the lysine, or just get a prescription for Dexedrine instead... I am very curious as to what is so different/unique about my physiology that the Adderall has that kind of long slow effect on me? As a matter of fact I think my concentration is better in the evening though I take it in the morning.

What slow action effect of Vyvanse are you worried about exactly? Do you mean that it doesn't feel as intense as Adderall IR or because it can last up to 14 hours, which by the way is not a bad thing! Taken at the proper dosage, you should get similar affects to Adderall (minus the intense feeling) while it lasts much much longer.

Vyvanse isn't weak, see the reviewshttp://www.drugs.com/comments/lisdexamfetamine/vyvanse-for-attention-deficit-disorder.html.

either dissolve it in something that hydrolyzes the amphetamine from the lysine, or just get a prescription for Dexedrine instead

Why would you want to do that? So that it effects you faster? Vyvanse should take you somewhere between 1 to 2 hours to kick in. Just take it first thing in the morning before your morning meal (you'll be fine) and it will kick in before your day starts.

I am very curious as to what is so different/unique about my physiology that the Adderall has that kind of long slow effect on me? As a matter of fact I think my concentration is better in the evening though I take it in the morning

Could it be your diet? What do you eat in the morning as opposed to the afternoon? Adderall is drastically affected by your PH level, so if you have an acid breakfeast than it won't work well at all. You might be following it with a lunch that has more base than acid afterwards (before it is too late). There is an exact science behind this all but its really hard to break down because it isn't my field at all. I'll just give a quick quote from Wikipedia for the basics.

Adderall's effects are similar to other CNS stimulants of the same class and preparation. (See amphetamine for details.)

Urinary and stomach pH levels can have a strong effect on DL-amphetamine excretion and absorption.[28] An acidic stomach and GI pH will decrease the absorption of Adderall,[12] and acidic urine levels will decrease the reabsorption of the drug through the renal system.[29] Co-administration of acidic substances (e.g., citric acid) causes decreased renal reabsorption of DL-amphetamine; whereas, alkaline agents (e.g., antacids) may cause a marked increase in renal tubular reabsorption. The increased reabsorption can increase the retention of amphetamines, with potential to result in dangerously high serum levels.[29]

You should note in contrast that Vyvanse isn't plagued by the same problem as this. Which leaves it with the potential to be much more potent in comparison to someone who usually has a lower PH level. However, the reabsorption of the Lisdexamfetamine is affected by your urine PH level, and that is what dictates how long the drug will last in your system. So if you want it to last the full 14 hours than you should have a more base filled diet, for lack of better words.

 

[Nano-Passion]

I have also been thinking about the N-body problem... I am probably very ignorant here... perhaps if, instead of tracking the motion of the bodies themselves, we tracked the motion of the centers of mass? Now I know that such a system has only ONE center of mass, but say we viewed it as each body having the force at anyone instant pulling it in a different direction... the lines along these directions of force for each body don't all intersect at the same point if the bodies have different masses, do they?

Or never mind that... let's say there is for each body there is an equation of motion, that is a function of the initial positions, velocities, forces, etc. of each of the other bodies, and we can regard it as a virtual particle that the corresponding body is gravitationally drawn toward but that isn't gravitationally drawn toward said body itself, it would be some sort of tractrix equation?

And perhaps one would have to invent new laws of motion to describe the movement of these "virtual particles", one for each body, such that each body's motion can be traced as just a function of following that particle around and it will come out the same as if you worked out the physics through repeated Euler method and such to find out where each of the particles would wind up (I actually stumbled upon the Euler method while thinking of how this would work, without having studied it before; I was studying differential equations instead of the lower classes I was taking at the community college and I paid for it afterward) and well... maybe a generalized solution for the N-body problem in such a way? And it would require some laws that explain how the virtual particles move in relation to each other... maybe they would sort of fall down toward each other... sorry if this makes no sense...

I'm lost after you started referring to them as virtual particles. I'm only an undergrad studying classical mechanics so I don't have any answers but just a couple of suggestions.

Start here to get the general idea behind it http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N-body_problem . It seems that the general method for the n body problem is an approximation, not quite using Euler's method but by taylor's expansion.

For starters, go to chapter 8 "Two-Body Central-Force Problems" from Taylor's Classical Mechanics book (very good book!). Study that chapter well then try to apply whatever creative method comes to mind. At this point, words are meaningless, the math will do the talking! Your method has a very high change of being more complicated or maybe even not work at all, after all this problem has been around for centuries. But you will grow way more by being taking the wrong turns and applying your creativity than you do by just following the book.

 

[CosmicKitten]

What slow action effect of Vyvanse are you worried about exactly? Do you mean that it doesn't feel as intense as Adderall IR or because it can last up to 14 hours, which by the way is not a bad thing! Taken at the proper dosage, you should get similar affects to Adderall (minus the intense feeling) while it lasts much much longer.

Vyvanse isn't weak, see the reviewshttp://www.drugs.com/comments/lisdexamfetamine/vyvanse-for-attention-deficit-disorder.html.



Why would you want to do that? So that it effects you faster? Vyvanse should take you somewhere between 1 to 2 hours to kick in. Just take it first thing in the morning before your morning meal (you'll be fine) and it will kick in before your day starts.



Could it be your diet? What do you eat in the morning as opposed to the afternoon? Adderall is drastically affected by your PH level, so if you have an acid breakfeast than it won't work well at all. You might be following it with a lunch that has more base than acid afterwards (before it is too late). There is an exact science behind this all but its really hard to break down because it isn't my field at all. I'll just give a quick quote from Wikipedia for the basics.



You should note in contrast that Vyvanse isn't plagued by the same problem as this. Which leaves it with the potential to be much more potent in comparison to someone who usually has a lower PH level. However, the reabsorption of the Lisdexamfetamine is affected by your urine PH level, and that is what dictates how long the drug will last in your system. So if you want it to last the full 14 hours than you should have a more base filled diet, for lack of better words.

No I mean instant release Adderall lasts longer and works slower for me than extended release Adderall world for other people, so I imagine Vyvanse will take a ridiculously long time to work. A 5 mg Adderall IR lasts for me ALL DAY and in fact is not very effective unless I've been taking it for the past two days at least. I tend not to eat much in the mornings, usually just a cup of valerian tea (which is also needed to help my mood, see, it works like a mild mood stabilizer instead of putting me to sleep, in fact if I drink it before bed I stay up half the night with happy dreamy giddy thoughts.) If I do eat something its usually a smoked salmon croissant with cheese on it. The medicine has a powerful effect on my appetite, see, I dropped from 130 to 112 in two months. Other than that I eat mostly frozen yogurt with fresh fruit, sushi, cheese, chocolate, tuna pasta, and coffee because the caffeine helps my mood as well.

Like I said it improves my mood but my attention I'm not sure about, likely because of the norepinephrine.

 

[Nano-Passion]

No I mean instant release Adderall lasts longer and works slower for me than extended release Adderall world for other people, so I imagine Vyvanse will take a ridiculously long time to work. A 5 mg Adderall IR lasts for me ALL DAY and in fact is not very effective unless I've been taking it for the past two days at least. I tend not to eat much in the mornings, usually just a cup of valerian tea (which is also needed to help my mood, see, it works like a mild mood stabilizer instead of putting me to sleep, in fact if I drink it before bed I stay up half the night with happy dreamy giddy thoughts.) If I do eat something its usually a smoked salmon croissant with cheese on it. The medicine has a powerful effect on my appetite, see, I dropped from 130 to 112 in two months. Other than that I eat mostly frozen yogurt with fresh fruit, sushi, cheese, chocolate, tuna pasta, and coffee because the caffeine helps my mood as well.

Like I said it improves my mood but my attention I'm not sure about, likely because of the norepinephrine.

Adderall IR lasts longer for you probably because of your alkaline level. I expect the people your comparing it too have a low PH level.

I expect adderall IR to last about max 6 hours. How many hours does it last for you?

You say that you expect Vyvanse to take a ridiculously long time to work. What leads you to that conclusion? It should take about 1 hour on an empty stomach. Please explain your reasoning or give a citation to support your hypothesis. [ Edit: Do you mean that Vyvanse will work for a long time, not take a long time to work? ]

110 pounds is very unhealthy. What is your height if you don't mind? There are some things that will help you tremendously with your caloric intake. One thing that you can buy is a weightgainer. This is the best and cheapest one out there http://www.bodybuilding.com/store/opt/sm.html

I use weightgainers to maintain my body weight as well, as it doesn't curve your appetite too much. Just take half a scoop and 2 cups of milk a day and you should be getting about 800 calories from that. Did I mention it is quite delicious? Tastes like chocolate milk (I would recommend not to buy the strawberry or vanilla powder). You can also add a tablespoon of peanut butter to it for more calories and for a more mouthwatering drink.