ADHD meds and anxiety

Sometimes my ADHD meds give me anxiety, sometimes they don't. Does this mean they are not working? Same with caffeine although caffeine is more likely to cause anxiety than my vyvanse. Same when I take caffeine and vyvanse. Sometimes together they will cause anxiety, sometimes not. Also I take clonazepam. Is it odd to be prescribed an upper and a downer? I usually only take my clonazepam/klonopin a little after vyvanse peaks in the evening. About 6-8 hours later. Any thoughts?

Hey i have anxiety and it is about what your conscious mind, for instance if i am aware i am doing something i will make myself anxious without even trying. Maybe you are subconsciously making yourself anxious by thinking is the meds going to work or not. I know caffine only exasperates anxiety and will definately do the same with ADHD. Sometimes meds and caffine will contradict eachother which can also cause anxiety.

Check with your doctor if you can change the meds or find a strategy for handling the anxiety because ADHD is one of the most treatable mental illnesses so i'd personally change anxiety meds or use therapy to manage it so you can eliminate the symptoms

Claire

I think we discussed anxiety possibly resulting from or being worsened by the combination of Wellbutrin + caffeine before, didn't we? Have you learned any more about it yourself? Thanks to someone on here mentioning it was a known interaction anyway, I found a lot of anecdotal accounts and discussion about it, and now suspect it may have been happening with me. When you think about it, since both promote dopamine release (I didn't know this before, but apparently bupropion is weakly dopaminergic), and one of them inhibits re-uptake, it's not that surprising they might not mix well. It could just like how it can be dangerous to take St. John's Wort with an SSRI.

Then, of course, come life circumstances and your mental preparedness to deal with them. Are your environmental factors and level of self-care at the levels you think they should be? Do you (or can you) benefit from therapy? With all of these other concerns eliminated (to the best of your ability), then you would be in the best position to know for sure if it's one of your meds or not.

I thought the St Johns wort thing was to do with serotonin because it can cause serotonin syndrome.

I have tapered from 450 Welbutrin to 300. Next will be to 150. Then onto a different antidepressant as I believe Welbutrin and caffeine do contribute to my anxiety, as I stated in another thread. Welbutrin is an SNRI and it is it's effect on norepinephrine that gives it it's stimulant effect. It says on antidepressant labels not to take an SSRI or SNRI with John's wort, which is a natural mood enhancer, because basically you won't need it if taking SNRI or SSRI. Together can cause serotonin syndrome because they both do the same thing. I have not had a psychiatrist for a few months because I moved to a different state that does not have medicaid so I haven't been able to find one with no insurance. I finally found a free therapist and started seeing her last week. So my whole support team from Colorado is finished since April a nd Florida healthcare sucks. So with this going on my environmental factors are overwhelming and very disappointing. Very stressful. I am trying to cut down on clonazepam because I may not be able to get it much longer due to strict laws in Florida. Same with the vyvanse. So my whole mental health regimen and meds may change. I hate this place. The main question I was trying to ask is, aren't stimulants supposed to calm ADHDers down. Are there others who sometimes get anxiety from caffeine or vyvanse. And why the inconsistencies. Like I said sometimes they calm me down sometimes they don't. So could the anxiety just be situational and from my GAD and not the meds?

Definitely. Anxiety and stimulation like from caffeine need not be linked. You can definitely have unrelated GAD symptoms if you have gad.

Yes, I was making an analogy there. Dopamine overload can be risky, just like serotonin overload. (In fact it's unlikely there's any neurotransmitter you can't have too much of.)

(*note: I need to properly confirm this but according to Wikipedia, Wellbutrin/bupropion has more effect on dopamine than norepinephrine, despite being called an SNRI)

I'm sorry you're having such a hard time with the agencies you're dealing with. Must be exasperating, if not overwhelming. Hopefully the new therapist can help! As for the stimulants question, they don't all work the same for everyone, and the "calming" thing is not meant in the sense of "calming down" from being emotionally upset. Different people will have different responses to each prescription. (That's why some people choose to go with non-stimulant ADHD drugs, for example.)

But again, you should be sure you have your self-care and environmental/situational factors sorted to the best of your ability, and then discuss it with your prescribing doctor and therapist if you still think your meds are involved.

i thought wellbutrin is an NDRI

Norepinephrine-Dopamine Reuptake Inhibitor (NDRI)

It's definitely not a snri. My pdoc won't let me go on those. I'm not sure what it is exactly. NDRI sounds good to me.

You guys are right. Welbutrin is an NDRI. My bad...

What does NDRI stand for anyway? Norepinephrine dopamine re uptake inhibitor? Just a guess.

Good guess. You got it

wellbutrin caused manic episodes for me... adhd meds were 50/50 on what they did to me... we ended up cutting the wellbutrin down and upping trileptal as a mood stabilizer. I would suggest avoiding caffeine as well... with adhd meds you get the paradoxical effect, but that affects only your brain... physical symptoms of uppers can still manifest and cause anxiety... fueled by a restless body and an increased heart rate

Thanks for the info tanto. When you say Welbutrin gave you manic episodes, what do you mean exactly? Have you ever heard of the combination of effexor and Welbutrin being helpful. A Dr of mine before mentioned that and said it does work for some people as "you are basically firing on all cylinders."

I would get jittery, restless, racing fleeting thoughts, talkative but unfocused, would sleep maybe two or three hours a night... I even had problems urinating. This was in an inpatient setting as well. I haven't heard any experiences of it combined with effexor. However "firing on all cylinders" seems a little intimidating to me, from suffering from anxiety. I week the anxiety has enough cylinders firing of already lol... But that's with chronic obsessive intrusive thoughts and paranoia

My doc advised against Wellbutrin for me; he said it can exacerbate anxiety in some people. It didn't work well for me--it made my anxiety much worse. But I do feel like my Vyvanse has a calming effect most days.

Thanks, guys. I also had my acronyms mixed up there. (The effects of the drug on the brain that I was talking about earlier should be accurate though.) For a while I think a lot of people (including professionals) were calling Wellbutrin an SNRI. I now vaguely remember seeing something about that term being incorrect on Wikipedia once, I think it was, but that was years ago now.

I didn't know wellbutrin could exacerbate anxiety or that adhd meds could help alleviate anxiety. Now if only I could find a pdoc that thought so.

Good luck Risuneko. I know how frustrating it can be to find the right Dr/treatment. Going through that myself right now. Best wishes.

Stimulants do tend to calm people with ADHD down and make them more rational, but at the same time if anxiety does occur on stimulants it may be amplified (especially the physical effects).

You are on so many medications, it is difficult to know. It could be many things.

* Withdrawal from reducing benzodiazepines like Clonazepam can cause anxiety.

* Wellbutrin may cause anxiety, and so can Effexor (I personally do not like Effexor). I find drugs that block the Serotonin Transporter like Effexor cause me anxiety in combination with stimulants.

* Environmental or other factors may interact with your anxiety.

Also changing to a different stimulant can sometimes help if the anxiety seems associated with the stimulant, or you can try Catapres perhaps.

I agree Cynical4096 there are so many things going on right now that factor in. It is hard to tell.