Ritalin and Anxiety | ADHD Information

Hi everyone,

 

I'm a 20 yr old college student, have had ADHD my whole life, but always did well in school. However, i've always been EXTREMELY disorganized, spacey and had a hard time sitting still. I've also struggled with anxiety, depression and eating disorders. Now that i'm recovered from my eating disorder, my psych suggested actually trying to treat my ADD with meds, so i've been on ritalin. Has anyone found their anxiety to increase with meds, specifically ritalin (i'm on 30 mg, LA) my anxiety has gotten really bad, but at the same time, i can definitely tell that the ritalin helps me focus, which then seems to be cancelled out by my worrying. i was wondering if anyone has dealt with this, and/or if they had better luck with other meds, specifically non-stimulant ones like strattera.

 

thanks so much!

-lola

I've found my anxiety decreases while on stimulants, but that's probably not very helpful for you, sorry.

Ritalin is a dopamine reuptake inhibitor (ie, increases the levels of dopamine in the brain), but the medication used to treat anxiety usually are selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors.  So, while the ritalin may be doing wonders for normalizing your dopamine levels, your serotonin levels remain unaffected.

Strattera is a selective noradrenaline reuptake inhibitor... so I don't think it would do much for your serotonin levels either, sorry :(.

You can get selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (Zoloft, Prozac, Lexapro, etc) but if serotonin levels aren't the cause of your anxiety these might cause serotonin sickness instead.  However, it's quite likely these might help you, but you'd have to talk to your doctor.  I'm just some random dude on the internet after all :)

Hope that helps.