Any positive Wellbutrin stories?

[username]

I've just finished writing to my psychiatrist justifying the use of Wellbutrin (or Zyban as it is known over here) for multiple reasons.

He said that whilst he is still edgy about combining ADs, I made some very good points and that he would talk it over with the professor of psychiatry at my University.

So... I may be starting it in a couple of weeks if all goes well.

I am also on Prozac and resperidone, though I have dropped the valproate.

Do you have any happy stories for me?

[Velvet Elvis]

I like it a lot. It helps a lot with executive functioning and general lethargy.

There is a very good chance it could make your tourette's type stuff worse though. It did mine but I would just put up with it and let people accept the fact that I twitch, mumble, and blurt out nonsense when stressed.

[punky]

I LOOOOOVE my Wellbutrin. I've been coping with depression all my life but my family instilled a firm belief that depression can be overcome with determination. I started seeing a pdoc for anger issues. Turns out I have anxiety problems and depression problems. When she treated the anger and anxiety, I got really sad and started having frequent little breakdowns. That's when I finally admitted I was depressed and started taking the Wellbutrin she had rx'ed some time before.

WB works really fast. The first few days at 150mg I got very giddy. I would get excited over little things and talk really fast. I felt like a cartoon cheerleader. That peaked after about 4 days and then tapered down into a general happiness. I'm not a cartoon cheerleader anymore. Just pleasant most of the time. I mean, I still have a normal life with ups and downs so I go up and down, but it is so much easier to cope with now. The first month, after the cartoonyness wore off, I still felt jittery, and even now when I take a 2nd pill (during pms) I get a little jittery, but it isn't very bad and I have klonopin I can take if my anxiety starts getting to me. I noticed in your sig line that you have OCD. I have some tendancies toward OCD and it seems to have helped that, too.

Oh yeah, during that early phase when I was bouncing off the walls with joy I would also experience occasional vivid imagery, some intrusive thoughts, but that has also stopped. My side effects are mild jitteryness, slightly suppressed appetite during the day, a drop in energy in the early evening, and I have a little trouble concentrating on reading now. The plus side is that my libido is up a little bit, I have more energy during the day, and I enjoy life a hell of a lot more now. Feel free to ask me any questions.

[username]

I like it a lot. It helps a lot with executive functioning and general lethargy.

There is a very good chance it could make your tourette's type stuff worse though. It did mine but I would just put up with it and let people accept the fact that I twitch, mumble, and blurt out nonsense when stressed.

That is a worry, since although my tics in themselves are not severe, I have injured myself in the past due to them. For example, I sometimes get the compulsion/complex tic to dislocate my shoulder. This has been done once before.

My eyes are another worry. I get cramps in them after tensing the muscles around the eyes for hours. This is one of the main reasons that my benzo intake is so high.

But if it does cause me problems, I can always stop taking the medication.

Sometimes you just have to experiment.

I LOOOOOVE my Wellbutrin. I've been coping with depression all my life but my family instilled a firm belief that depression can be overcome with determination. I started seeing a pdoc for anger issues. Turns out I have anxiety problems and depression problems. When she treated the anger and anxiety, I got really sad and started having frequent little breakdowns. That's when I finally admitted I was depressed and started taking the Wellbutrin she had rx'ed some time before.

WB works really fast. The first few days at 150mg I got very giddy. I would get excited over little things and talk really fast. I felt like a cartoon cheerleader. That peaked after about 4 days and then tapered down into a general happiness. I'm not a cartoon cheerleader anymore. Just pleasant most of the time. I mean, I still have a normal life with ups and downs so I go up and down, but it is so much easier to cope with now. The first month, after the cartoonyness wore off, I still felt jittery, and even now when I take a 2nd pill (during pms) I get a little jittery, but it isn't very bad and I have klonopin I can take if my anxiety starts getting to me. I noticed in your sig line that you have OCD. I have some tendancies toward OCD and it seems to have helped that, too.

Oh yeah, during that early phase when I was bouncing off the walls with joy I would also experience occasional vivid imagery, some intrusive thoughts, but that has also stopped. My side effects are mild jitteryness, slightly suppressed appetite during the day, a drop in energy in the early evening, and I have a little trouble concentrating on reading now. The plus side is that my libido is up a little bit, I have more energy during the day, and I enjoy life a hell of a lot more now. Feel free to ask me any questions.

Hi there. I am glad that the Wellbutrin has worked so well for you.

I have a couple of questions.

1) Does it cause you any sleeping troubles?

2) Can you still relax on the drug? I like to practice hypnosis so relaxation is important to me.

Cheers.

[olga]

I love Wellbutrin, too. I'm taking the XL one, and it feels like a world of difference after my last AD. (Which worked, but made me logy and lazy and sleepy.)

No problems sleeping at all. I take it in the morning (300) so maybe that's why I sleep okay. I also can relax. I sat down to read after lunch today, and almost fell asleep. (!)

I hope it works for you.

olga

[punky]

1) My insomnia has actually gotten better. I think because I have more energy during the day, I am a little more worn out at night. I take mine with breakfast. If I forget and don't take it by 1pm, I don't bother because then I would have sleep problems. I took it around 2pm once and stayed awake so late there was no point in going to bed.

2) It seems like I'm usually pretty wired for the first 4 hours. Then I can relax, yes, and I can quiet my mind, but I cannot take a nap at all anymore.

[Catnapper]

But if it does cause me problems, I can always stop taking the medication.

Yes, you can stop, and the good thing is that Wellbutrin has a short half-life which means it clears out of your system quickly, although you still need to titrate down with the help of the pdoc. The flip side of the short half-life is that once you're taking it, it's definitely not a drug to run out of so keep an eye on your supplies.

I have a couple of questions.

1) Does it cause you any sleeping troubles?

2) Can you still relax on the drug? I like to practice hypnosis so relaxation is important to me.

I've never had any sleeping or relaxing trouble, but then again, I never do. I have the opposite problem and tend to sleep too much, which is an indicator for me of my mood. (Too much sleep/tired all the time=heading rapidly towards the abyss.)

I started Wellbutrin after my first visit to a pdoc in my early forties; I'm 47 now. He diagnosed me with major depressive disorder, recurrent, and dysthymia, as well as binge eating disorder. My therapist at the time referred me to him because she thought I was depressed.

The pdoc determined that at the time I was just suffering from dysthymia and took my off the SSRI my GP had me on and started me on Wellbutrin. It was like a miracle drug to me because I felt like I did on my very best days every day. Apparently that's how normal people feel all the time and it only took me forty years to find out!

The SSRIs I had tried made me too sleepy and anorgasmic to the point that I fell asleep on myself. Wellbutrin also solved both those problems. You'd have to tie firecrackers to my bra straps to make me jumpy or even start to give me anxiety attacks, so I can't speak to those concerns.

When I went into major depression number four while taking Wellbutrin as a maintenance drug, I asked the pdoc how that could happen - if I was taking a maintenance AD shouldn't that prevent me from ever getting depressed again? His honest answer was, "We don't know yet why that happens." So my maintenance drugs now include an increased dose of Wellbutrin (450 mg), 100 mg of Topomax (off-label usage of an anti-seizure med), and 20 mg of Vivactil, an activating tricyclic.

I hope that if you end up taking Wellbutrin you have as much luck with it as I've had. I also hope that your pdoc will learn that many people are on all sorts of combinations of ADs, along with whatever else might conceivably work. Very few people seem to be helped with a single med, or for that matter, even a single class of meds. If I wasn't tired, I'd look up some web references for you. Maybe later.......

P.S. I take my 450 mg of WB in three 150 mg doses of SR pills at morning, noon, and night. I'm going to try to switch to the XR pills so I can take it all in the morning as I sometimes forget my midday dose. You can't double up doses with WB due to the threat of seizures.

[dianebea]

I'm also a Wellbutrin fan. It was prescribed by neurologist for migraine prevention, and I've continued it since my psychiatric diagnosis. I was a little jumpy at first, but that stopped pretty quickly. The weight loss has continued, though.

It really helps to counteract the sexual SEs of Effexor.

dianebea

[zapoteca]

Yay! Finally something I can contribute!

MDD/ADD here. Serious crashes for a year when I crash. Through trial and error, it looked like the neurotonin activators were the effective ones for me. I went off Serzone after it was taken off the Euro market, did Zoloft for awhile as a crash preventative but it DID nothing positive for me.

Then. New Pdoc. New drug, Cymbalta.

Cymbalta knocked my legs out from under me, but it did work on neurotonin. Actually, at the time it was quite pleasant sleeping 16 hours a day and vegging the rest of the time. After 3 months of this, I said it was getting old, and pdoc prescribed Wellbutrin in concert with the Cymbalta.

IT WORKED WITHIN THREE DAYS. I COULD GET UP OFF MY HEINIE AND TAKE 3 MILE WALKS WITH THE DOG AGAIN.

If neurotonin is your thing, Wellbutrin may be helpful for you as it was for me. I hope it is.

Good luck. You helped me feel productive today!

[Penny Century]

wellbutrin is amazing. it's the only AD that i can tolerate (evil SSRIs) and thankfully it's also the one that works the best.

get the xr version not sr if you can. stay the hell away from instant release.

i know it's hard to get docs there to give it to you for depression b/c it's "zyban" and for smoking cessation so i wish you luck getting it.

and i hope it works for you.

it really works wonders for me.

[null0trooper]

Yay! Finally something I can contribute!

MDD/ADD here. Serious crashes for a year when I crash. Through trial and error, it looked like the neurotonin activators were the effective ones for me. I went off Serzone after it was taken off the Euro market, did Zoloft for awhile as a crash preventative but it DID nothing positive for me.

I *think* zapoteca meant "norepinephrine" (aka "noradrenaline") as you have to be overly-sensitive

to notice much serotonin change from Wellbutrin/bupropion/Zyban.

As to whether it can help? A work evaluation before treatment didn't quite say "Do we need to

put a muzzle on you?". The evaluation after starting WB actually praised my communication skills and

so forth.

Oh, and with comorbid ADD in the mix Wellbutrin can take effect rapidly.

So even though *I* can't take it anymore, I still say that when it works it really works well.

[Loon-A-TiK]

I have 3 stories for you:

Ex #1- He has ADD and took his Adderall with WB for the longest time. It helped him with the ADD and depression. It probably saved his life. He had no trouble, except trouble using the bathroom (bathroom #2).

Ex #2- Was in the psych ward for 2 months. They gave him WB. It worked with no adverse effects. Then the stupid dork went off of it and was back to suicidality. So the stuff works, and for him, had no side effects.

Me- I've been on WB twice. The first time I was taken off because my pdoc was lowering the number of meds I was taking, however I noticed no side effects and there was no withdrawl. The second time was when I needed more AD fortification, and I started the WB again. It helps with my ADD to the extent that I don't need an ADD drug (anything in my cocktail could be helping, or maybe just my mental exercises, but my ADD is very light now).

So- no signs of dysfunction except for trouble doing #2.

[scatty]

Doc took away my wellbutrin and within weeks I was inpatient. He thought it was making me hypomanic, but

it turns out I was just <gasp> HAPPY!

[Thomas]

My wellbutrin, 400 mg., seems to help with the sexual side-effects of some of my other meds.

One bonus side-effect, a good one, I have gone 5 days without smoking and with all that wellbutrin in my system I'm not having any substancial cravings.

Tommy