I am currently taking adderall and have been feeling anxious and fatigued. My doctor thinks I should start taking an anxiety medication so I tried Neurontin. I have been on Neurontin for about three days and I just cant take it any more, the side affects are disturbing me. My brain becomes tingly and my right eye loses focus and light contrast(lazy eye?). It was the weirdest feeling I have ever felt. Anyway, I need to take some kind of anxiety medication because I have a feeling of a lump in my throat because of anxiety I think and I can't stand it any more. I also have nervous tics and feel like crap when I get off of Adderall every day. Adderall is just too effective to give up so I guess I just have to find the right anxiety med.

Does anyone take anxiety meds with Adderall? Is there a med in particular that you have found effective in reducing these obnoxious side effects?

I felt a lot of anxiety while on adderall and ended up taking 20mg per day of celexa to combat it. I noticed a bit of improvement to longer term memory and mood as well.

One thing that really struck me while taking adderall is anxiety really has two parts. One is in your brain i.e. anxious thoughts (social anxiety in my case). Celexa helped this a lot.

The second is more physical and caused by adrenal action. Which is more sweaty, muscle tension, feeling stressed out, and in my case would slowly build to mild panic. The physical anxiety from adderall would build up during the day (and even day to day).

Drinking cofee would make the physical anxiety much worse.

At first the only way I found was to reduce the physical effects of adderall was lower the dose. At a lower dose it didn't build up as much. After a few weeks I got my general doc to switch my BP medication over to a beta-blocker. At first the betablocker really worked well ~10 days, but then the physical tension started building again. I noticed a few people on this board take an alpha blocker at night which may be a better choice. (i'll talk to my pdoc about that in a week).

Shortly after starting the beta blocker I switched to dexedrine from adderall. I was able to lower my dose from 30mg to 20mg a day and that helped with the physical anxiety effects as well. My focus is good on dexedrine, but its not as motivating as adderall.

Adderall also seemed to eliminate my desire to drink alcohol.

BobC

Definitely stop the Neurontin and contact your doc about it. I'm fairly against the stuff myself, but I do realize it works for some people. But if you're getting side effects like that you definitely don't need anything to do with it.

I did have a decent bit of anxiety on Adderall. I occasionally counteracted it with benzodiazepines but that's the only thing that controlled my anxiety when it got bad before I started Adderall. It's certainly not a first course of action though. (And I'm not suggesting you go straight to, or even consider benzos for your anxiety... I don't want to be taken the wrong way and anger the anti-benzo people. I'm just relaying my personal experience.)

In the end, I couldn't handle the anxiety (mostly physical), the headaches, or the comedown of Adderall on a daily basis and decided I might be able to do better. I'm titrating up on Dexdrine now and I'm much happier with it. Like the previous poster said, it's not as motivating but does provide improved focus and such.
It's like Adderall "makes" you do things whereas Dexedrine "allows" you to do things. Or something like that.
That extra kick in the pants was helpful sometimes but the near lack of side effects (cottonmouth like a b**** but that's about it so far) makes dex a much more comfortable choice for me. It is something I can take everyday to improve my quality of life, as opposed to Adderall which I could only take when I really needed it (school and such) because of the side effects.

Dexedrine could certainly be good for you if you continue with amphetamines.

You also might want to look into non-stimulants like Strattera, Wellbutrin, etc. if you're having anxiety issues.

My personal rule of thumb is, don't take one medication to counteract another. It's caused me nothing but trouble. Of course, if it works for you, then go for it.

I'm on Effexor XR for my anxiety, but it's a condition that exists with or without Adderall.

I take Klonipin for my anxiety and other issues (bipolar mania) and it helps.

i just doubled my anxiety meds due to adderall....works wonders

There are many meds for ADHD that do not cause the anxiety as much. Try a change in meds and see what happens. You may find a med that works better than Adderall. It is hard to get an anti-anxiety med prescribed on a regular basis because of the strong chance of addiction.

i just doubled my anxiety meds due to adderall....works wonders

Which anxiety meds do you take?

Probably Klonipin or Xanax

Yeah - I take Cymbalta with Adderall XR - and the Adderall doesn't make me more focused - I only feel depressed when its wearing off. Maybe thats interfering somehow with the adderall. Somethings not right.