I had tried zoloft and one other antidepressant with little to no affect for me. My mother had gone through a whole laundry list of different ssris and eventually ended up on wellbutrin among other things. When looking online into my depressive symptoms, it seemed that low dopamine was the reason for a majority of my symptoms, including the complete lack of motivation, which honestly could be because of my years as a heroin addict. In fact, one of the things I loved about opiates is that I'd actually get off my ass and do the little things that just seemed pointless or to exerting - like cleaning my room, showering, basically anything other than getting out of bed. So with all of this in mind, I seen my psych and mentioned my mother had found relief from it and asked if we tried that next.
He started me on 150mg because of my history of seizures and the fact it lowers the seizure threshold. I had a little struggle falling asleep for a couple days, but that was about it. Next visit I got bumped up to 300mg, and again had similar side effects, though much more pronounced. There were nights I felt like I was coming off of heroin (in regards to struggling to sleep) which eventually subsided after a week or two. I didn't notice much of an effect at first - but its not instantaneous. I eventually realized how well it was working for me when I stopped thinking about suicide every damn day. I also noticed that I had more motivation for the monotonous daily tasks and to better my life, though honestly its seems to have plateaued recently - about 6 months in. I'm definitely not as bad as I was before wellbutrin, just simply feel its losing its effectiveness - though it still is 1000x easier to power through the shit I don't want to do.
I remember reading somewhere that it stimulates the nicotine receptors in your brain which is why it is also used to help with smoking cessation. Didn't work well for me. At first I tried powering through regardless, and usually ended up with headaches. However, that eventually subsided and I'm still smoking to this day.
My sex drive has increased, but honestly opiates didn't diminish it - it straight KILLED mine, and after so many years using its hard to tell how much so, but if they haven't for you, I wouldn't worry much. If anything the vast majority seemed to have an increase in it anyways, whereas most traditional antidepressants that work on serotonin have the opposite effect.
Good luck regardless. Give it a chance for a little while, and if it doesn't work or you feel it doesn't do what you want ask for something different after a couple of months. Unfortunately trial and error and often a combination of medications generally is the norm for most of us.
