Neurontin? (kind of irrelevant, sorry!)
Find a Conversation
| Fri, 03-17-2006 - 11:14pm |
Hi, hope you all are well...I am in the midst of down-to-the-wire exam studying for a class that has me and my friends spending pretty much every spare minute trying to learn all these frustrating details (argh! sorry, good to get that out!) :). But otherwise I'm OK, just in pain physically...muscle pain, once diagnosed as fibromyalgia...
So I saw my general doctor today for the pain and a few other things (I feel so awful taking up her time like that...when I left, there were more than a few people in the waiting room!). Anyway, she recommended going back on nortriptyline that I was on before and did help (along with the Prozac)...both antidepressants, both of which made me drowsy all day to a really strange degree (no one I've heard of has had that problem, really).
Plus I'm hesitant to go back on antidepressants because my mood has been so good...I didn't say anything about that to my doctor because...well, I don't know...now I'm kind of regretting it, actually...but I had a few days of being really hyper recently (didn't fall asleep til 4 AM), though it's settled down lately...and I didn't want meds to make me really crazy. Plus I would kind of like to figure this mood issue out without confusing things with Prozac, etc.
OK, sorry, this post has gotten so long! But she ended up giving me Neurontin to try...and I thought I remembered some of you mentioning having pain issues (plus it has rarely been used for mood stabilizing, I think?), so I was wondering, have any of you tried it? What did you think? I'm worried about the sleepiness side effect that I've heard is possible, but I could really use something to help with this muscle pain, and Advil just isn't cutting it by any means!
I know it definitely won't work immediately...she's starting me on a very low dose because of my sensitivity to meds...and she said it would be a month before she'd expect me to get up to a therapeutic dose. I'm a little nervous about what I'm going to do about the pain before then because it ranges from very uncomfortable to almost unbearable...but it is much worse during my period, which I'm having now...so hopefully it will improve some on its own in a week or so. But I see a new neurologist in a month for my migraines, so maybe I can ask about this then too...but it is a month from now!
Wow, really sorry for the length of this post...I realized I apologize a whole lot, in real life too...and I have been having major issues feeling like my "friends" really don't like me, and everything comes out of my mouth wrong, just arrogant and silly...I think my personality is just "bad"...which I don't think there is any cure for, lol!
Oh well...thanks again so much for just being here and listening...I should be able to be back soon once things in school settle down some. I don't want to be just a "taker" and not a "giver" when it comes to posting!
Rose

Rose,
Neurontin is an epilepsy med, that is being used "off label" as a psych med for BP.
I take Neurontin, which works for my mood stabilization very well (I consider myself lucky I don't need to take one of those fat-inducing meds!) I'm afraid I couldn't tell you how it works for muscle pain- I never used it for that. But, go ahead and try it for stabilization!
Express!
Beth "Petrouchka"
Edit: I think I have to give a pre-post warning that this is a bit of a novel, lol! Sorry...I was trying to come up with a distraction from studying, and this turned out to be it!
Thanks so much, Marci. I'm not on anything for the fibromyalgia pain now except my own concoction of 800 mg of Advil and 1000 mg of Tylenol as needed...my doctor said that was OK. They hardly do a thing, though!
But I also used to take Ultram, and I had a similar positive experience with it. I even got a refill of it through my current doctor a year or so ago...but she seemed very hesitant to give it to me at the time, and now I'm even more reluctant to ask to get a new prescription for it. I know it's odd/bad when I'm in pain to feel that way...but I'm so scared of getting a reputation as a drug-seeker and then never being able to get help.
I do see a therapist, and we've talked a little bit about my general fear of speaking up when I need help, of being seen as "crying wolf"...but then again, she doesn't even seem to "believe" in fibromyalgia, so there seems to be more than a bit of irony there! (After having more than a few doctors turn me away with a roll of the eyes and little more than a recommendation just to run every day, and the pain will go away, or things like that...you learn not to speak up!).
And I also really tend to minimize things too...but the pain now really isn't as bad as it once was years ago...back then, for weeks upon weeks (months?), I hurt so badly I felt suicidal. I had to give my mom my bottle of Ultram to give me a pill only every 4 hours so I wouldn't be tempted to take more...and still, the pain was unbelievable. I think that was pretty much the bottom.
I don't want to get "addicted" like that again...but I don't feel like wanting to be in less pain is necessarily an addiction, either! But fortunately now the pain is not quite to that level...it's hard to say since it varies. So I wonder if I should wait to seek help until I do feel that the pain is constantly unbearable...there I go minimizing again, I guess!
But if I did want to pursue the med route, I *could* call my doctor's office and ask if I could get a new prescription for Ultram over the phone. That would mean the nurse getting the OK from my doctor...but I wouldn't have the conversation with my doctor to ask her what she thought, and it seems like it would be harder for her to say no to giving me a prescription that way, and I kind of feel bad putting her in that position.
Or I guess I could go ahead and set up a whole new appointment with her to ask about it, though I just saw her and I'm there all the time (seriously...every week sometimes!). Sorry, I guess this is the kind of basic thing I should be able to figure out on my own...I'll give the excuse that this is the Ambien talking (I took some a little while ago!).
About the friends thing...thanks...I hadn't even thought of that really, that it could be related to BP. I also just started the Neurontin last night, and I can't imagine this would happen so fast as a reaction to it, but I seem to be more tired (I slept til noon today, which I absolutely can't afford with my studying!) and also a little down.
But today the problem in my head really became obvious to everyone...they were all going out to study and didn't seem too enthusiastic about having me come along (I honestly think they don't want me there)...so I even ended up saying out loud, "It seems like you'd probably rather I didn't come."
When one of them tried to explain that it would be fine for me to come, my eyes welled up with tears and I told them I'd stay by myself...the one friend there who knows I was depressed gave me a long, questioning look, though! After they left I had a little crying fest and still don't feel back to normal...I do believe very strongly, though, that they have mostly all come to dislike me as a person.
But my moods have been all over the place to some degree...it wasn't obvious to me, but I've just started noticing that the ups and downs are much more intense whenever I've been off the Topamax...the hypomanic (if I can call it that) phase I had, I think started around the time I went off of it, and now once again I'm back off it, though the Zonegran I've just started for migraines may have some mood properties too, I've heard.
Wow, I have really talked your ear off if you've made it this far...this rambling was my distraction from studying, so I guess I tried to drag it out as long as possible! Guess I should force myself either back to the books or to bed so I can get back at it tomorrow. Many thanks again,
Rose
Edit: Since this is a novel already...if you were me, would you try to do any explaining to any of the friends I was talking to? (only one knows I have a mood problem). I just know people don't like non-self-confident people, so I don't think there's much I can do to fix the impression I made of "oh, no one likes me, I'm an awful person..."
Edited 3/19/2006 2:20 am ET by rosa444
Just wanted to add my bit if it could be of any help.