Anyone take gabapentin to help with sleep, hot flashes, moods?

I’ve been taking 600 mg of gabapentin three times a day for a few years. I initially took it for joint pain, I have osteoarthritis and while it is not supposed to help it did help. I’ve had both knees and a hip place now so I thought I could stop it, but when I started tapering down and got to 400 mg the pain in my joints came back.

It’s supposed to help with hot flashes, but it never helped me. I never had a problem sleeping at night so it didn’t help with that either. Is it possible he’s sleeping better at night because he doesn’t have his joints hurting anymore, and he is able to do more things because of the same joint relief. Interesting to hear other peoples benefits from doing this drug.

I never had any side effects from gabapentin. In an online meeting earlier this week, somebody mentioned that they were having some weird side effects, but we’re taking it only at night. Their side effects did seem to go away after a month or so. My understanding was, this was a drug you had to take three times a day or you have some side effects from withdrawal. I’m not sure that’s really true.

@jeffmarc he takes it only at night I think 600mg, never had pain from PC.
Only pain he might have is after working out if he tweaked something, but initial bone density/bone scans didn't show anything.
we did read something about tapering down if going off of it, though 600mg once a day is still low. Doctor says some patients take 900 3x day.
We'll see what happens

@beaquilter
The pain isn’t from PC, it’s either from side effects of the drugs or from osteoarthritis in my case. ADT can cause joint pain.

What’s interesting is that your husband‘s reaction to gabapentin doesn’t match any of the side effects. Improvements in mood and energy are just not one of the things one hears about the drug. Got to admit that’s a great thing.

I was once prescribed Gaba for some nerve damage to my lingual nerve and I had "out of body experience" which freaked me out O_O. I never took another pill and I am happy that your husband is having great results and better mood too. Good for him :))

@surftohealth88 oh wow scary! Yeah my husband is "special". ha ha

@jeffmarc yeah I didn't see that on the list of side effects either.
His pains were muscle from working out and subsided after a few days usually, of course on ADT he got a lot weaker but kept doing weight lifting etc at the gym, now the last few weeks he's "stronger" of course not like a 35yo....
But because his mood is better, mine is too a bit. Though it all sucks!

I take 600 mg 3x a day for bilateral neuropathy. Other than more pronounced tiredness when I haven’t slept well, I haven’t suffered any side effects. There was an article in the WSJ not long ago about the dangers of the drug. You can access it at the Journal, or here’s a link if you have Apple News: https://apple.news/AIxw_7fAhQnqIchcpHoSRbw.

@nikolai57 it has a paywall

@beaquilter
If you highlight the subject of this Wall Street Journal article and add the word gabapentin to it. You can do a search on the Internet and find a lot of articles about this.