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Gabapentin side effects?
I am a regular on the Mayo Board! I don't know what I would do without it! Our doctors don't want to discuss openly the things about illnesses and side effets of drugs and other things. Anyway, my question to all of you is Gabapentin and it's side effects. I have been on it now for 6 months. My doctor raised me from 100mg. to now I am on 400mg. three times a day.
The problem is my tiredness! I happen to be in a friends office yesterday and she was taking some medicine. She said she was taking Gabapentin. I asked why and she said she had, had shingles back when and it still helped with the pain. I know the drug is percribed for many things that is why I take it for my issues.
I told her I had been taking it for about 6 months. She asked if I had been tired all the time, just out of the Blue. OF COURSE I SAID YES! She said it took her a year before she got out of the tiredness.
Let me know if any of you have experienced the same thing. Also let me know at what dosage you may be on? I know this is all confidential!
Again Thanks to The Mayo Clinic and Everyone who is kind enough to be open with their lives!
Sundance!
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Tramadol has been a miracle drug for me. It conquered knee pain and other pain episodes over the last 15 years. I have never used it longer than 6 months. Gabapentin caused rapid weight gain. I quit taking it because I could not control my weight.
I couldn’t do anything but sleep on tramadol ..could have been great but I slept through it 😁
Gabapentin gave me psycho dreams. I pass.
Gabapentin gave me hives for weeks. Ugh! Took prednisone and got MORE HIVES! Ugh!
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2 ReactionsPrednisone made your hives worse?? I don’t think I’ve ever heard of that .. scary.
I have to second this. Tramadol works, gabapentin, no. Tramadol mild side effects, Gabapentin, horrendous. Dizziness, brain fog, unable to work kind of horrendous. Tramadol allows me to live a productive life.
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2 ReactionsI could have worked on Tramadol..
If I could have started at noon 🙄
I am Uber sensitive to sedative effects. I’m sure most could overcome that.
Gabapentin was great, imo, though I did take a very small dose. I had to stop using it due to blurred vision. It just became too bothersome. I’m going to try pregabalin to see if that will be different.
@celia16
Lyrica is very similar to Gabapentin and both drugs can cause blurriness.
Since you had to stop Gabapentin because of blurriness, when you start Lyrica, you may want to start with the lowest strength available and even cut that in half to help decrease the risk of adverse effects be it blurriness or something else.
Good luck,
Jake
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3 ReactionsI had a spinal fusion and laminectomy back in 2010, and after about 2 or 3 months, I started experiencing numbness in my feet; neuropathy. It has progressively gotten worse, extremely bad now, and I've been on Gabapentin for 13 years for it. I was on 300 mg 3 x day, and then was increased to 600 mg 3 x day about 3 years ago. I had no side effects until late last year. I began to be extremely nauseous, throwing up occcasionally, so I went to my gastro doctor. He looked at all my medications, and told me he'd bet it was the Gabapentin causing it. I had tests run, and lo and behold, I was not digesting my food, and it would make me sick. I had develped Gastroparesis. I spent 3 months being very sick. I was put on a very bland "white" diet, anything easy to digest. I backed off of some of the Gabpentin, taking 300 mg x day. That's what I still take, but my feet hurt SO BADLY!
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2 Reactions@carolm23
Good morning,
Have you ever considered talking to your doctor about giving Lyrica a try? According to some studies it’s more effective in treating nerve pain than Gabapentin. It may be less likely to cause intestinal upset than Gabapentin.
Jake
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