Quick thoughts

[thezerosystem]

The pain clinic appt went well. The doc was very sympathetic and knew just what to do to start to combat this pain. He gave me a pain patch (the fentynol like I was on before) and a drug called topomax (sp?) that stops nerve pain, which is my worst pain. I'm worried about the patch, since it gave me terrible withdrawl when I went off of it

Comments

Topamax

[ariedana]

#1 - How big is the dosage they gave you? If it's over 50mg, I HIGHLY recommend that you go on the meds slowly, 25mg at a time over a couple of weeks. I've known people whose docs who gave them 100mg dosages without telling them a word about side-effects and such, and were immediately plunged into severe mood swings and bipolar symptoms. That leads to...
#2 - Keep an eye on side-effects, particularly mental. I went on Topamax six months ago for migraines. I started out at a low dosage and noticed some manic feelings, but noticed more the other stuff (hair loss, weird mouth taste, soft drinks becoming metallic-tasting) more immediately. After going off and on it again, I eventually got used to it. Then another doc upped my dosage, and I ended up plunging into a really negative place. Won't bore you with the details, but suicidal idealation was involved. When I finally figured out what was going on, I called my doctor's office and told the nurse. Her immediate reaction: "Yeah, Topamax messes you up." Apparently this reaction is really common. And since then, I've had a close friend who had almost a carbon-copy reaction.

I know you're going through side-effects to stuff that I can't even imagine, and this might just add needless worry. But I did want to share this with you, because I know that doctors give out this script without a word about what to watch for. It affects your temporal lobe, which is kind of serious. So just in case, I wanted to give you a heads-up.

Re: Topamax

[thezerosystem]

Thank you for the heads up. They just uped my dose from 25 to 100, so I (and I'll have Keith) be on the look out for signs. Thank you for the warning.