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Question about thigh pain

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Chronic Pain
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Posted 6/12/2008 6:15 AM (GMT 0)
Mochiah - did it help any of your pain, particularly the neuropathic (or neuropathic-like) symptoms?

PaLady
Posted 6/12/2008 7:30 AM (GMT 0)
The charley horse pain outweighed the neuropathy for me. However, it did not work for my mother who has spinal stenosis and SI pain with radiculopathy. She and the doctor decided to continue it anyway so she could lose weight since losing weight can ultimately lessen our pain. I believe it was stopped it after approximately 9 months because she no longer was losing weight and I think they were going to wait 3-4 months then restart it to see if it would kick in again.
Posted 6/12/2008 3:34 PM (GMT 0)
Delilah: Thanks for the information. When I was reading your post, I was thinking parts of it were like you were telling my story. For years before this all got chronic, I had repeated "episodes" where I would be in this much pain for a solid week and then just wake up one morning and it would be gone. I didn't go to the doctor then either. Then, like you said, six years ago it happened and just didn't go away. I haven't left any docs with bad blood - just when they gave up on me and said they couldn't help. By the way, I've had some scary ones in the past, but never any with dead animals on the wall! I would have run too! tongue

Thanks for the other info, Mochiah. My doc did mention the weight-loss side effect. I don't really need to lose weight, but I'm glad this med doesn't cause me to GAIN weight, if that makes any sense at all.

Sad news, though... last night was right back to my "normal" pattern of sleeping no more than a couple hours before the pain woke me up. sad Maybe next week when I do the first step up to the next dose I'll get the sleep effect again. The burning pain is back too. BUT, I refuse to be discouraged until I've reached the full dose level. I'm going to keep hoping this will help with the chronic stuff too! Can't hurt to hope, right? yeah
Posted 6/12/2008 3:44 PM (GMT 0)
Hang in there. Ry. If you're stepping up to 3X what you're taking, then you're likely on a very low dose, so don't give up until you've given it a fair trial!

And thanks, Mochiah, for the info!

I do know about how the pains come and go and then, finally, stay. I've had the symptoms down my right leg that built slowly but stayed rather quickly, but stuff in my left leg started out as "rare" but now since surgery has moved to more "occasional" to "regular' but doesn't stay. Still, I notice the frequency increase and it's scary because I wonder when it will stay. I am also coming to think the cold weather is HORRIBLE for all this, as I feel at least a little better now that summer is finally here. But we only have a few months of it.

PaLady
Posted 6/13/2008 9:04 AM (GMT 0)
Well, sad news to report. Night #3 yeilds NO sleep at all... confused I am beginning to think you nailed it PAlady. That this dose is really too small to do anything at all, and this is just more of my same sleep cycle secondary to my pain. After many nights of little or no sleep, I occasionally have a "crash" night where I do actually sleep clear through just because my poor ol' body is just worn out. I am wondering if my first dose of this med just happened to coincide with one of those events. That would make more sense with the last two nights then.

So...Hopefully when I get to the full dose in 3 weeks I will begin to see some real results in the way of pain relief AND restful sleep.

Mochiah - a question for you... Did the weight loss happen b/c of nausea from the med or loss of appetite or was it just unexplained weight loss? I have struggled for a long time with nausea, so I'm hoping this won't be yet another trigger for that! (so far it hasn't been)

Thanks!
Posted 6/13/2008 2:18 PM (GMT 0)
Ry,
I remember when I first started neurontin. It was 300mg at bedtime, and initially it helped with sleep but then wore off...until I built up to a higher dose. Now I take 400mg q.i.d., always saving the last dose for bedtime. So try to be patient re: the meds at the dose is increasing.

I do know those night when you finally crash after little or no sleep for days. Before I was getting any narcotics at all (I was taking huge doses of ibuprofen and tylenol for about 2 years before my PCP acquiesed to give me a vicodin to take at bedtime - what a difference!) I was chronically and severely sleep deprived, but didn't realize it until after I got the vidocin to take with the neurotin. Now I take percocet, neurotin and 5mg valium at bedtime and finally sleep MOST of the time.

Have faith (as hard as it is)!

BTW I also use Belleruth Naparstek's relaxation tapes at bedtime, which always help some.

PaLady
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