After a month long taper I finally quit pregabalin a week ago. But am kinda anxious tonight. Don’t want to ruin my hard work by taking any though
Why’d you quit just curious
The drug is quite addictive, not many people realise this, psychiatrists prescribe it really often to patients describing it as a safe alternative for benzodiazepines in order to treat anxiety. While it can be effective for some time, tolerance increases drastically and you have to increase your dose to feel the same effects. I myself was on a dose as high as 600 mg, addicted to it, ended up in a hospital, so I wouldn’t recommend anyone using this drug for more than a few months or even weeks, really.
To the author of the post, have you ever tried antidepressants?
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Yeah am on antidepressants too. Fluoxetine
What for was it prescribed for you, anxiety, depression, OCD? And what dose are you taking? Does it help at all?
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Prescribed for obsessionality and anxiety. Not sure if it helps - 60mg a day
Apparently it doesn’t get its work done if you still experience anxiety. But maybe the anxiety is caused by withdrawal effects of pregabaline, can’t be sure. But it is certain that you shouldn’t take even a single dose of pregabaline, once you have discontinued it. Instead, I would wait to see if your condition gets better with time. If it doesn’t, you should consider talking to your psychiatrist about changing the antidepressant. You’re already taking the highest dose of fluoxetine, so instead you may ask for paroxetine or escitalopram - those have more of an anxiolytic profile of action, fluoxetine is rather prescribed for patients with apathy or bulimia.
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I was on 600 mg Pregabaline as well. I had a lot of mixed depression and anxiety after i weaned off. It got better after a month.
Perhaps a small dose of a mild benzo like oxazepam could help in a short period?
I was thinking of that too. It depends on how often those anxiety situations happen. If it does happen often, then maybe I would suggest something with a longer half-life. Obviously I don’t want to recommend stuff like clonazepam or diazepam, though these could be a good example, but too risky anyway. Where I live, clorazepate is considered the mildest benzo and it has a half-life of around 50 hours or so.