Lyrica Withdrawal

[Dirt Nasty]

I run out of lyrica all the time in between scripts, and the only thing I notice is my increase in lost libido, increasing cognition, the same anxiety I was already used to coming back (No new levels)... I become skeptical... I do know for a fact that concurrent usage of lyrica with gaba agonistic drugs will lead to terrible withdrawals if you stop the lyrica before the other drug... (Alcohol, benzos, etc...) Now I know for a general fact that the people claiming horrible withdrawals have to be for a fact abusing gaba agonistic drugs at the same time. There is no other way you could possibly have anything more than stated above in the first part of this post.

You nailed it right on the head, been through the WDs about 5-6 times. I'm, going through them as we speak. I've been taking benzos [different ones, rotated] for 20yrs. Every time I stop Lyrica they differ in type and intensity. It gets worse and worse each time l get on and off again..I got the bright idea to start using it again as a detox "tool" for benzos. BAD move. Now I'm tapering two fucking drugs simultaneously. It IS like an opiate/benzo [been on oxy, morphine, Hydromorphone for years at medium/high doses and CTed them all] and l can honestly say it's even worse that Opiate WDs but NOT worse than benzos. I'm off the opies for now [thank fuck] I got cold turkeyed off benzos by an asshole doc and it's NOWHERE near as dangerous/severe. Landed my ass in the ER. The fucking chills, sweat and crushing depression and the list goes on suck donkey dick BIGTIME. They linger for a LONG time too. But we're all different as most of us know.. Baclofen helps me a lot for Lyrica WDs and I can see Gabapentin useful for them too at a 3x-6x higher dose those who wish to taper. I agree that folks taking GABA A agonist drugs taken prior to this will make it a lot harder for them. For the record I don't abuse my meds. l have legit GAD/panic disorder and nerve damage from a car wreck. I think I'm gonna CT AGAIN just to get this shit over with ASAP even if it has worse WDs.. Now Benzos? HELL NO. Tapering is pointless with this drug IMHO unless you've been on it for a long time at high doses. I've become sensitive to temperature from this crap and other freakish symptoms too long to list that almost seem permanent. But they DO go over time. FUCK Lyrica, I'd rather detox off all my opies all over again than this shit, it's a real mind fuck..It's a LOT more drawn out and intense than opiates[for ME] Good luck guys, if this guinea pig can do it you can too.

 

[Runningfox]

Psychedelic Jay, I really think that this is a very irresponsible comment man. Pregabalin (Lyrica) doesn't cause withdrawal because it didn't cause you withdrawal? Was it because the manufacturer says that it doesn't happen? Withdrawal from Gabapentinoids is fairly serious if it's severe. It's similar to Benzodiazepine withdrawal for a lot of folks. The people complaining about withdrawal from Gabapentinoids are people that I trust completely.

Dear people who are flat out wrong :

THIS above (keifs comment) is Indeed what "nails it on the head".
Certainly we all have our opinions.....

Lyrica or other gabaergics alone DO CAUSE HORRENDOUS WITHDRAWALS. this is a fact. It may not have happened to one particular or ten thousand particular ppl, yet its still true that IT HAPPENS, frequently badly severely horrendously and so just count yourself as a dude with a horseshoe up your ass if it did NOT happen for YOU.

And no, PSYCH JOE , a person need not be "abusing other " anything's ot even abusing their One particular gabaergic med, in order to suffer the awful withdrawals upon its cessation. To say otherwise is NOT an opinion; it's a lie.
Pls dont lie on our forums.

 

[Squeaky]

You are a true scholar RunningFox....... you couldn?t have said it any better.
?Horshoe up the ass? line almost made me spit out my cheerios.

 

[Dirt Nasty]

You are a true scholar RunningFox....... you couldn?t have said it any better. ?Horshoe up the ass? line almost made me spit out my cheerios.

Lol that made my day haha...In a nutshell, if a drug affects your central nervous system you MIGHT have WDs of differing intensity depending on which drug it is , how long you've been on it, which dose, age, state of health, metabolism, etc, right? It's common sense but common sense isn't very common apparently...Have a great weekend everyone, I'm going to go swim in my bed.

 

[Runningfox]

As always it cant be stressed enough that we are ALL different, too.
Some ppl become addicted to things and behaviors the majority of us would first jump to say, "oh that's impossible! " or that horrible line, "it's all in their heads". (That just means it's psychological if so. Psychological and imaginary are not the same thing.
But in general it is a response made when another individual simply cannot fathom a symptom or side effect occurring. )

Someone's experience is their experience. We must At Least start there; otherwise discussion will be the Impossible goal.

 

[Dirt Nasty]

As always it cant be stressed enough that we are ALL different, too. Some ppl become addicted to things and behaviors the majority of us would first jump to say, "oh that's impossible! " or that horrible line, "it's all in their heads". (That just means it's psychological if so. Psychological and imaginary are not the same thing. But in general it is a response made when another individual simply cannot fathom a symptom or side effect occurring. ) Someone's experience is their experience. We must At Least start there; otherwise discussion will be the Impossible goal.

We're all like snowflakes; No two are alike, period. Well put Runningfox. Couldn't have said it better myself. Peace.

 

[swilow]

I cold turkeyed off pregabalin last year at 1.2gram a day and it was one of the single most unpleasant experiences of my life, and i've been through intense opiate and benzo withdrawal. There is something so deeply unsettling about lyrica withdrawal coupled with nausea, extreme anxiety, pain everywhere, panic attacks, deep depression . . . and it lasted for weeks. I would start feeling normal at the end of every day and then it would start again as soon as I woke up. Even after 2 weeks clean from it, I was still feeling really raw and uneasy, and it was several months before the malaise and general shittiness left.

Like benzos, this one seems to kindle to an extent. After my first w/d, I got on it for another month or so and jumped off again as it was exacerbating my epilepsy, and the withdrawal was heaps worse than the first time.

I think we will hear more and more negativty about Lyrics over coming years. IMO, it is highly addictive in that even brief usage triggers withdrawal that is totally incapacitating and, unlike benzos, I found myself craving the drug. A problem I faced is that my dr gave me 3 scripts at once and pharamacists didn't bat an eyelid at dispensing either script weeks before they were due.

I will NEVER touch this again, and I seriously never say that about any drug.

 

[Ne0]

So I finally was able to quit pregabalin, now about 1 month since I quit. I used 700mg-1,5g daily for 4 months. The wd's lasted around 1,5 week, first day I didn't take anything, but after that I drunk around 10-20 beers a day and it really helped, I didn't get any hungover from alcohol after first day, so I was very drunk for 3 days then 2 days took buprenorphine 2mg/day, opioids really don't help with pregabalin wd's tho' and buprenorphine gives me somehow dysphoria, like I felt high and somewhat good but still felt shit. But alcohol was like godsend for pregabalin wd's, I drunk from the morning till I went to sleep. I got mild wd's from buprenorphine because I quit opium around 4 months back so just two days of use of any opioid will give me mild wd's, even just 4mg loperamide which I took 5 days row for diarhea gave me mild wd's. Now it's almost 1 months since last buprenorphine, 3 weeks since last alcohol dose.

Pregabalin wd's are surely almost as bad as opium/poppy wd's, but don't last months. I've taken alprazolam for 6 months eveyr day 1mg in the past and other time 2 months 3mg clonazepam + 2mg alprazolam daily and the wd's were very mild compared to pregabalin wd's. Good that I had lots of quetiapine to get some sleep (200-300mg nightly).

Tho' I have still buprenorphine in my car for my friend and still can get one bottle of pregabalin from pharmacy it's easy to not take them because it's not worth it.

Pregabalin stops working after 3 months of daily use anyway, and even the best feeling stops after two days use, even when taken something like 2g at a time I still didn't get any effects. But in par with any other drug, when pregabalin worked greatly it was almost as good as opium/poppy. Very addictive too.

 

[Flowerpotman]

Final update (I believe)
Two days ago I ran out of my 100mg pregablins. I was having more than I should but totally randomly. Some days base dose, others base dose*4 lol. So I ran out. Panicked. And ransacked the house just in case I went through hell again. I found a SINGLE 50mg LYRICA. I took it. But that night I didn?t sleep a wink. I didn?t even feel BAD or anxious I just couldn?t fall asleep.
The next day. The day with 0 gaba drugs. I had some prickly skin and sweated a lot. Emotion wise I was 3/10. I phoned the docs but they said I was 2 weeks away from my repeat. Oh shit! But it hasn?t gotten bad at all. Sometimes my skin tingles but, actually I?m feeling great and motivated. I used to take lyrica then gabapentin for help with motivation as well as pain stuff. I?m sat here now feeling wonderful.

I really hope this is it now. The worst, most genuinely insane I?ve ever felt was that 3rd time coming off lyrica. 600mg cold turkey worked once. The last time it made me depressed (?all my family will die one day, some sooner than others?) anxious (?I have no talents, my business sucks, friends are ahead of me?) paranoia (?my friends and family hate me. What does my wife see in me??). All the time. No let up. So glad this might be it. I was worried yesterday that I might have at least a fortnight of severe anxiety.

 

[Keif' Richards]

I sort of have this theory of mine and I'm really without any kind of reference to back it up, but here's my shpeel. When you research drugs that have been developed in the past, they often run through a series of ineffective drugs on their way to the final product.

Take for instance, Meprobamate (Miltown). You can read the history for yourself, but essentially, they developed this drug based upon these other drugs that had effects that they wanted to amplify. They had a sedative, but it had the downside of not lasting long enough. They kept working and eventually arrived at the "blockbuster" sedative Meprobamate, which had all of the qualities they desired, but which the previous drugs lacked.

Onto my point now. Gabapentinoids are great. They truly have had a positive impact on my life in terms of antidepression, anxiolysis, ambition, motivation etc. The problem with these drugs however, is that tolerance develops extremely rapidly. It develops so fast, that the drug become useless to people as their dependence escalates at exponential levels. This is why I always take days off. If I don't take days off, the medication loses virtually all of its effect. I never go more than 3 days, because by day 4, I can literally take ten times the dosage I took on day one. I'm not exaggerating.

So, I think they have developed these wonderful, fairly effective drugs, but the caveat is the issue with tolerance. It's my belief that what needs to happen, is that they need to develop a drug with similar action, that doesn't produce tolerance at such an exponential rate. Rant over

 

[zephyr]

I have a script for this lyrica and havent used it daily as everyone here has built up unreal tolerance quickly.

But now codeine is kaput... looks like I have no choice.


Busted a disc in my back .

 

[Squeaky]

Zephyr- good luck with the Lyrica. I?m no scientist but this is what I know. Codeine is a pain killer, works for pulled teeth, broken bones, etc. Not very strong, but the right class of drug for ruptured discs. Lyrica works to make your brain ignore pain signals from damaged nerves. It?s great for burn victims where the pain originates from damaged nerves.
Some people have luck using Lyrica for damaged discs, but many do not because it works on the wrong part of your brain.
You should plan an appt with a pain mgmt doc asap. If Coedine was working before, you should have little trouble getting a script for something comperable.

 

[Squeaky]

I?m working a taper off lyrica right now. From 300 mg/day. Im opening the capsules and approximating 1/2 of 150 mg to get 75 mg doses .
I?m going super slow as I have a huge stash and I have had trouble in the past with withdrawls. My plan is to cut down about 50 mg each two or three weeks.

 

[BenzoGAD]

I've been watching this thread from afar but I've been on Lyrica for about a year or so on and off. Recently I switched docs and he took me off Lyrica (for anxiety) so I went back to my old doc and got a 30 day script (150mg per day). At my peak I used to be on 150mg twice a day. Anyways, I had 4500mg of lyrica and I killed the whole bottle in about 3 days. I think I was taking anywhere from 1000-2000mg of pregabalin in those 3 days. However, I've never suffered from any withdrawal or any that I can think of. Other than the slurring of my speech, Lyrica is one of my favourite drugs both for anxiety and recreationally. Hopefully I can get another script soon

 

[Squeaky]

I got my script for nerve pain in my legs and feet from pinched nerves in my back. They started me on Gabapentin for it but that didn?t work so they moved me up to Lyrica. Once that started, none of my doctors has ever blinked at writing new prescriptions.

 

[Squeaky]

Just posting to keep this thread alive

 

[Scogar]

No, I didn't taper, and believe this is very dangerous.

I know most people don't WANT to believe that Lyrica gives bad withdrawals, but they haven't actually been through the experience. I'll just say I've withdrawn from most opiates and found it to be worse. Might not be worse than withdrawing from a large methadone habit, but that's not saying much, it's still bad enough. Respect the drug, like any drug that can mess with your psycholgy as bad.

The ones who say withdrawals aren't that bad are usually the ones who have been taking low doses for a short period of time. You might need to have taken it regularly for as long as 3 months to get bad withdrawals, but we are all different. Very small doses might not give so bad results. Would be very interested in hearing other's experiences.

Hi Ninae,

Did the mental and physical symptoms just stop one day or did they gradually improve for you? I?m in week 8 and still getting it pretty tough as you describe, still problems with breathing and the mental side is unbearable.

Cheers.

 

[Squeaky]

I found a list of DEA schedules for all drugs with dates when they became controlled (USA only). It goes back a few decades. Kind of interesting for anybody who cares:

https://www.deadiversion.usdoj.gov/schedules/orangebook/orangebook.pdf

 

[Cyanoide]

Yes mods, this is a duplicate of my other post but since I think it's an important subejct and I can give some useful advice I'll also post this in this thread for people who want to read about or need help with pregabalin withdrawal.

I can give advice regarding my tapers but please don't take this as some kind of medical advice, and we are all different and react differently.

When I've used such high amounts (like now) I usually start the taper from 900 mg. I haven't found any need to start the taper from something like 1500 mg or 1800 mg. 900 mg has always been enough to keep the worst WD at bay and sleep somewhat normally.

Usually, I reduce the dose every 4th day by 150 mg, but for some every 7th day may be needed.

So from 900 mg, it would look like this
900 mg x 4 days
600 mg x 4 days (this step I usually cut the dose by 300 mg, for some it would be better to stay at 750 mg for 4-7 days).
450 mg x 4 days
300 mg x 4 days
150 mg x days (this is where it gets hard, so I sometimes stay at 150 mg for 7 days)
75 mg x 4 days
So this taper would take 24-27 days.

Some people even reduce from 75 mg -> 50 mg -> 25 mg but I have never found a need for that. 75 mg is such a small dose that you really don't get any severe withdrawal at that point anymore.
A more cautious version of my taper schedule is to reduce by increments of 75 mg; 750 mg -> 675mg -> 625 mg -> 575 -> 525 -> 475 -> 425 -> 375 -> 325 -> 275 -> 225 -> 175 -> 125 -> 75 (and from 75 with increments of 25 to 50 and then 25). This would obviously take considerably longer.

There are few remedies for pregablin withdrawal. Benzos alleviate some, but only some, symptoms. And if you do take benzos, take them vary sparingly. As you probably know, they are a completely different ballgame to withdraw from. Gabapentin most probably share a cross tolerance with pregabalin, as both are gabepentinoids with pretty much the same method of action. That's why I would avoid taking gabapentin. There is a study that says there is no cross tolerance between gabapentin and pregabalin (e.g. this study) https://patents.google.com/patent/EP1196160B1), IME they share a very high degree of cross tolerance. Although gabapentin is both less potent and weaker in just about every aspect, it might be easier to switch to it when you've reached a lower dose of Lyrica and then continue the taper with gabapentin. But I have to admit that trying to switch to gabapentin has failed every time; gabapentin helps somewhat with the insomnia but not for the anxiety and depression.

On another note, I've found Taurine to help quite a bit with the anxiety. It's a (very) weak GABA-A agonist and has a slight sedative effect in high doses. And it's very safe to take it. Other than that, there's not many other drugs that may help. For insomnia, a small dose of mirtazapine (7.5 mg) and a high dose of melatonin (6-10 mg) does also help somewhat for the insomnia. I'm not that familiar with antiemetics for the nausea, but there are certainly some ones (any idea anyone?) out there that helps. Maybe antihistamienes like hydroxyzine. If you have a raised BP or heart rate during withdrawal, a beta blocker like propranolol is helpful.

To be really honest, the thing that has helped the WD's most is alcohol. And that's pretty much the worst thing to start taking regularly. If you have a high degree of self control, taking a few beers every now and then is no big issue though. If you struggle with insomnia, I can't say that you can't take a few beers if the insomnia is really bad. You might get a few hours sleep until the alcohol wears off but that may be better than no sleep at all.

Pregabalin withdrawal is hard but perfectly achievable. I've detoxed from benzos 3 times (and has to do a 4th it seems...) and that was in a totally different league, you can't die from Lyrica withdrawal, it's just nasty but it also gets better somewhat quickly in my opinion. There's no PAWS like for benzos that lasts months to years. When WD'ing from pregabalin, you start feeling better within days to weeks. Again, some suffer considerably longer, but at least it may give you some hope that for all it's not the case.

 

[Barry big tits]

I have been on lyrica 300mg pd for around a year now and it's completely saved my life. Along with the snri venlafaxine which acts like the tricyclic antidepressant amitriptyline only without the side effects.

The combination of these drugs along with diazepam, have reduced the nerve and muscular pain from my fibromyalgia by around 50%. I can actually go out and see my friends and babysit my nephew and feel like a real person again.

I never get a recreational high of lyrica. It just does alot for me. Perhaps for getting high the tolerance increases quickly. But for pain reduction it still works great. I will be happy to stay on this dose for the rest of my life.

If your going to go out and buy a drug thats not for nerve pain reduction and to get really high. Go get some strong opiates/opiods or some good weed. Don't go out and buy the most expensive street drug unless you want some help coming off opiates or benzo's. It's good for that too.