I've been on both lyrica and gabapentin. I still take gabapentin, for mood stabilization and anxiety supposedly. It worked pretty well at first for anxiety, but not sure it does anything for me anymore. Initially, I thought they were sound alternatives to benzos, and according to my psych: no withdrawals.
They both seems to lose their effectiveness pretty quickly and I have personally developed a pretty serious dependency on gabapentin but not an addiction. After 24 hours I start going into wd but I have been on it for years. Make no mistake, both gabapentin and lyrica can create nasty dependencies for some people. The wd can get pretty wretched for the drug having such subtle effects. I've heard anecdotes from people here on BL of pretty fucked up withdrawals even after some relatively short term use. Maybe you will be lucky and not experience it, but that's not something I would count on. I've read of people not improving for a very long time that tapered too fast or went CT. Not like opiates where you are sick for a week and then you are better. Some of these drugs just don't work like that.
Reason I harp on this all the time is because, IMO, drug withdrawal is one of the most fucked up things the human mind can experience, esp psych drug withdrawal. For those of us with legitimate mental health issues, WD can easily be what pushes somebody over the edge. Very few drugs are worth that type of experience. I hope you find something that works for you and maybe lyrica will be it for you, but I would rather take kratom or something personally.
