Misc Phenibut vs. Gabapentin?

[SizzleSword]

I am prescribed gabapentin for anxiety now that I've been tapered off of klonopin. My dose is 400mg four times a day, and at first, that dose worked VERY well. My social anxiety was completely gone and I wasn't as worried about things like I normally am.

The thing is, after taking this for three months, I'm am still prescribed the same dose and I usually take twelve 400mgs a day (three at a time, four times a day). So, of course, I run out way before I can get a refill. I've talked to my psychiatrist about increasing my dose and she told me that this is the highest dose that they allow at the facility (400mg four times a day).

I was going through some threads and I saw something about phenibut, which seems to also work the same way gabapentin does, and is sold at vitamin stores. I read up a lot about it and called around some health food stores (GNC, etc.) and nobody seems to carry it, but I see a lot of online stores that have it.

My main question is this... Is there a possibility that phenibut can substitute for gabapentin in any way? I'm not really trying to take amazing doses and get messed up off the stuff, I'm purely using it for anxiety. I've seen people talk about taking huge doses and feeling hungover the next day, but I'm not really aiming for that type of thing.

Anyway, there it is.. Can phenibut substitute for gabapentin in a situation involving social anxiety?

 

[phung]

Everyone reacts to this substance differently but I think when used infrequently, it's a much healthier choice than benzodiazepines as you said you originally took. If you have concerns you could talk to your doctor about it too since it is a legal substance. Here's my suggestion though:

I would buy some online and try around 600mg see how you feel in the morning. I've taken as much as 8g before and regretted it severely (don't ever do that).

Nowadays I take around 1800mg in the morning for a good anxiolytic affect, but it seems to build up in your system, so you can't take it everyday. Sometimes I'll take 4g for recreational purposes but this amount has gotten my friends sick and I have a ridiculously high tolerance to GABAergics. 1600mg usually gets my friends dancing and singing with a few beers.

Don't take it more than twice a week or you will get hangovers and the likelihood of hangovers are lessened by taking it in the morning rather than late in the day. Also, the the following day having a cup of coffee or around 50-100mg of caffeine clears any remaining fog.

Hope that helps.

 

[homeydontplaythat]

yeah, with gabapentin you can only take it two or 3 times a week if you want to feel anything. lyrica on the other hand you can feel everyday.

 

[Supeudol]

^ I think he was talking about Phenibut - only taking it 2x per week, cause taking it anymore will get you in trouble with tolerance and withdrawals. And he's right. I'd way rather take my NaGHB powder anyday over phenibut. Much safer IMO.

 

[SizzleSword]

Thanks a lot for the replies.

phung, the way you describe phenibut is almost exactly how I feel/felt with gabapentin. I've been curious and taken kind of a lot of gabapentin before and it sounds almost exactly how you describe phenibut (tolerance building quickly, ~1600mg with some alcohol makes you sing and dance, caffeine clearing up the hangover fog). After looking at some prices it's clear that it's more economical to buy the powder and cap it yourself, so I'm thinking about trying this out.

homeydontplaythat, I know the exact feeling. If I skip a day or two with gabapentin, I can definitely tell that the anxiolytic effect is more pronounced with smaller doses. I've heard of lyrica/pregaabalin but I doubt my psychiatrist would prescribe me that as I feel somewhat lucky to even be prescribed gabapentin.

Supeudol, I think phenibut and gabapentin possess the same tolerance-building characteristics, so I also think it would be safer to only take gabapentin/phenibut every other day or something like that, to avoid tolerance and withdrawl. Also, I'd much rather take GHB as well if I had access to it, but not everyone's so lucky.

 

[love2party]

are you staggering your gabapnetin doses? it works much better that way.

 

[Jamshyd]

I have extensive experience with both drugs, and my best dose of gabapentin is similar to yours. Let me tell you right away that the two drugs have almost nothing in common in terms of effect.

The only - only - way to remedy your problem is to taper down the gabapentin to zero, take a break, then go back to it.

One thing you might want to consider is asking your doc to try a small dose of bupriopion (wellbutrin) along with your gabapentin as many people (myself included) have found bupropion to make it possible to take less gabapentin and experience the same effects.

Another option that will not work out with your doctor is small doses of ketamine, which works like a miracle. Do a search under my name if interested as I've written extensively about that on BL.

p.s. whichever you decide, if you want to get the best out of your gabapentin then don't take more than 400mg within 40mins - 1h. Anything more you take will simply not be absorbed into your body. That's just how the body works with this drug. If you space out your doses, you'll notice a DRAMATIC increase in effect.

 

[edarrin]

^ I think the absorption thing is likely true (I'll try it) and that is how PG s promoted as more bioavailably orally, hence the lower doses. I think PG and GP are basically identical in effect but PG is stronger.


Phenibut , on the other hand , is a strange one. I believe it is a GABA B agonist. Great for sleeping I find. Not really recreational although I can see if you take to much you would probably regret it. Tolerance builds really fast. I find if I take about 1g around 5pm I get a nice sleep. You can't use it more than 2-3 times a week as everyone has said.

 

[SizzleSword]

A friend of mine that's into body-building had a bunch of coupons that I was looking at and I noticed one for some phenibut, so the thought popped back into my head about the few people that had told me that it worked really well for their anxiety and sleep, as well as other things.

I looked at a lot of info on phenibut, suppliers, reviews of different brands, etc. Long story short, I ended up ordering some that had some really positive reviews. Unfortunately it wasn't from the place the coupons were for, but the price was still okay.

Anyway, I got the stuff about a week ago and I had already been off my normal gabapentin dose for about a week, so I figured that if the stuff could have any sort of similarity to gabapentin at all, I could probably tell since I hadn't taken gabapentin for a week.

I dosed 1500mgs at first, stuff was real bitter, took a shower and waited and I started actually feeling something that felt somewhat like what I'd feel on around 800mg of gabapentin. The effects increased over the next three hours, and ended up feeling pretty close to a 1200mg gabapentin dose, almost exactly alike, just lacking a somewhat.. 'trippy' aspect that gabapentin seems to have.

I've taken the stuff three days in a row, then stopped, then I just started again today. The first dose was 1500mgs (like I had mentioned), the next day I took 2000mg, and the day after that I took 2800mg. The stuff feels a LOT like gabapentin, especially if it's combined with even a single shot of alcohol or beer.

Doing more reading I start noticing that some people are saying lots of the phenibut on the market from sleezy body-building sites are actually either, 1. not phenibut, but something else (usually whey protein), 2. phenibut in small amounts mixed with other ingredients, 3. 'cut' phenibut.

The stuff that I got definitely has a good effect, it has the effects I was looking for, and I'm glad I actually gave the stuff a thought again. I think the issue here is that with chemicals like phenibut and gabapantin and pregabalin and such, some people just don't get much out of them, others require really high doses, or other people just expect way too much from them. I think another issue is that a lot of the phenibut that has been tried by people here isn't pure phenibut.

I just thought I'd reply back on this topic since I finally decided to get the stuff and it worked like I hoped it did.