Pregabalin (Lyrica) AMAZING for Opiate Withdrawl

[Diego55]

I'm a herion addict and I'm posting this for anyone else who is finding it hard to go thru withdrawls. I am prescribed lyrica 300mg x3 daily , diazepam7mg x3 daily, temazepam 20mg at night, tramadol 100mg x3 daily for pain, dihydrocodeine 60mg x4 daily for pain and lorazepam 1mg x3 daily. I am on all these drugs for bi-polar and generalised anxiety disorder I am also on keppra for epilepsy. In my opinion if I am planning to kick the gear then Lyrica is gonna be my best buddy for the next week or so. LYRICA takes all my withdrawls away, I am left with the sniffles and a bit of the shits but thats it. If I am having a good day with my bi polar and i've had my lyrica then I am able to go out and socialise with people while I am "Withdrawing" from heroin. LYRICA is an amazing drug for withdrawls, it is my lifesaver. I just want to let anyone out there who doesn't know about this drug to find out about it. It is prescribed for generalised anxiety disorder for me but others have it prescribed for nerve pain management.

I hope others find this post usefull in their quest for recovery.

Good luck.

 

[THECATINTHEHAT]

I'm using it for opiate withdrawal as well, it's amazing. If youre getting 240mg dhc a day I would imagine that would cover a fair amount of the wd anyway.

I'd kill for 20mg temazepam at night atm.

 

[ScotchMist]

Interesting

 

[THECATINTHEHAT]

It kils almost all symptoms, it's amazing. Surely in the future this will be used for detoxing opiates.

 

[LFC]

LYRICAis one thing I don't have
Have 120mg dhc, xanax, alprazolam, lozerpam and valiums,
Also have sub's but there can also can wd at the end

 

[5StarSquatHotel]

It kils almost all symptoms, it's amazing. Surely in the future this will be used for detoxing opiates.

Once it goes generic I think it will do but at the moment it costs the Nhs about £70 for a box of 56. Its a strange drug and seems to have many uses but I do worry about the effects of long term use with these some what new drugs.

 

[THECATINTHEHAT]

Once it goes generic I think it will do but at the moment it costs the Nhs about £70 for a box of 56. Its a strange drug and seems to have many uses but I do worry about the effects of long term use with these some what new drugs.

Yeah you're right to be, when benzos came out they were touted as non-addictive by the pharm companies. Who knows what might actually be going on with any new drug, I mean look at what happened with seroxat.

 

[Raasyvibe]

fuck withdrawal medicines... just say no!!

 

[plumbus-nine]

I just want to second this.

Have been in opioid maintenance up to 600mg/d of XR morphine for around 3 years (with some months off, when I used dissociatives - the second best route imho, on O-PCM I felt GREAT when the opioids faded away instead of entering w/d but needed to stay on dissos 24/7 for at least some days).
Then started pregabalin 600mg/d for anxiety. It doesn't really do the trick for me, but continued for some reason then realised that I could took just 240mg XR morphine without any noticeable changes.. recently decided to take an additional 600mg of pregab as I entered slight w/d and had no morphine with me. After one hour or so I began to feal so very at ease, active, empathic, alive like for so long time not.. When I later took a bit of morphine, as soon as it hit me (yeah, I felt 20mg!) ... I REGRET TAKING IT!

Now switched without any withdrawal, no diarrhea, no flu, no anxiety, NOTHING. But I am taking more than recommended, as only at least 600mg at once, better 900 or 1.2g, give me the stimulating effects.
Let's see how long this lasts and how it is to get off pregabalin which sounds like having similar w/d than opiates when taken in high doses. Still, as it does not interact with opioid receptors, it might be possible to use it only short time and get away with it.

I suspect pregabalin to activate/stimulate endorphins, as otherwise there is no way (I know of) to get over ALL the w/d symptoms. COMPLETELY ALL. I have NO side effects as of now. It's a different beast even than NMDA antagonists, loperamide, clonidine and even benzos, as I feel NO impact on wakefulness at all. Sleep like a baby, covered in gabaergic fluff but at the same time socialably stimulated. Pregab is truly unique.

Edit: Oh, and no craving for opiates at all.. but it comes with one thing: After the stimulation fades away, I begin craving stimulants/low dose disso, something which was gone while on opiates.... weird.

 

[Jabberwocky]

As far as I have read, understood and felt, pregabalin reduces release and activity of glutamate which is main excitatory neurotransmitter. In layman's term, glutamate is opposite to GABA, and if the nerves are less excited they are firing less often. That has impact on all systems in the body and effect is that it is essentially calming (quieting) CNS. Less excitability in CNS equals less (nor)adrenalin and more GABA. It is surely more complicated than that but I think I got the gist right. Also, pregabalins mode of action is still, like many other medications, not fully understood. Bottom line, pregabalin can do wonders for acute phase of withdrawal but I personally have to taper it down fairly quickly or I will have quite nasty pregabalin withdrawal. But for first few days of short acting opioid withdrawal combination of pregabalin, benzo and therapeutic dose of loperamide does wonders. Just quickly taper and stop benzo and then pregabalin. Loperamide will be easy to stop if pregabalin and some benzo are used.

 

[fightingthetoot]

Press do indeed help great for heroin WD, but I hate the sell my 300mgs every week. I have some of the same problems , why you get so many good meds lol jell lol

 

[plumbus-nine]

Pregab is afaik a bit more complicated than they do sell it to us. Remember that stimulant effect you get oh so briefly from acute higer dosages? That's glutamate pregab hits GAT-1, the primary(?) reuptake pump for glutamate and seemingly as an antagonist. Together with inducing some other enzyme, which converts glutamate into GABA. I'd go as far as suspecting the "main" a2d ca channel inhibition to be more or less irrelevant for most of us around here who don't suffer from seizures, when it's true what they say and this blockade only affects hyper polarized neurons or something which is related to seizures. It might offer protection but not the primary way of efficacy.

Interesting here that pregab seems to completely inhibit these nasty electric brain zaps resulting from SSRI withdrawal. Pregab is by some wicked way serotonergic itself, at least it has reports of causing serotonin syndrome! Yet guess the zap reduction might indeed be the seizuroleptic properties.

So - strange here, as high doses should cause LESS withdrawal than low ones, as when the blockade of GAT-1 gets off, we have net LESS of glutamate, so balancing out the effects from releasing the other enzyme? But GAT-1 upregulates very fast.
That some effects seem to last way longer than the 6h of acute half life, as well as full w/d apparently (yet I managed my way round but will probably not stay that) kicks in also after a day or so, that will be when the GABA enzyme induction resolves..?

I want these effects alone. An own chemical for each enzyme, and tool around with them. Pregab is no magic bullet like NMDA antagonists but so far the best pharm corps were able to come out imho about withdrawals.
Pregab taber should be possible with a benzo, as said. But we'll see.

 

[Jabberwocky]

@plumbus-nine it was great to read and to imagine that I understand it (just because I recognised what you were talking about ). But truth be told I am in no position even to fully understand what you wrote, let alone to understand pregabalin itself. To be honest I was just parroting what I read. But pregabalin is a really weird one. I once explained the feeling like "the mixture of alcohol, psilocybin, mdma and benzodiazepine but non of the mentioned". It is just that weird of a drug. But it is the great one for the withdrawals that much I can vouch.