Posted by headachequeen on December 28, 2003, at 9:36:52
In reply to Re: effects of topamax, posted by dragonfly25 on December 27, 2003, at 23:42:46
> i started losing my appetite at 25-50mg can't remember, but i just started to forget to eat- not good. i noticed the stupidness at 50mg and i started feel really empty headed at 75mg- so i am back to 50....but after reading the posts i think i am going off the drug!
I think you are reading only the negative and fearful posts...
I too had some of the negative side effects, but learned to counter them and have had a good experience with topomax...the side effects of the topomax can either be overcome... drink lots of water, take vitamins and supplements, and so on...
or they will pass...often the side effects occur because you are increasing the doses too quickly... and your body has not had time to adjust... the schedule I was given was a suggestion, I was told to follow it loosely, but that if I was not ready to move to the next dose to wait a week or two... to listen to my body... and that is important
interesting sidebar to all this...
I have been toying with the idea of increasing the dosage of the topomax and decreasing the dosage of tegretol whose side effects I am unable to counteraffect... and whose side effects do not go away after time... I have been on Tegretol for over two years now and still have the side effects that accompany it and they are most dis-comforting (arrgghhh never thought I would use a non-word like that)
This Christmas, a time that is always an extreme positive in our home, was NOT, and we know will not be a positive experience next year, either, no matter how hard we try to overcome it. We downplayed the extreme changes and the stress as much as we could; at one point I had decided to cancel the celebrations entirely. Christmas night, despite the anti-seizure meds, I had a seizure around three o'clock, serious enough that I had to go to emergency.
Here we have a team of doctors supplied to the emerg by a service although a few of the local doctors, my own included spend a day of their own time in the e r - but not during the holidays it would seem...
the er doctor who saw me asked what anti-seizure medication I was on and when I said tegretol rolled his eyes before I could say topomax and asked who my neuro was and if he had come into the twentieth century let alone the twenty-first... I said he had put me on topomax as well and explained why...
he said that was a step forward...
and explained that he had started work toward specialising in neurology until he discovered the sheer addiction of emergency work... and that in his experience topomax had far more to offer..
he agreed that there were side effects and we discussed them and the way to deal with them...sounded like discussions here <g>
but then we discussed the side effects of tegretol and his opinion of it is that it is not effective enough ...
and he suggested that I increase the topomax...
he wrote me a prescription for increased topomax...
increasing it by 25 mg a day for two weeks (sound familiar? <S>) then upping it to 50 until I reach 200 on top of the 200 I already take in the evening... decreasing the tegretol each week by that amount...
by that time I shall still be taking tegretol but only 200 mg... and if that is working then I am to discuss dropping it entirely with my own doctor... or he says to come back and see him...
I have greater confidence in this programme than in the tegritol believe me...
kat
poster:headachequeen
thread:50878
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20031225/msgs/293982.html