Comments on: Bipolar Disorder Medication Spotlight: Neurontin (Gabapentin)

By: New to this med

New to this med — Sat, 04 Feb 2012 09:43:17 +0000

I was just prescribed neurontin 4 days ag for anxiety, I was started on 200mg a day, and just bumped it up to 400mg twice a day. It has helped some with my anxiety, but I still get anxiety at times. I also have had some pretty bad side affects, such as loss of balance, foggy thinking, hallucinations, very irritiable, and a lot of enegry. im not sure how I feel about neurontin, I hated it at first but, now I have so much energy and feel great, so I guess ill have to wait and see if it last.

By: RB

RB — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 12:27:10 +0000

My husband was recently hospitalized for a non related illness, meningitis, that affected his liver functions. They suspected the Depakote he was taking for his BPII was partially to blame, so they took him off of it and his prozac and put him on Neurontin. I know for a fact it is not working at all for him. He is regressing back to his cycling of depression and agitation. I am very angry at the doctor, because my husband will likely not seek treatment on his own and our relationship will again be tragically affected. We had just had the best year of our marriage ever. Now it’s back to being verbally abused and beings subjected to bursts of rage. He has just started a new job that will also suffer for it. He’s always had trouble with work because of the BPII, and had finally settled into a good routine and getting his feet under him. Thanks for ruining our life, Doc.

By: JKStephenson

JKStephenson — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 18:15:17 +0000

I am taking gabapentin. I have mixed feelings about it. I have doubled my dosage of it. I still get anxiety and have to take ativan (lorazepam) to take the edge off. I take 600 mg. 3 times a day. I have read many things about gabapentin and I think that it is not working like I would like. I went off of it for awhile and had terrible withdrawals from it.

By: Denise

Denise — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 02:11:48 +0000

I was just prescribed Gabapentin for bipolar disorder. I have only been on it 4 days and I have had terrible side effects: fatigue, droziness, irritability, and severe traveling pain in my neck and spine. This drug is not for me!

By: Sarah

Sarah — Tue, 26 Apr 2011 04:10:58 +0000

I have bipolar II and take this drug. I also have fibromyalgia. It helps me sleep, which has been HUGE, as I have been an insomniac since I was 12. Incidently, I think the bipolar kicked in at that time as well. It works fairly well for me, though I can still feel myself cycle. I just hit a manic phase, but I just renovated the kitchen rather than other crazy stuff. I think, for me, it takes the edge off. Is it possible to get “used” to a dose? I was on the lowest does and it seemed to help, then I got very depressed and my dr increased the dose. Recently, I’ve been very depressed again. Is it possible that I need to increase it again?

By: LS

LS — Sat, 26 Mar 2011 00:41:16 +0000

I was taking Neurontin for a nerve pain disorder, but I am tampering off of it because it made me too tired and lethargic and made me really thirsty and crave salty things. I just didn’t generally feel like myself. I left like I was always kind of down and want to sleep all day even when I was happy and normally I have a lot of energy. Also, I would usually forget to take the 3rd dose and the pills were HUGE! It didn’t seem to work for the pain though, although for me the problem isn’t that bad.

By: TDD

TDD — Mon, 21 Feb 2011 20:20:14 +0000

I was diagnosed with BP in the Fall of 2010 so I am just starting medication mixes. I just got an increased dose of neurontin from my DR last week as I had no improvement from it on a dose of 300 in the am and 300 in the pm. I also take depakote that I will be weening off of as it is making me gain weight and I think it’s making me moody in the morning as I cannot get up. Today, I popped a second 400 dose of neurontin 2 hours after the first to address my outraged anger at my kids. It did help relax me and now I will ask the doctor if I can increase to see if it will help my outbursts. I will start lamictal on Thursday to replace depakote. Crossing my fingers! Thanks for all your posts, they were very helpful for a new person on this journey.

By: GF

GF — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 21:26:18 +0000

Ops…im not taking 900mgs 3 times a day, its 300mg 3 times a day.

By: GF

GF — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 21:24:52 +0000

I was prescribed Gabapentin as a sub for Xanax. I am diagnosed Bipolar and GED. Originally it was prescribed for getting off of the Xanax. Afer a few weeks of taking 900mg 3 times a day, i began to notice my anxiety was oddly low and my moods were stabalizing. Ive been taking it now for 6 months. Im amazed that it works so well for me, i thought i had tried everything. I had thought I would be stuck on Benzos for the rest of my life. I hope that i can continue taking Gabapentin. I also hope that since this medicine seems to be pretty safe with tolerable side effects, it will be studied more so that it could be at least available for more to try.

By: Kim Harris

Kim Harris — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 21:32:41 +0000

I take Gabapentin (the generic form of Neurotin) for Diabetic Neuropathy. I am up to the max per day my doctor told me. I take 3600 mg’s per day (1800 in the afternoon and 1800 at night). While this medication greatly helps with the Nerve pain in my feet, it is no longer taking all of it away. Since I am at my max, I don’t know what will happen now. I also was told I am bipolar…I was not prescibed this for bipolar, but I do know that I don’t lose my temper so bad after being on this drug. Before I could lose my temper and it was almost like someone else was in my body…I could have killed someone and not thought twice about it and not realizing what I was doing enough to stop. I think this is a very good drug, and besides working up to the maximum dose and getting use to the diziness while doing it (working up to max dose), I have not noticed any side effects much besides the eye movement and it went away after I got use to the new dosage.