How to virtually cure panic disorder with low dose Gabapentin
MISSION STATEMENT
I am not a doctor and I am not pretending to be a doctor, but I am the self proclaimed worlds expert on panic disorder. I am a Mechanical Engineer by education. I had my first panic attack at age 17 and it became chronic by age 27. I could barely function by the time I was finally diagnosed and put on medication. The medications were horrible. Thus began my twenty year search for a better treatment. I have tested over thirty compounds ( see research section) and finally found .125 mg of gabapentin would “virtually” cure me with no side effects. My goal is to get some researcher, panic disorder clinic, NIMH, someone to verify my results. I can’t believe how horrible I feel without this medication and I can’t believe how well and normal I feel on it so I can understand the medical community’s skepticism. Medical paradigms are the hardest to change. I will bet any skeptic $20,000 this treatment works, but I pick the patients. Many GAD people have occasional panic attacks but do not have panic disorder.
TREATMENT
If you have panic disorder I believe gabapentin will virtually cure you. However, it is a tricky drug to take. Therefore, if you meet the following criteria I believe it will work.A diagnosis of PD with your first attack coming “out of the blue” or suddenly.
Benzodiazepines work very well at first but because of their addictive nature become less effective/desirable.
Once the disease reached a chronic state you could barely function without some type of medication.
You find alcohol causes panic/anxiety symptoms.
You have responded to Depakote treatment.
You tried gabapentin and had a negative reaction. (Tremors, feeling awful) The smallest dose of gabapentin is 100mg and does not work or mix with benzodiazepines.
Some of the symptoms I’ve had include: out of the blue attacks, nausea, dysphoria, racing heartbeat, inability to sleep, nervousness, depression, depersonalization, dizziness, feeling like I can’t breathe, feeling spacey, feeling like my head is going to explode.
How to take
For panic disorder patients this drug does NOT mix with benzodiazepines! If you think you can take the two together or just stop taking a BZ for a few days or weeks YOU ARE WRONG. If you’re using .25 BZ occasionally that’s ok but if you’re using it daily you must go through BZ withdrawal before you can use this drug. I KNOW. I would suggest something like Depakote as a transitional drug to get off of Klonopin and then use gabapentin but never tested this. I went from Depakote to mebicar and then to gabapentin and had no issues so I’m only guessing Depakote could be used to go to gabapentin directly. This is a huge problem since most of us are hooked on BZs and can’t get off. It takes three to six months to get unaddicted to a BZ. I suggest contacting some PD clinic (there are many around the country) to try this. If you are not addicted to a BZ I use 1mg a day at first. I have taken .25 four times a day and I have taken it all at once at bedtime. It doesn’t seem to matter. It does not work like a BZ. You will probably notice nothing when taking this drug at first but very slowly you will feel better every week. It takes about a month or two to really work well but once it works you’re done.AS soon as the drug begins to work ( this may not be obvious but clumsiness, sleeping difficulty and a heaviness in your legs or arms may be apparent) start cutting the dose back to .125 daily. Failure to reduce the dose will give poor results. Even this dose will quickly become too much and I cut to once every other day and then once a week or as needed. This drug is not a tranquilizer and taking more will not make you feel better. I typically take less and less and eventually go off for extended times. I never feel panicky and I never feel like I need to take a pill. I find this drug needs to be taken like insulin, too much is no good and too little is no good. I use to call them my magic pills but now call them my miracle pills. I can’t explain it but it seems to return things to normal and it tends to stay there. DO NOT OPEN THESE CAPSULES. GABAPENTIN IS CAUSTIC AND WILL BURN YOUR THROAT AND YOU WON’T EVEN KNOW IT DUE TO ITS ANTI PAIN EFFECT. IT MUST BE COMPOUNDED BY AN APOTHECARY INTO LOWER DOSE CAPSULES. Be careful with the 1 mg. dose as you can burn your mouth on hot food and not even know it till your skin peels off your gums!
BACKGROUND and RESEARCH
I had my first panic attack when I was 17. While out to eat on my high school prom night, I had just taken one bite of food when “all of a sudden “ I felt extremely nauseated, dysphoria, flushed and my heart raced. The episode lasted only a few seconds. I went to the restroom where I washed my face with cool water and tried to calm down. After that I pecked away at my food. After leaving the restaurant I felt fine for the rest of the evening.
That first attack occurred so fast and passed so quickly I didn’t think much of it. Little did I know at the time that it would return years later. I had a few episodes between 17 and 27 but they were mild and few and far between. However, by the time I was 27, I was beginning to have more attacks, more symptoms and the severity of the attacks was increasing, until by age 29 I was in a constant state of panic. I was at this point I started going to doctors who told me nothing was wrong with me.
A lot of my symptoms were physical, but a lot were mental too and I thought this was an emotional problem. I looked up anxiety and fear in the phone book and found psychologists who were treating such symptoms. After seeing a few of them and spending a lot of money, it became apparent to me the treatment provided wasn’t helping. I was getting worse by the day. I finally called the Anxiety Disorders of America and talked to a doctor who told me it sounded like I had panic disorder. To which I replied “whats that?” Through that contact I went to a doctor who sent me to a psychiatrist. At that time I didn’t know the difference between a psychologist and a psychiatrist.
Lucky for me he was a good and well respected and he put my on tofranil which started to work within days. At first I was ecstatic that anything would work, but after a few months I realized it didn’t work that well and the side effects were almost as bad as the disease. So began my odyssey to find a better treatment for what ailed me. Panic disorder is a rare mental illness effecting a small percentage of the population. Nobody gives a shit about us. We’re on our own.
In the early eighties I found information and or research on panic disorder to be virtually non-existent ( still true today). If I even mentioned the word panic disorder I’d get a “what” response. It seemed I was the only person in the world who had it. My futile search led me to believe that if I was going to make any progress on improving my quality of health, I’d have to do it on my own. In 1988, I called the National Institute of Health (NIMH) and volunteered for a 3 month study they were doing on panic, which would require me to stay there in Washington at the Institute. I took a leave of absence from work and went. It didn’t take long for me to realize that what wasn’t known far exceeded what was known. I did test several drugs like Persantine. It did something but was better at reducing my blood pressure. I also tried Prozac which was best at making me nervous.
After I left the NIMH I volunteered for some studies being done by the drug companies. I participated at Princeton, the University of Pennsylvania and the University of Buffalo. I became an expert at testing drugs. I could tell within two weeks if a drug worked but it takes about three months to really evaluate one. None of the drugs tested worked well.
I often tested compounds on my own since I had no restrictions. I could do what I wanted and more determined than anyone to find an answer. I would test any compound at first but eventually narrowed my search to drugs that effected the GABA system since they seemed to work the best. Hence, gabapentin. You can see a complete list of tested drugs and results in following table.
SUMMARY
To repeat, I’m publishing this looking for any clinic, researcher , drug company, or the NIMH to validate my results. I have tried in the past to no avail. I still can’t believe how well it works and how little is needed. I spend my time playing golf, pickle ball, racquetball, biking, yoga, helping others and traveling. I feel completely normal on and off this drug. After my psychiatrist finally gave me a prescription for the small dose I never went back except to tell him I was cured. After about twenty years of bitching about every drug he ever gave me he believed me. He called the drug company to tell them and they told him it was a placebo effect. BULLSHIT, my doc knew better. Once in a while I have my GP refill my script cause some of my pills are twenty five years old, just in case I need them which I do occasionally. Three times in 25 years. At one time I had panic attacks in restaurants and felt like I was going to get sick and years later I had a panic attack while driving and felt like I couldn’t breathe and ended up in emergency. WTF. Don’t try to figure it out. Both times gabapentin cured me within weeks. I just shake my head in disbelief. 25 Years ago I gave a presentation to a biotech company that was trying to develop a drug for panic disorder. They believed me but said there was no money in it since it’s an old generic drug.
I’m sure the geniuses at Pfizer think I’m nuts since no one believes this small a dose does anything but I got $20,000 that says they are wrong. 25 years ago I published this info before the internet. Many people responded. Unfortunately, many with GAD who would drink to medicate rushed to try it to no avail. The few with true panic disorder who I thought were perfect were too scared and addicted to BZ to try it. That is the conundrum. While I feel perfectly normal on gabapentin, just like a diabetic shouldn’t OD on sugar, I try to keep my stress level low. I’m not going to Disneyworld and get on the Tower of Terror, but for everyday living, no problem. I can even watch Dateline by myself. I can be contacted through the comment section below. I will consult if needed.