Just wondering if anyone can help me. I started on Trileptal 2 and a half weeks ago. I have been increasing by 300mg every 4 days and am now taking 450mg morning and 450mg at night. I am experiencing nausea, bad headache and extreme tiredness. I have read that these side effects will lessen in time but I am wondering how long will it take or do I need to decrease the dose. I cannot go to work and spend most of the time on the sofa. I have taken gabapentin and epilim over the past 3 years but have never had such bad side effects. Thanks to anyone who can help.
Sounds like you should call pharmacist and doctor, maybe you need to go up slower. I don't remember how fast or slow I went up the first time. Now I'm on a low dose after surgery. But I don't remember having side effects that bad. Trileptal has different names and forms. Somebody will come on here
Keep Posting!
I take 900mg in the morning and 900mg at night. There definitely is an adjustment period with each increase but, I never felt like I couldn’t function.Maybe this isn’t a good med choice for u!!
I agree about calling your doctor, Anne. Was there a reason you were taken off Gabapentin and Eplim? By this time, those meds will likely have passed out of your system. Trileptal is generally much better tolerated than you seem to be experiencing. Recommended daily dose for seizure control (the primary use of this med) is 1200 mg per day. Most patients are not able to tolerate the 2400 mg/day dose, primarily because of CNS effects.
The following reference is authoritative for the side effects of Trileptal. Please see and read http://www.rxlist.com/trileptal-drug/side-effects-interactions.htm. This website and drugs.com are both excellent for this type of information.
Regards, Red
I wonder if you still have gabapentin in your system and that is what is causing the intense effect. I remember having a headache when I first started the Trileptal. Seems like the first couple of weeks. I started with 6oo mg per day, then went straight to 1200mg per day pretty much. Only had a few days at 900 mg. I had bad pain.
I was on 600mg twice a day and have recently upped it 900 twice a day. The initial increase made me incredibly tired but that is slowly going away. The meds make me tired but when I was at 1200 I got adjusted over time and the tiredness faded.
Occasionally I'll take a 4th pill (2400mg for the day) but not often.
I never had the nausea of headaches that I've read about it but certainly has messed up my detail memory badly which sucks but what can you do? I've been told that it will right itself if I ever get off the meds.
I've been on Trileptal for 2.5 years and it works very well for me overall.
Thank you so much to everyone who replied. I phoned my doctor yesterday and I am reducing dose for a couple to days to see what happens.
Red, I stopped taking the epilim and gabapentin because they both seemed to lose effectiveness after a few months. I was on 2400mg of gabapentin and 25mg endep but still had pain. The reason I started trileptal was it was supposed to have fewer side effects. I hope this is temporary because I don't want to go through a withdrawal again. The withdrawal from gabapentin was terrible, bad dizziness, headaches and nausea.
Thank you for taking the time to reply.