Hannah wrote:Is it OK to keep increasing Lyrica without any problem.
I can share my experience on this. I got off pramipexole (.375 mg) two years ago. I went to Mayo Clinic (Dr. Silber), and he prescribed 300 mg Lyrica to help with the DA withdrawal symptoms. After two days of hell, I contacted Dr. Silber and asked if I could up it to 450 mg. He consented, and I stayed at that dose for a week. The max sleep I got during that period was about 4 hours, so it probably helped a little, but I experienced some strange side effects, so I went back to 300 mg. Even at 300 mg, I had unwanted side effects, so after a couple of months, I scaled back to 150 mg. I track my sleep pretty closely, and there wasn't much of a difference in my sleep (or the way I felt the following day) between 150 mg and 300 mg, so it was a no-brainer to reduce the dose.
I've been at 150 mg for just under two years, and now I'm wondering if it's helping at all. When I couple it with Kratom, I seem to sleep fairly well (although still up 3 times/night with symptoms), but without Kratom, I'm up 4-5+ times per night. However, I haven't noticed much difference in how I feel (tired/borderline depressed) the following day (Lyrica + Kratom vs. just Lyrica). I plan on taking a drug holiday starting next week, to reset my receptors and see what my baseline symptoms are if nothing else.
I believe the "Clinical Management of RLS" book indicates that for most RLS patients, improvement of RLS symptoms occurs at a mean dose of 300 mg/day. At 150 mg I believe it helps somewhat with my sleep, but probably doesn't help much with my RLS.
Depression is a known side effect of Lyrica, and I'm sure more prevalent the higher the dose. However, with RLS I'm sure many of us are borderline depressed from lack of sleep, so hard to tell if it's that or the Lyrica.
Good luck! I hope it helps to know others have made it through this and that you are not alone.