Requip withdrawl experiences- sleeplesness

[rtlegpain]

I may have spoken too soon. While the RLS during waking hours is gone while I sleep I guess I am still kicking, per my husband.

My Ferritin actually did not go up anymore and dropped from 47 to 44. I was a bit cockey and lowered my dose and I guess I should not have.

I am back up to the original dosage when my Ferritin levels were rising so hopefully it will resolve.

I have been having a nagging pain in the psoas area of my right side lately that keeps throwing my hip into a flare. I don't know if this is RLS related or not. I have not been able to sleep because of it.

[ctravel12]

Hi rtlegpain. It is good to see you post again, but sorry that you are having a rough time.

Have you talked to your dr regarding this problem?

Please keep us posted on how you are doing.

[Justjay]

Can anyone please give me some indication as to why when I stopped taking Requip I actually started feeling better?? I had taken it for about two months (weaned onto it for one month) and started feeling very irritable toward hubby. I stopped taking it cold turkey and was suprised that I nearly immediately felt better, not worse. No withdrawls, no sickness, nothing. Felt happy to be looking at hubby again without the desire to snap at his every word.

Perhaps it was that it was a small dose, dunno. But after reading all about some of the troubles people have had with their withdrawls from it I am sure wondering

[ViewsAskew]

Most of the horrid withdrawal experiences are from people who augmented. That means their RLS got worse from the medication. It's only in those cases that stopping Mirapex or Requip causes problems.

[ctravel12]

Hi Justjay and welcome to this group. That is wonderful that you did not have any problems going off of requip cold turkey. I am so happy for you. That is definitely a plus in that department for you.

Is your rls doing good, if so I am happy for you and hope that it continues for you.

Thank you for sharing this with us as we learn from everyone on this board.

Please let us know how you are doing.

[Justjay]

My RLS is a pain, I like most here am very tired. Legs sore, hot etc... and am not on any medication at the moment as the doc is still deciding what to do with me.

I did try a large dose of magnesium last night (after reading one of the posts on this forum) and that helped with the achey legs a little, but not the hot feet.

Work in progress I think, much like many others.

[combinola]

I'm new to the board as well.

I am a caregiver to my 95-year-old father. He had been taking requip for a year when he augmented badly. So, now we are weaning off the requip. We are on day 5 of no requip at all after 16 days of slowly lowering the dosage from 2.5 mgs down to .5.

This is no fun. Sunday was hard. Monday was pretty good and I thought things would be fine - hah. Tuesday was miserable for him all day. Wednesday it let up a little and I called the doctor. We decided to try to stick this out. Last night - Wednesday night -was agony for him. Today seems a little better. I so hope this gets better soon.

I have a good relationship with his gerontologist and he will support me in anything we want to try. I am currently trying to get through this with hydrocodone and we have upped the dosage twice. If things are not better tomorrow, we will probably try the methadone and see if that helps. I have been so tempted to just give him requip again, but I only want to go through this once.

At 95, my goal is to keep my dad comfortable.

[ctravel12]

Hi combinola and welcome to this group. First off, I want to say what a wonderful caregiver that you are for your father. That is so sad what your father is going through. Augmenting is a miserable thing to do. I am glad that you have a good relationship with his dr.

Myself personally, as I am not a dr nor have any medical backkground, I would not put him back on requip but check with his dr to find out what he can take so he will be a bit more comfortable.

Also being new to this site, go to the forum New to RLS "Managing RLS" there is an excellent article to read from the Mayo Clinic Algorithm. You may also want to bring it to his dr too.

I hope that this has been of some help.

Please keep us posted on how he is doing.

[slowactive]

new to this form and had just posted about sleep deprived, I get 5 hours at night and 1 hour during the day, seeing Dr. on monday June 11. hoing he wil do something. my iron levelis good though ferritin at 26. talking to a naturopatic Dr. hoping maybe a diet change will help.
thanks for asking the ? it helped me not fell lone on about lack of sleep.

[ctravel12]

Hi slowactive and welcome to this group. Being sleep deprived is one of the most miserable thing that can happen to anyone. I have and know that others have been down that road and it is a very lonely one.

With being new to this group go to the forum New to RLS "Managing RLS" There is an excellent article from the Mayo Clinic Algorithm. Please read it and if possible print it out and give it to your dr. I know that you saw your dr already, but you may want to bring it to him. Another good site is www.rlshelp.org

Please keep us posted on how you are doing.

[rtlegpain]

new to this form and had just posted about sleep deprived, I get 5 hours at night and 1 hour during the day, seeing Dr. on monday June 11. hoing he wil do something. my iron levelis good though ferritin at 26. talking to a naturopatic Dr. hoping maybe a diet change will help.
thanks for asking the ? it helped me not fell lone on about lack of sleep.

A Ferritin of 26 should be considered low, what are your lab normal ranges? I think a Ferritin of 60-70 is more the average. My Ferritin was 18 when I started and now finally 62 and I'm happy to say all rls symptoms are totally gone, hopefully for good. I took 2 - 324 mg tablets of ferrous gluconate since late September to raise my levels. Constipaton is a problem and I cannot tolerate any more than that so I only add about points per week. I had a period when my levels stopped increasing in January-March.

My right psoas pain has been linked to a cyst on my right ovary. I'm considering surgery to remove. I had originally thought th tightened right side may have been related to rls but think not now after this recent discovery.

I still do not sleep well but thing I have narrowed it down to the cyst.

[lambchop]

Hi everyone- I noticed melatonin mentioned a few times here. I have had good results using a time-released melatonin. I stay asleep longer with it. Look for it in specialty vitamin stores. The regular melatonin only keeps me asleep for a few hours.If you're interested, go to http://www.mothernature.com/shop/detail.cfm/sku/40870
As a side note, I too suffer from RLS, but I happen to have been born with very high iron levels.Just goes to show how varied the causes of it are. For me, the artificial sweetner aspartame triggers horrible RLS episodes (see my post under non-pharmeceutical, "Aspartame-the culprit for me"
I hope someone out there finds this useful
d

[rtlegpain]

The cyst seems to have naturally gone away with a period. So the pain on my right side which seems to come and go is either tied to the continual forming of ovary cysts or a colon issue or in my opinion mild rls.

I'm tired of going to doctors to dx this as they never do.