Hair thinning on clonezepam!!!

[horschj]

Hi,

This is my first post and I have had RLS for about 3 years now. When I first went to a doctor he had prescribed me with .5 mg of clonezepam three times a day. The drug worked wonders allowing me to fall asleep at night. I have been taking the drug now for a year and a half and for the last 8 months i gradually started to see thinning of my bangs and a receding hairline is now forming and a lot of hair is starting to fall out. I was so confused to why my hair was starting to fall out. I finally came around to reading that a side effect of clonezepam is excessive hair loss. I am only 23 years old and Im am beginning to become very paranoid about my hair. My question for any of you out there is if you have had the same experience? If so, did you stop taking the medication and did your hair grow back. I have read online that once the medication is stopped the hair does grow back. I keep mentioning my hair loss to my doctors and they do not think it is because of the clonazepam. I tried to stop the drug and start taking mirapex but dropped clonezepam too quickly and started going through some horrible withdrawl sypmtoms. I am now back on clonazepam for a few weeks until I can slowly make a change to a different medication. I am hoping someone out there has experienced this hair loss but has seen regrowth after stopping clonezepam. Thank you for reading any responses will be appreciated.

[becat]

Hi Horschj and welcome to the board,
I didn't do much for me, thus I didnt' take it long enough to be of huge help to you with tihs one. I did have major hair loss with Mirapex after I got into the upper doses I was having to take.
Yes, My hair did grow back, but not as full, but it came back. No your not paranoid and most of us woman would feel the same way. I did.
I'm proud of you that you are coming off of the medication slowly. Withdrawl is so awful and it's really a bad thing to have to go through.
I hope someone that has taken the drug longer will chime in for you. I just wanted you to know we're listening.

[jan3213]

Hi Horschj and welcome!

I've been on Clonzepam and Mirapex for a long time and, so far, my hair has not started thinning. But, I know this has happened to other people who are on one of these drugs.

I wanted to say something about withdrawal. The drugs we are given are really strong and I've had withdrawal from Effexor XR, Paxil, Topamax and even Clonzepam, when I had to go onto a lower dose. And, I didn't go off of any of these drugs "cold turkey". Even going off of them slowly can cause withdrawal---probably more so if you are a person who is sensitive to medication and I am. So, please be very careful!

Good luck. I hope you hear from someone else who knows about the thinning hair! Please keep us posted.

Jan

[horschj]

I probably should have noted that I am a male. I was hoping to get responses from any men that have experienced this type of hair loss using clonazepam. Thank you though for those who replied. My doctor was actually going to put me on mirapex but if this to causes hair thinning I may request something else. Thanks again

[1joeedie]

I hated clonozepam. I was having to take 2 naps a day just to get through the day. I went to a pulmonologist/sleep disorder doctor over a spot on my lung. He noticed rls on my history and asked me about it. He wanted me to go the have a blood test. Ferritin - serrum iron total iron binding capacity. apparently normal is between 44 - 100. mine was 8.
he put me on 325mg iron and vit. c and 7 months later i felt great. no more restless leg syndrom and i had energy. i just went in today for the same test and i can't wait to get the results. you might want to ask your doctor about this test.