Amitriptyline (Endep)

[Udkas]

Hi Guys,
my Urologist told me to try 10mg of Endep at night to see if that helped with pain, which is ironically what my GP prescribed in the first place to help me when he thought it was neurological pain, so I guess it can help with both but I don't seem to be able to tolerate this med.  I took some last night at bedtime, only 10mg. and I am only just functioning now.  If I had to work today I would have been screwed.  I still feel like I would not like to drive my car etc.  I slept from 9am until 10am and that is weird for me, my husband couldn't wake me when the alarm went off at 6am.

Does anyone else take this drug and have problems with it?  It is for the spasms and the pain I am experiencing in my privates.   He did mention another drug lirozol or something like that, forgotten the name to try if this didn't work, I can't try it tomorrow as I am working tomorrow and I just couldn't take it and go to work.  I am on Gabapentin as well, so perhaps it reacts adversely with the Gabapentin.

Cheers,
Udkas.

[Kippy7]

I take 10 mg. of Amitriptyline at bedtime and within 20 minutes, I'm out.  Don't even know if it helps with the awful neuropathy I have in my feet, cause I'm sleeping.  I don't even know why I'm taking it, except for the fact that it helps me sleep.  On some mornings I feel the need to have 3 cups of coffee instead of my usual 2, but most often there are no other side effects.

[Khiba]

I tried 10 mg to start and slept for 24 hours straight, like a dead thing! ugh. What I did was back  off to 2.5 mg or a quarter of a tab and am doing that for a week then going to 5 mg and see how that affects me. After 5 days at 2.5 I finally got a really really good night sleep and woke up with less pain than usual.

Try a smaller dose and see if that helps some.

Jessica

[HVAC]

I used to be on 500 mg of the stuff years ago. On 10 mg your body takes a couple of weeks to get used to it. Is it a tablet you can break in half and start at 5mg? I hated the stuff but back in the day for depression it was the drug.

Alex

[PastorDan]

I think I was on 10mg of amitriptyline long enough that I learned how to spell it.  Like most everything else they've given me, it made me sleepy but had no other noticeable impact, for better or worse.

[green924]

I have been taking 25mg Elavil at first, now 50 mg and I still can't sleep at all. My docter asked me to increase to a 100 so that has helped a little. I have so much pain, copaxone sickness, muscle spasms, and urinary probs at night I'm starting to think even a horse tranquilizer wouldn't help me to sleep! Who knows... From the description my GP & rhuemy gave it seems to be a highly prescribed medication?

Good Luck - Live, Laugh, Love
Melanie

[Udkas]

Hi Ren,
I might consider changing, I really can't even trial this med for a few more days to see if it is going to work as it really sedates me, I am struggling to type this and I need to be able to go to work, especially this time of year.  I am also really weird in my legs today, I woke up with my left hand really numb and was dropping things etc. and now my legs feel weird, I am assuming this is the Endep as well, I hope so but it feels neurological but the info pkt said some people experience numbness and to contact your Dr, well how do I know what is what?

Hbananas:
The thought of someone sleeping through a tornado has made me smile.  I am sure it was not funny at the time but at least you didn't have to deal with the stress of the tornado, I imagine they would be scary, where I live we don't seem to get extreme things like cyclones etc.

I was a bedwetter too and took some tablet at night and I often wonder now with my bladder probs if there is any connection.  I don't need constipation!!!!  I think I have shares in a fruit and all bran market.

Cheers,
Udkas.

[hbananas]

I used to take amitriptylene (Elavil) as an antidepressant, I think it was over 100mg at bedtime (obviously).  I switched to a less sedating antidepressant after I slept through a tornado that uprooted trees in a yard at the end of my block.  I did always manage to get up when the alarm clock went off, though.

Once upon a time, my husband was having trouble sleeping, and I gave him one.  I didn't see him for about 18 hours.  I think you build up a tolerance eventually.

Side note:  when I was a kid, I was a bedwetter.  They finally cured it with imipramine, another tricyclic antidepressant, US brand name Tofranil.  The tricyclics have an anticholinergic effect-they dry you up.  That's why it helps with bedwetting, but it also can constipate.

[rendean]

Hi Udkas,

I use NORtriptyline instead of amitriptline as an adjunct to my Trileptal. The nortriptyline is less sedating. It is a metabolic by-product of amtriptyline.  I tolerate the nortriptyline (Pamelor) much better than the amitriptyline (Elavil in the US) . It produces less dry mouth and less sedation and it does help tremendously with the neuropathic pain.

Ren
For me there were fewer side effects such as sedation and less dry mouth.