Reactions to Topamax

[wildnv]

In 2002 or 2003 I was on Topamax for about 4 mounts and I had some bad side effects.

I hade Out of body experience where I would travel far away. It was also very painful to return to my body.
I would not sleep or eat for days then for days I would only eat or sleep.

Some times I could not find my way out of the house. One time took my close off and planed on running down the street, but thankfully I could not find the way out of my 3 bedroom house.

I would talk to dead relatives.

I thought my wife was a Witch.

could not concentrate at all.

I believed Topamax gave me the special power to see the world clearly.

When I was taking Topamax I did not thank the drug was the problem, but after I stopped taking it a new it was the problem.

Just wondering if any one else went threw this? My doctor told me I was the first to have the problems I described.

I am all over the effects now but it took a several mounts to get over all of it after I stopped the drug.

I do not drink or use drugs.

 

[Endless]

Hi, Wild,

Welcome to the forum! There are such great people in here with a wealth of knowlege. They all got me through things when I was first diagnosed.

I am so sorry you went through that experience with the unusual thoughts and actions. It sounds really scarey.

These doctors really do drive me nuts. If your doctor had read the package insert, he would have seen that psychosis can be caused by Topamax.

Psychosis is a psychiatric side effect, and happends between 4%-12% of the time, depending on which study you read:
http://professionals.epilepsy.com/medications/p_topamax_seriousside.html

According to the package insert, adverse reactions include:

Psychiatric Disorders: Frequent: impotence, hallucination,
psychosis...

https://www.topamax.com/topamax/assets/topamax.pdf

Another possibility.... I was wondering, do you know where your seizures are coming from in the brain? What you are describing sounds like temporal lobe seizures. One possible explanation is that the Topamax increased, not decreased your seizures.


If it all went away when you stopped the topamax, I think you are right, it was an adverse reaction.

Does your doctor have you on another medication now?

 

[daisy.girl]

hi...
I just started this med three weeks ago at 25mg, then after two weeks upped to 50 mgs, then last friday up to 75mg (50 at night and 25 morning) and yesterday up to 100mg....
well last night I felt very winded and short of breath. when I went to bed I had a severe muscle cramp in my neck. this morning, I had a severe muscle cramp in my calf (like a charlie horse) and in my bicep......then, as I was getting out of the shower, I noticed a small red rash on my stomach and all over both of my legs.
I call the neuro...they told me to take a benadryl immediately and to stop the topamax that I was having an allergic reaction!
Gotta love these meds!!!

 

[imligia]

The nightmare-TOPOMAX

Hi

Even though I am new to this website I am glad I saw your thread. Your side effects to topomax were just like yours, only my reaction also included....
time

1) My hands and feet went numb ( which was hard considering I sculpt, teach
and play the violin
2) heard people talking about me all the time when there was no one in the room.
3) thought my family and friends where trying to kill me
4) I had a constant resting body temp. of 99.1f
5) I could not remember the names of the children who were in my class
6) absolutely could not eat a thing (I lost about 50 pounds )

My friends thought I had started using crack and wanted to take me to the local rehab. It took complaints from my pharmacist, my family and me going into her office and screaming for her to take me off this drug now before she took me off that drug. Like you I thought I was the only person who experienced these side effects also, mainly because like you thats what my dr. at that time, said.

It took my current neurologist, who said "he would not curse his worst enemy with topomax" before I realized that I was not the only person who survived that nightmare.

Just remember, what effects one person does not necessarily effect all people.

 

[Aubrey]

That sounds exciting! That was one of my options for an adjunct drug. I think maybe I won't complain too loudly about what I am taking.

 

[droolmonster]

topamax

I agree with you. Topamax made me skinny, have nightmares, and afraid of hallways. I became afraid of hallways after seeing the movie "shock corridor". After I was taken off of it, I was no longer afraid of hallways. I was in eighth grade, so I don't remember too well. My sister was on it too, around the same time as me, for bipolar. She's fifteen years older than me. She got skinny and depressed as well. I've never heard anything good about Topamax. My mom's friend said flat out that it was a bad drug. On the website crazymeds, dominated by crazy people, it's nickname is Dopamax. Don't let yourself get Doped up on Dopamax, you'll be Doped to the Max.

Topamax also did absolutely nothing to help my seizures.

Anybody taking it, stop. Talk to your doctor, and just say, I've heard this med makes you miserable and insane. It's evil. Nobody should ever have to take this drug. It's bad. I've taken almost every drug on the market, and the worst one is Topamax.

 

[Zoofemme]

I don't have all of the problems that some do with dopamax, lol. Numblies, aphasia and weight loss, yes, but I take lamictal and trileptal too and on those I already had numblies, weight gain, and hair loss. The topomax helps with my migraines and reduced my hair loss, the lamictal has my emotions all over the place, the trileptal knocks me out. They seem to cancel some of the bad effects of each other out as each one is increased/decreased. I do have cognitive and memory issues but I think that would be a result of any aed that I took, just the nature of the beasties that they are adn the fact that I take so many.

You have to set your rules for what you will accept regarding side-effects and what you won't, but you also have to realize that ALL aeds have side-effects of some sort and it takes more than a few days or a week or two for them to subside a bit. Everyone has their own personal worst med and flavors vary, lol.

 

[Lynda1]

I'm on topamax, I've been on it for the last 7 years, I'm on a relatively low dose200mg bd- that's all I'm on, my seizures are controlled for the last 5 yrs. I did lose alot of weight but I needed to lose weight! I'm skinny now, my memory is useless, I don't remember people's names, what I did earlier that day, my attention span is low & my concentration is low. I have nightmares or hallucinations so real. But main thing is my seizures are controlled- isn't that the most important???