I was on Dilantin for many years, in combination with Neurontin. I'm male, had a girlfriend for years, and all was right in the sex dept., unless I was just exhausted or something like that.
Then we discovered Dilantin was hurting my bone density, so I got off of it. I'd had so few seizures (hadn't had one in over 3 years at that point) so we thought we'd just try to end the Dilantin and see how I did. I was still taking a low dosage of Neurontin though (600mgs a day). The weird thing was that as soon as the Dilantin ended, my libido fell thru the floor. Totally gone.
I didnt have a girlfriend anymore so that wasn't a problem really, but it does affect a guy's self esteem to just not even have the desire. After a year, the doc suggested that Neurontin may be causing the sexual effects and I didn't notice them before because the Dilantin was "masking" this effect. So, we decided to get of Neurontin since I hadn't had a seizure during the year since being of Dilantin.
Unfortunately, before we could, I had a seizure. The doc put me on Keppra, and early on as we were ramping up the Keppra dosage, we ended the Neurontin. I immediately noticed an improvement in the libido department. But, it only lasted about a month.
I'm now on my up to my maintenance dose of keppra (1000 mgs per day), and I feel like the libido is going away again. It's like it improved when I first got off Neurontin and now its going away again. Either way, it's still not back to where it was before I got off of Dilantin. Docs don't know what to think either..
My only other med option at this point is Lamictal, but I need to do something because I like sex, I'm single, and I'd like to start dating again. I don't feel like trying to date if I don't have the desire for sex because I don't want to be unfair to the woman..
Any men know if Keppra kills desire, or if Lamictal could help? It's frustrating because I've never had a ton of seizure, but I have just enough every so often that they make me take meds.