Can baclofen help a sober alcoholic?

[Greg]

Has anyone heard of any alcoholic achieving sobriety and THEN obtaining benefit by taking baclofen? I've been AF for over 10 weeks but I've been using a strong herbal remedy as an alcohol substitute nearly every night, and I now realise I need to give that up too. I tried baclofen very soon after doing a home alcohol detox using Valium but didn't continue taking it due to a few side effects. Staying sober has been a hard slog every day and night, like a locomotive slowly trying to climb a long hill with a heavy load. Basically I just try and hack it out, one day at a time, but what I'm taking at night isn't helping much anymore. I am prepared to have to take a tranquilliser and sleep aid for a while if I need to, but what about baclofen? Would baclofen be worth trying in this situation just to try and feel a bit more sure and stable?

Best wishes to all and thanks for any advice.

[Lo0p]

Can baclofen help a sober alcoholic?

YES. YES. And well...yes.

Props to you for the AF time! I remember you were in a world of hurt not too long ago. :goodjob:

[Guest]

Can baclofen help a sober alcoholic?

Hi Greg you are sober thats the main thing....... Baclofen can lend a hand in that area ...... but staying stopped!!!! ( thanks Gyco) and not getting drunk again is the hard part i do believe drugs can short cut you to a stage where you have the opportunity to change youre THOUGHTS and obtain a LONG LASTING sobriety but that takes a lot of work!!!! the drug doesnt do that work for you..... any way you look at it..... there is no pill that completley wipes out the addiction.... its much more deeper than a brain temporary thing just popping a pill that stabilizes the Gabba B receptor in my myopic view is not a cure as such...... Baclofen gave me the clarity to look at the personal emotional destruction I have undertaken in my life .....there in lies the cure of my addiction if i can get and cure that bit of my brain i do believe there is a way out of the nightmare that is addiction

All the best to you Greg in this major fight we have to win if not we die.

[wort]

Can baclofen help a sober alcoholic?

Hi Greg,

Ameisen has recently applied for a patent on using baclofen specifically to prevent relapse.

My guess is that you would need to titrate up until your craving disappears (symptom surpressing dose - SSD), then titrate back down to a maintenance dose that is low enough to just keep the craving at bay. Then when you get a trigger, take an extra 20mg or so on an as-needed (p.r.n.) basis.

If possible, continue with the herbal remedy until you hit the baclofen SSD.

Good Luck!
-wort

[brightlite]

Can baclofen help a sober alcoholic?

Greg,

I agree, I think that Bac would help. It would not only help with the cravings, but anxiety and sleep as well. You already have the determination and may be able to feel comfortable and stable at a relatively low dose. Congrats to you and keep up the fight.

[eileen]

Can baclofen help a sober alcoholic?

My husband just got back from the family dr. and he would only agree to give him one week's worth of baclofen (3 mg, 3 times a day). His worse problem is alcohol cravings and has been on campral, but drinks much of the time while on that.
The doctor doesn't want to consider the Ameisen program ( we left the book with him on the last visit).
Any suggestions? I think he should withdraw from the campral before trying the baclofen.
Then we're going to try to order the baclofen online if we can find a reliable source. How can we tell that? He has been sober for 2 weeks (mainly by practically never leaving the house). I know he's going to give the baclofen his best shot; he has tried just about everything else. We have tried and tried to find someone in our area who will do the baclofen. We're getting so discouraged!

[Greg]

Can baclofen help a sober alcoholic?

Thanks everyone for your replies. I'm going to see how I go with a small-medium dose of baclofen for a while. I can tolerate the drug well as long as I don't take it too close to bedtime (for those who don't already know, insomnia is the ONLY side effect of bac that I absolutely can't tolerate).

Eileen, I'm not the best person here to give advice about baclofen but I would say that your husband could benefit from it even at 90 mg per day (I assume you meant 30 mg, 3 times a day). I've never ordered online but others here have mentioned online pharmacies...I think 4rx is one, aswell as river, and another one with the name "gold"-something.

With Campral, I can say that it helped me to feel reduced alcohol cravings when I was sober some years ago, but it only worked if I wasn't drinking at the same time. I tried it while drinking and it had absolutely no effect. I've read other accounts of this happening too so I don't think it's just me. I'm not aware of any drug interaction between Campral and baclofen, but other members may be better able to advise you about that (and about the exact details of online ordering). Best wishes to you and your husband.

[eight days a week]

Can baclofen help a sober alcoholic?

Greg;832439 wrote: Has anyone heard of any alcoholic achieving sobriety and THEN obtaining benefit by taking baclofen?

Absolutely, my specialist finds it most successful by far used exactly in that way

[eight days a week]

Can baclofen help a sober alcoholic?

OnTheWagon;835369 wrote: I spoke to Dr. Fred LeVin last night and explained my situation i.e. nearly two years sober with a history of panic disorder since childhood. He told me baclofen would do nothing to help anxiety (it doesn't I've found) and I essentially was told there's no reason for me to take it. I asked if it could be used to moderate drinking and he told me that is not possible for someone who's been previously addicted.

All in all, a pretty discouraging phone call. Anyone found any evidence to the contrary?

Regarding moderate drinking, how about Dr Ameisen's book? And, if you still have cravings, there's every reason to take it (see the same source!)

[eight days a week]

Can baclofen help a sober alcoholic?

OnTheWagon;835409 wrote: I know. It's odd since he clearly contradicted the book. If I remember the premise of Dr. Ameisen's theory, isn't it that alcohol abusers are deficient in naturally occuring GHB? That fact will not change just because you're sober. I wish there was a doc on this board who could weigh in on this.

As I wrote previously, my specialist (very experienced in using Baclofen) finds it most effective in patients who are already abstinent. I'm not sure this is common, but I'm getting an almost anti-depressant effect from Baclofen. I can only put this down to the fact that my brain is indeed being 'balanced' with the boost of a naturally occurring and absolutely necessary chemical that I'm deficient in.

If you're still craving while abstinent I'd say you have absolutely nothing to lose by trying Baclofen.

[eight days a week]

Can baclofen help a sober alcoholic?

I guess a lot of medical practitioners have different views on and approaches to the same treatments, but it cured Dr Ameisen. I suffer from GAD and Panic Disorder, and tend to depression, and hope it'll do the same for me. I guess you can keep an eye on my progress thread if you're interested to see how I do.

Personally I don't think 20mg daily is enough. I'm on 100mg, have noticed a subtle general anti-anxiety effect from about 70mg upwards, and will be going much higher if I have to without medical supervision, but I am also currently drinking.

Have you tried psychotherapy? I am open to the idea that it can help, even if Baclofen seems to be showing me that there is a chemical imbalance there that needs addressing.

I've seen two of the top psychiatrists in the UK in the last year and a half by the way, and both gave me completely different and opposing advice.

[lulylucy18]

Can baclofen help a sober alcoholic?

i just got the vivitrol shot, i have been sober 4 days. my doctor prescribed 333mg dose 3 times a day. I amhoeing the campral will help with the anxiety and cravings, the vivitrol is strictly to prevent relapse. i do not intend to drink. my dose seems high reading the other posts but ill give it a shot. any experience with weight gain?

[beatle]

Can baclofen help a sober alcoholic?

I'm very surprised about Dr LeVin's advice. In fact, I heard that anxiety is/was one of the main off-label uses of baclofen, and the only reason my psych (who is an anxiety specialist and refuses to have anything to do with dependency issues) was interested and agreed to prescribe it to me.

I'm also surprised because Dr. Ameisen specifically mentions how the bac cured his lifelong extreme anxiety -- and he had tried absolutely every medication known before that.

For me, even at 10mg, it lifted my anxiety tremendously, literally overnight. Before that I had been taking Lamictal prescribed for anxiety and it had little if any effect.

I know there are many others who have mentioned the anti-anxiety effect, so I recommend titrating up slowly, and I am hopeful it will help.

btw, my therapist (traditionally the ones who don't like meds -- you know, we can solve everything by delving into it, and all that) actually told me she thought I needed meds and that my anxiety and PD were definitely at least partly physiological/chemical.

[beatle]

Can baclofen help a sober alcoholic?

The anti-anxiety effect was only at a lower dose. After titrating up, I have "the weird, spacey feeling" from about 1 hour after I take bac and it lasts about 2 hours, subsiding at just about the time I take my second dose. And this does increase anxiety and hence the feeling of wanting a drink.

[birdy02]

Can baclofen help a sober alcoholic?

Greg;832439 wrote: Has anyone heard of any alcoholic achieving sobriety and THEN obtaining benefit by taking baclofen?

I read Dr Ameisen's book. It is my understanding that the first time he tried baclofen he was drinking and he went as high as 180mg/day at which time he became concerned about the high dose. He then backed down and did some more research. Then, while he was AF, he went all the way to his magic number of 270mg before reaching the "switch". He knew that he had reached it not because he quit drinking (because he wasn't drinking at the time) but because he suddenly had an "indifference" to alcohol. He found that he could be in a public setting with others drinking alcohol around him and he had no desire to drink. So, yes, the very man who discovered the "switch" did so while he was sober.

I will add that the book itself is unclear as to whether he was drinking at the time he did his second and final run of baclofen. However, early in my Baclofen climb I became concerned about drinking while using baclofen so I wanted to clarify whether or not he was drinking when he reached the "switch". I went back and looked at his actual paper he submitted to the journals and in there it clearly states that he was AF as of day 1 and continued AF the whole entire time when doing this.