bac question

[Phin]

Would it be acceptable to only take bac, say an hour or so before witching hour? I dont want to take it during the day or before bed so I'm not exhausted. (I get up for work at 4:15am--I'm tired enough :S)

Thoughts?

[man on mars]

bac question

I'm confused. You say "an hour or so before witching hour" and then "I don't want to take it ... before bed." Are you suggesting waking up in the middle of the night to take the medication?

Generally, what you need is to maintain a consistent dose of baclofen in your system throughout the day. Baclofen is not one of those drugs where you take it and it remains effective in your system for 24 hours, it wears off in 6-8 hours. You need to be taking it several times a day. If you want to avoid side effects, such as tiredness or sleepiness ("somnolence"), start with a very low dose and increase it very slowly.

You have to get to a pretty high dose of baclofen to get to "indifference"...when you first start, you may experience significant side effects when taking just 30 mg/day. Eventually, though, you will probably need to make your way up to like 200-300 mg/day, and you just cannot take that much baclofen in one dose realistically. You will end up having to break it into several smaller doses throughout the day. So maybe now, you can get away with taking 30 mg once a day, but as you increase your dose, that will quickly become unworkable. Side effects from 3 doses of 100 mg, or 4 doses of 75 mg, or 5 doses of 60 mg, will eventually become tolerable, but trying to take 300 mg in one dose just sounds insane.

[Phin]

bac question

I guess I forgot about having to get that high. I wasn't thinking of taking that much in one dose. It's the side effects that worry me. I've taken bac in the past but it makes me exhausted and with having to get up so early for my work, being so tired isn't an option.

There's only certain times if the day that I might drink. After work....I used to be ok during the week, but for the last say, 3 weeks, it's been an every night occurrence and I need to get out of that.

[StuckinLA]

bac question

Have you tried naltrexone? You can (and should) take that about 2 hours before drinking. And you don't need to take it if you're not going to drink. Look up The Sinclair Method. Some people have had success with it, others say it's bollocks.

[john doe]

bac question

There was one guy on here quite some time back who took his whole dose before bed. I'm currently on a 2 dose schedule but I think the general agreement is the 3 or 4 dose approach.

I don't think there's any right or wrong approach as we're all guinea pigs really.

[Ne/Neva Eva]

bac question

It doesn't work like that, Phin.

JD, you've been around for a while! Or reading a whole lot. The guy who took his whole dose before bed had been on baclofen for a long time. He titrated almost all the way back down, and then back up again using the one dose method. I've tried several times to take baclofen in as few doses as possible (without titrating back down first) and it has never worked for me. Too many SEs if I don't spread them out. Even after 2 years.

[john doe]

bac question

Yeah Eva, been lurking since '08

Can't remember the guys name but your right. I think he had success with the single dose and then stopped for whatever reason, tried multiple doses which didn't work for him and went back to the single approach.

3 or 4 seem to be the optimum approach though. I'm having success with 2 as by the time I get a few chores out of the way its touching 11pm so I take my first then and my second at 3pm. Any later and I've been having trouble sleeping. I've been lucky with SEs though and the 2 high doses from what I've read wouldn't suit everyone.

[bleep]

bac question

I've taken it in one dose before, but it still has to be taken everyday, you can't just think, oh, tonight I feel like a pint, and then take 300mg's. And it's an amount you want to build up to, you certainly wouldn't want to try it straight off the bat.

It's more convenient, but that's the only difference that I could see.

[Cassander]

bac question

We really need a pharma company to come up with an acceptable extended release version...

[john doe]

bac question

Probably no money in it Cassander sadly. It would most likely be patented and cost a few quid.

[Cassander]

bac question

john doe;1505063 wrote: Probably no money in it Cassander sadly. It would most likely be patented and cost a few quid.

Perhaps a few quid less than some folks are spending on AL, however, jd....

[john doe]

bac question

Cassander;1505987 wrote: Perhaps a few quid less than some folks are spending on AL, however, jd....

Probably for some. The doses some have to go to I'm not sure if I could personally afford it. A new patented drug would a hell of a lot more expensive to buy than the current Baclofen. I hazard a guess the price would be sky high for a new extended release Baclofen. At doses of 250mg + it might be out of reach on those users on a lower income.

I'd say about 60% of my budget goes on booze and I buy the cheapest beer I can find.

That being said it would be extended release so in theory you wouldn't need as much. I think there would need to be a market there for the big pharma to even think about putting some research into it. If a profit was there to be had.

Could happen if Baclofen ever became a standard process for alcohol abuse and the market grew.