Benedryl

Does anyone know if there is any potential of MOH or rebound with the use of benedryl?

After intolerable side-effects with gabapentin, I'm just about weaned off it, but my insomnia is back with a vengeance. I've also had a cold/flu the past 2 weeks. I started taking the benedryl to help with breathing since my sinuses were congested, but I found it helped my daily migraine and helped me to sleep.

Just worried if I use it too often, although still according to label instructions, whether I'll run into MOH/rebound problems. Does anyone have an opinion on this?

Thanks so much!

well, becky, i've used it for years and years. i've been told by more than one doctor that ANY DRUG a person takes long-term can cause tolerance.

not rebound or medication overuse headaches, mind you, but tolerance, which is a whole different issue. it means it isn't going to work as well, and you need more and more to get the same effect (sleep, in your case and mine).

i've tried for several years to alternate three different antihistamines, and it's worked pretty well. my 5 overnight sleep studies have come up with the same thing every time.......MY BODY HAS FORGOTTEN HOW TO SLEEP, and it needs lots of help!

if i were you, i wouldn't worry at all about the things you mentioned. one cannot function w/o sleep, so go for it. imho. dianne

Hi,

I have used benedryl along with migraine meds when I have a realy bad migraine. When I was at one headache clinic, I was given IV benedryl 5Omgs, every eight hours, as one way of treating the migraine. The doctors there told me it was ok to take benedryl for the bad ones, so I do. Most of my neurologists have suggested it at one time or another. I know there is a tolderance factor, because I now have to take about 1OO mgs orally to see an effect. However, I have been assured that this is ok too.

I do not think it can hurt you and I would not worry about rebound.

Pain free days,
sailingm

I don't think you have to worry about rebound. I don't get any benefit from the pill, but when I go to the ER, I always get IV benedryl, in addition to morphine, because by the time I'm bad enough to need the ER, I am very tense, and that contributes to the pain's cycling of itself. The benedryl relaxes me enough that I don't tense up as much.

Twice a month I can get IM shots of morphine from my PCP, but she refused to give me benadryl IM with it because she said it's too addictive. Yet she gives me 25 mg morphine! My headache doctor was amused by this explanation and asked her addiction specialist friend if she had never heard of benadryl being addictive, and the friend could think of only one case that she had ever even heard of! Probably the one my PCP came across!

yes there is a risk of rebound from any medication you take more than 3 times a week, be it a triptan, narcotic or over the counter medication such as benadryl.

I have been in rebound 3 times and it is a terrible place to be in but an easy place to get to since pain is something that we want to treat. I do believe in rebound. I do monitor my medications. And I make sure not to take any medication more than three times a week.

Can you talk to your neurologist and let him/her know you need better pain care? Also, inform them that the benadryl is working but is there anything else you could switch it up with.