OK- since I was diagnosed with fibro about a year ago I have gained almost 15 pounds, putting me over the limit of a weight I can live with. I have never been too worried about weight, and have accepted that due to genetics I will never be a tall, slim model. I have always been short and "thick" as they say. I wasn't fat, but not skinny either.

But my weight has suddenly skyrocketed. Part of it is being alone now, and I go to bed with food instead of a man and the depression that goes along with loneliness also contrubutes. I have had problems exercising because of the pain, and it seems like my appetite has gone out of control!!
I am going to see my PCP this week and Im going to ask her to put me on something. I don't have trouble sticking to a diet, well I never did before, but its like right now I can't help the cravings for things like donuts and Best if kept off the board like that. I would like to try Meridia or something like that because it may also help with the fatigue. I don't know, though because I have never taken any diet pills.

Do any of you have experience with diet pills? What is the best one and what would you avoid? Any advice would be appreciated.

Sarah

Sarah, there is a very interesting thread about diets pills here. web page

Quincy-
Have you developed an insatiable sweet tooth since being on methadone??? I was very underweight when I started on methadone 9 years ago. I am 5'8" and weighed 115 lbs back then. During the course of the first 7 years, I gained about 15 lbs a year until I reached my maximum weight of 195. I started looking "plump" but never fat (perhaps my frame carried it well...) Anyway, I began reducing my methadone dose 2 years ago and starting losing weight right away (as well as the horrible symptoms of falling asleep during conversations, driving, etc...) and no more sweet tooth. I've lost 55 lbs in the past 2 years. I also lost several teeth (a common problem with this medication, I've learned) even though I practiced good dental hygeine. Many, many people have complained of weight gain while on methadone.

I wonder if you have considered the medication as the weight gain source rather than the underlying illness.

Don't know if diet pills containing amphetamines would be a good idea while you continue to be on methadone.

Best of luck, as always!

Quincy,
I am on Methadone, and have been for over 4 years. My dose was as high as 620mgs at one point, it is now 145mgs. This is because one day in February of this year, I stopped my methadone COLD TURKEY!!! Just like that. I lasted 12 weeks without ANY opiates at all and lost 50 pounds, because of the intense withdrawal I suffered.
Now, being back on the methadone, I started to gain weight right away, and it continued, as did the sweet tooth.
So, this past week, I went to my Family Doctor and told her exactly why I wanted to be put on a diet pill:: that I cannot lose weight on methadone, that I am too tired to exercise all the time, that my sweet tooth will be the death of me and that I am miserable weighing this much, having never been fat before. I always used to have an amzingly sexy figure, not too thin, just right. Didn't know how good I had it!!! Until now.
So, she prescribed Phentermine, in Canada it's called Ioamin. There are many Brand names for it. But if you tell your doctor you want to start taking Phentermine, he/she WILL know what med that is.
I have found that it works so so so well. I have NO appetite at all, all day and all night! None. I have to force myself to get some nutrients into my body.
The side effects are: more energy, more hyper than usual, never tired during the day....before I took these I used to have to take a nap during the day, now I don't have to or want to.
The side effects are minimal considering the potential results!!!
Also, this med does not eat up your methadone at all. It is also not an amphetamine. But it does act as one, I suppose. (I've never taken an amphetimine, so I wouldn't really know) The only warning about these are that they have the potential to be abused and you can easily become dependant on them, well, not easily for everyone. But, I could see how one could. The energy alone they provide is pretty tough to let go.
Anyways, if you'd like, look it up, and/or ask your doctor about Phentermine and see what you decide to do. Either way, they do what they are supposed to: they completely take away your appetite for the entire day and night!!!!
Good Luck,
k8kat

Sarah, here's my nickel's worth. Warning: This message is not suitable for all viewers! Viewer discretion is advised.

Meridia did not work for me. I participated in a clinical trial & lost some weight, but it was due to the diet we were put on. Meridia works by encapsulating the fat you eat to keep it from being absorbed into your system. If you eat too much fat while taking it, you will be very sorry. Even when you don't eat very much fat, you will have loose, orange stool. In fact, you'll find that you leak a bright orange oily substance which can permanently stain your clothes.

I have used Didrex, & it does reduce your appetite. However, if you're having mood problems now, this could make it much worse. It's also potentially addictive and long-term use can lead to paranoia & other bad things. Not good if you have high blood pressure either.

I've tried many of the popular herbal weight loss concoctions. None of them worked.

I must have tried every diet & diet pill at some time. Lost lots of weight and put it back on plus some every time.

So what's my point? There's no hope just give it up. I'm kidding kind of.

I'm not going to give you the usual spiel about diet & exercise. But I will tell you that you can diet your way to a weight much larger than you have now. Don't put anymore money into some scammer's pockets. Try to figure out what you could cut down or out or substitute and still be satisfied. Do some mild exercise.

From what you said in your message, I think you might find some books helpful...like Feeding the Hungry Heart, What's Eating You?, there are others I can't think of right now.

Another poster made a good point about meds causing weight gain. Besides methadone, some anti-depressants, birth control, and corticosteroids can cause weight gain. Have you had your thyroid hormone levels checked? It used to be that people would say that thyroid problems are rare. Not so these days.

HTH

I've know people who have lost big numbers by thaking Retalin(they had Attention DD).

I've know LOTS of people to lose an average of 50 pounds over 3 months by doing that hcg weight-lose therapy.

and I've know a couple of people who lost around 35 pounds by doing th Nutri-systems program where they send you the food to eat.

good Luck on your weight loss program no matter what yu decide to do.

What you are describing above is not Meridia - it's Xenical (which is now available over the counter & called "Alli"). It pretty much sucks & is not worth wasting time trying, in my opinion. Meridia is not much better, but I think it has a better track record than Xenical--it works more like an SSRI. It didn't do a thing for me.

To the OP - phentermine is your best bet. Try either the instant release version - which is Adipex, or the time-release version, which is Ionamin (or Duromine in some countries). Most people have a strong preference for one form or the other. Seems like the most popular is Adipex (but I prefer Ionamin because I don't like how jittery Adipex makes me feel).

The best diet pill I ever took was Xenadrine w/ Ephedra. Worked great, when I used to be able to go to GNC & buy it OTC.

After they "banned" ephedra I started buying it from companies overseas but nothing worked close to Xenadrine w/Ephedra.

So I found out about Phentermine and got ahold of that. I went from 145lbs to 98lbs and I felt fantastic!

I gained 10 of it back... if I had to choose between the 2, I'd say ephedra, but good luck finding it.

Both drugs make you "anxious" so be careful if you have any sort of anxiety problems!

OMG the best back in the day was Ripped Fuel with Ephedra. Now no more. I liked Xenedrine but that is now being investigated and pulled from the market. I know you have heard this before, but the good old diet modification and EXERCISE is the way to go. God only knows, these diet pills will KILL YOU!

I agree, Ephedra was the bomb but while you lose 30 pounds, you could encounter a heart attack and/or stroke. This happened to many people. Especially athletes who dropped dead after running a mile!

the higest dose of done i've seen was in the 300's and that was for hard core heroin addicts---sorry i dont believe you can cold turkey done in the 600's---youd die so i find the whole post incredible

Do people really lose weight on Ritalin?

The phentermine & ephedra make you not hungry. You have to remember to eat. The great part about that is, let's say you love donuts. Every day you get 5 donuts. You think about those 5 donuts before going to bed and when you wake up, you get dressed and go get your 5 donuts. Enter Phen. All of a sudden you don't think about donuts. You are too full to eat a donut. Besides donuts don't seem all that great any more.

That's how phentermine works. So when you get off of it, you no longer crave junk food and eat foods that are good for you.

good diet pill is bontril

You can still buy ephedrine products, just not "dietary supplements". In PA you can buy ephedrine/guaifenesin to help your breathing. They just have you sign a log for the purchase to make sure you are not buying too much (for chemistry?) I can buy two 24 ct 25mg ephed/200mg guaifenesin per 24 hour period (waaaaaaay more than needed). I used to take this all the time when I had a really early shift. The guaifenesin is an expectorant, but I didn't notice any real effect from it at all (no hacking up debris if you know what I mean). I had read that 200mg of caffeine per 25mg of ephedrine is the way to go. This was the idea behind most of the old dietary supps (metabolife, xenedrine, etc.- used Ma Huang (ephedra), green tea, ginseng,guarana and the like for caffeine)They sell "ephedrine plus" and "ephrine plus" (just 200mg caffeine and vit. C)in the convenience stores here. So I would take one caf per ephed. I took like 6 or so of each a day (get up at 2:30AM and work 'til 3 pm), but watch when you first start out, I did have a couple of "pill-sick" times where I took too much too fast. I don't know if this helps anyone, but i didn't even think about food. On the other hand, my wife (who usually takes phentermine) wasn't impressed at all (of course, she really wasn't interested in a replacement for her phen). I have read some info relating ephed use to kidney stones, but I took it for 5 or 6 years, and to paraphase Jimi- I'm stone free- so do what you please. (in no way do I suggest anyone trying any thing w/o consulting their doc of course)

try lipobind

I remember getting Ripped Fuel in the mid-90's, taking it a couple of times and having a lot of energy but feeling too jittery to channel that into getting anything done. I felt like I drank too much coffee. I never could take stuff like that without feeling very uncomfortable.

A healthy diet with smaller portions and exercise is the only thing that works for me.

Phentermine or didrex

O.K. I have to amend my last post where I said diet and exercise work for me (I know how much people hate hearing that because sometimes I am one of those people)....that was before menopause. Losing weight is much harder now. I gained a few lbs. after Hurricane Ike while living in a travel trailer, eating a lot of canned, packaged and donated food with snacks and desserts which I was grateful to have but would now like to return.

What is ephedrine/guaifenesin? Is there a brand name for it?

"What is ephedrine/guaifenesin? Is there a brand name for it?" Bronchodilators, like ephedrine, act on specific receptors, resulting in the relaxation of bronchial smooth muscle.
Guaifenesin is believed to cause a reflex stimulation of bronchial glands, resulting in a decrease in the thickness of bronchial secretions.
Bayer makes a product called Bronkaid.

tiffy1,
I agree with your post, "in the here & now", the best appetite suppresants, are Phentermine HCI a/k/a "Adipex-P" mfg by Gates Pharmaceuticals, Sellersville PA. (37.5 mg tabs or capsules) C-IV, also Diethylpropion HCI mfg by Watson Pharmaceuticals in 25 mg. and 75 mg. ES. Phentermine has been marketed in the past extensively as "Ionomin" and "Fastin" by the former manufacturers Strasenburg/Pennwalt/Fisons and by
Beecham Laboratories. Also, before the California generic mfg
released Diethylpropion HCI, it was widely prescribed my US doctors as Tepanil 25 mg. and Tepanil Ten-Tab 75 mg. (extended release)by Riker Pharma, as well as "Tenuate" and "Tenuate Dospan" by Merrill-National Labs of Cincinnati, Ohio, wheras, the "Tepanil" was available for decades by the Northridge,CA mfg. Riker Labs, Inc. All of the above are/were C-IV's
Regarding "Didrex" (formerly made by Upjohn, Kalamazoo, MI
it is currently made by Mova Pharmaceuticals (Manati Puerto Rico) & distributed in the USA by Pharmacia, a division of Pfizer Inc. (NY NY) A C-III class, (benzphetamine HCI). Another competive product in the C-III class is Phendimetrazine Tartrate a/k/a "Prelu-2" "Adipost" & "Bontril" & "Bontril PDM" (It was incredibily popular as recently as twenty years ago, when it was sold under twenty six "different names" ....."Carnrick Labs of NY NY, "Prelu-2" time released capsules by Boehringer Ingelheim & "Plegine" mfg by Ayerst & Melfiat tablets/Melfiat 105 Unicelles mfg by Reid-Howell Inc were hold outs until recently.
IMHO, the very best appetite suppressants, or obesity management meds are "long gone" but were the most potent and "smoothest" all day long meds for dietary managment, along with tremendous energy, were the former Abbott Labs of North Chicago IL "Desbutal"
(methampetamine/pentobarbital), Obetrol Pharmaceuticals (Brooklyn NY) with their "Obetrol" (methamphetamine saccharate,
methamphetamine HCI,amphetamine sulfate, dextroamphetamine sulfate combo's) Smith Kline & French Labs (Philadelphia PA)
with their "Dexamyl" capsules of dextroamphetamine with amobarbital and the wildly popular "Biphetamine T" (Strasenburgh Laboratories Rochester NY) with their ultra smooth combination of resin complexes of d and dl amphetamine combined with methaqualone...a/k/a red & green capsules (12.5 mg amphetamine with 40 mg of methaqualone, and the red & black capsules of 20 mg. of combined amphetamines mixed with 40 mg. of methaqualone. We can thank our DEA for banning the so-called combination stimulants with sedative/hypnotics in 1973, and finally with the SKF "holdout" of "Dexamyl" in 1981/1982.
Interestingly "Obetrol" was later "reformulated from by Rexar Pharma, when Richwood Pharma & later ShireUS" switched the methamphetamine in "Obetrol" to "dextroamphetamine of 2 types, added to the already existing 2 types of amphetamine" and renamed it "Adderall" and made a fortune with that "new patent"
(now available also in generic form by Barr Labs).

Here's the perfect diet combo. Purchase a box of Primatene tablets. They are behind the counter. A bottle of No Doz caffeine pills and Bayer 81mg "baby" aspirins. You take 2 of the Primatene and one each of the caffeine and the baby aspirin once a day for at least two weeks. You will lose a lot of weight. Guarantee. Most diet pills use to contain the ingredient ephedrine. The Federal Government banned the diet pill makers from using this ingredient making the new diet pills basically worthless. In conjunction the caffeine and the ephedrine helps your body metabolize your fats in food better. Of course try at your own risk. It does give you the jitters and might give you insomnia but it works.
Source(s):
Google it!

I am anxious to try that combination of OTC meds and see if it works... guaranteed huh? Have you done this? What exactly would I google to find results?

I tried alli it works perfect for me

Alli worked for me as well. I have lost almost 65 pounds in the last year. There are no real known long term affects. the side affects are a bit hard to get used to lol but if your really heavy in my opinion it is the best and it was a life saver for me. It also has kept me motivated and it is legal, and easily available lol.

Well if you can get your doc to prescribe it, tenuate dosepan is one of the best ones out there. It is a true extended release pill.

I've never seen it online, but I have never looked for it. I took it a couple of years ago for a short time to help get off a few stubborn pounds that I just couldn't get through the hunger.

There are a lot of times you can find a "diet doctor" that won't have a problem prescribing them and many times your PCP won't have a problem.

The doc first gave me the regular phentermine and it wasn't lasting all day, so I called the pharmacist and asked them which ones were ER, he told me, I told the doc and the doc changed my script.

Does anyone have any experience with "Sibutramine" aka Slimex?

I've been told it's more effective than phentermine, but did some reading online today that made me wonder if anyone else had been on this med.

Didn't mean to play thread killer here at all...sorry folks. If there's no feedback, there's no feedback.

Stubby - no way is sibutramine (US brand name is Meridia if you're in North America) more effective than phen. Put it this way, sibutramine is considered effective for you when you're able to lose 4 lbs on it in one month. If you're unable to achieve that on it, than it likely won't work at all for you and the doctor [if it were prescribed] would take you off it.

I've tried Slimex - definitely not worth it, IMHO.