Anyone else have atypical reactions to medications?

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Yes, I find most painkillers, alcohol and anti-depressants do not work or only work at exceptionally high doses.

No anti-depressant has ever worked or had any effect on me in terms of altering mood. Unfortunately the current one has turned me into a gastric vampire - I can't stop eating. However, my depression is almost totally circumstantial and the negative events in my life are far too extreme to be helped by anti-depressants, or at least helped to any meaningful extent. One anti-depressant gave me terrible toothache, which the pharmacist after some research (as he found it interesting) discovered was an exceptionally rare but previously documented side effect, being nerve pain.

Pain killers, including NSAI's and even opiates, have little effect on the pain. If I need an operation, I will typically need extremely high doses of painkillers. Dr's often ask if I am addicted to opiates for this reason (I am not!). Funnily enough when awake I cope extremely well with very painful conditions and don't take any pain medication. I once had a fully ruptured anterior crutiate ligment (ACL) in my knee and as I had no health insurance had to walk around on the damaged leg, without pain relief or even crutches. My knee was so swollen none of my trousers would fit - it was about 4 times bigger than my other knee. When the leg was eventually operated on to repair the ligament, I needed massive doses of painkiller during the operation, but had virtually no pain relief during rehab - normally an opiate like tramadol would be used at this time. Alcohol also has virtually no effect. I could drink a bottle of whiskey and apart from urinating a lot, would not really be affected. In the days when I tried to date it was amusing seeing guys trying to get me drunk (while they passed out under the table I would be totally fine - usually putting them in a taxi home).

Other classes of medication, including anesthetics, sedatives etc seem to work just fine.

Wow, I have just had an extremely bad reaction to Naproxen (Aleve), an ordinary OTC pain medication I've never used before. I was having some back pain from sitting too long at the computer, so I thought I would try it. Seemed to help a little, but started feeling "off" in other ways and thought maybe I was getting the flu or running a temperature.

Went to a local clinic and they found high blood pressure -- never had any blood pressure problem before. Didn't find anything else wrong, and recommended *more* Naproxen for the back pain. Took two doses as recommended and blood pressure went through the roof. That was very unpleasant. Now trying to flush this toxic stuff out of my system.

A bit of searching turns up quite a few people who have had bad blood pressure reactions to Naproxen. When they detected that at the clinic, Naproxen was the *wrong* thing to give me.

I have no idea if this was aspie-related or not, but if you try Naproxen, be on the alert for bad side effects.

I don't know about atypical (other than certain antibiotics, notably nitrofurantoin, that just don't work on me, IDK why but I guess it has something to do with metabolism), but I'm extremely sensitive to just about everything.

The good news is, I can get pain relief (and, whether fortunately or otherwise, a whole lot more) from just THINKING about opiates. Dunno what's up with that, either-- I think maybe all the meditation exercises I've done trained my brain to make natural opiates on cue or something.

The bad news is, as far as I can tell, I can't take any kind of psychotropics at all. I get every side effect in the book, at very low doses, and nobody seems to believe it's happening until I'm much, much sicker than I was when I started. Just not going back there any more. Sick and tired of being either stoned all the time, sick, numb, or all three.

I tend to get the side effects and not much effect on my problem. Also, I used to need very small doses, but with age I have become less sensitive.

Luvox gives me a slight "body buzz" a half hour after taking it. Probably has something to do with its actions on the sigma-1 receptor.

I do. I had a genetic test done because of the way I react to medications. It showed I have a variant of the cyp2d6 gene making me a poor metabolizer so instead of metabolizing like other people, drugs just accumulate to toxic levels and I get all sorts of side effects. It sucks. Cyp2d6 is the gene responsible for production of the enyme p4502d6. You need that enzyme to metabolize about 30% of meds and it's also used to convert phenylalanine and L-tyrosine into dopamine. Possibly why I get so sad all the time. I'm genetically incapable of happiness

I don't metabolize chemicals/drugs properly, at all, thus, I rarely, ever take them, apart from when I absolutely must. I, actually, just returned home from hospital, a few days, ago, as the result of a negative reaction to an antibiotic. I was in the hospital for several days. It was the worst illness I have ever experienced. Will be researching that gene and enzyme. Thanks for mentioning it.

I'm sorry this happened to you, Britte.

Hi, Britte----so nice to see you!! I hope you're okay, now, after that episode.

Anyone else have atypical reactions to medications?

Yep----I'm the type that often falls-under that "Very Rare but May Occur" section, on the med info sheet; and / or, a medical professional will tell me: "I've never heard of that happening, before". Also, I'm allergic to TONS of stuff; I have to keep a list, and take it with me, everywhere.

Yep. I'm *that* patient for every Dr I see. Little to no response to the drug, crazy side effects. I am most sensitive to sedative effects (20hr Bactrim nap anyone?) even in drugs that aren't known to cause sleepyness. Anything that effects the mind or hormones is a bloody nightmare.

Oh, and to make it even more fun? I get odd disease presentations too.

-i can sleep on stimulants, easy.
-commonly prescribed painkillers like hydrocodone and codeine just make me sleepy and irritable, barely dull the pain.
-NSAIDs have always worked fine for me.
-antacids make me feel nauseous.
-it's been noted on my psych record that i am "treatment resistant" in terms of medications. but i don't think that's accurate. it's more like i'm resistant to treatment. i have even hated being a complacent zombie.
-i have a lot of negative reactions to drugs, like antibiotics, but it's not that i'm allergic to them. for ease of simplicity i just list them as allergies anyways.
-sleeping meds only work at much too high doses for my body size, and thus are never worth it.

When I had a lump cut out of my hand, it required local anaesthetic. The doctor injected it and I felt all woozy, like I was going to pass out for the next 5 minutes. That was the only time I have had local anaesthetic, so I don't know if it will happen again.

Just had the experience of a low dose of risperidone. It made me feel weak and shaky all the time, I couldn't do much physically. The doctor was surprised because people usually only react that way to a much higher dose.

Yes, I have atypical reactions to meds, so I try not to take any prescription meds. Tylenol doesn't do a thing for pain for me, but does interfere with my automatic breathing reflex when I try to sleep, so I don't take Tylenol. I tried Aleve for my bad knees, which helped a relative with back trouble, but it didn't do anything for my pain. Can't take Robitussin, as it ties my innards into knots, and doesn't do anything to stop coughs. Tried prescription Ibuprofen, but it upset my stomach, even when taken with meals. A couple of aspirin actually works better, and with much less stomach irritation, as long as I take it with meals. I have always had this situation of getting little or no relief from meds, but getting at least some of the side effects. Tried arnica for pain once. Didn't do a thing for the pain, but made me terribly sleepy, which interfered with my work. Allegra allergy med doesn't do anything at all for me, but Zyrtec & Claritin do help, and I really need the help more now, than I used to, at least when trying to sleep, as my post nasal flood makes me cough and hack more when trying to sleep, so I started trying over-the-counter allergy meds, till I found what works for me.

It's annoying to get the side effects, but not the benefits, from meds.

Yeah I tend to have a lot of problems with meds. There are certain types of meds that I typically don't respond well to at all. Either I get intolerable side effects, or the meds won't help at all. I've had so many bad experiences with psych meds that I've developed a rather bad phobia to them. I've tried a bunch of stuff to try to help me sleep, and it's like it either does nothing or it's way too strong and I'll be non-functional for a large portion of the next day. There are definitely times when even the lowest dose of a medication can be too strong for me, and sometimes I've had bad reactions to dosage changes.

Some people mentioned Valerian being too strong for them. I actually find that it barely takes the edge off, but no idea what the dose I was taking compares to what others are were taking.

I wonder if anyone has actually done a statistical analysis of autistic sensitivity to various medications. My guess from the comments here is that we may not be in general more or less sensitive, but that we are more highly variable in our reactions than the general population. That's what you might expect if we have more neurological variation in general.

But of course this could all be just selection bias -- people who have had problems of this kind all speak up when the question is asked.

I'm my case, I'm really not liking these continuing reactions to Naproxen poisoning. I want them to go away.