Posted by gary (209.187.113.54) on December 09, 1999 at 22:43:33:
In Reply to: Gary, can you posted by Ted on December 09, 1999 at 01:51:59:
almost all medicines are actually toxins of some sort
that is, they are something the body senses as an unnatural/foreign substance( VERY simply speaking) and reacts to
the body's reaction to the "poison" is the effect that helps the problem we took the drug for
it's always a tradeoff of some sort-
the whole idea is for the drug reaction to be less of a problem for the body than the original problem we are treating
now, with many drugs, if we take them too much and/or for too long, the body adjusts itself and then senses their presence as a more "normal" event (what I call building a tolerance)
then we either have to increase the dose or find a different medicine (many medicines we would not want to increase the dose, because of worse side effects - the "tradeoff" mentioned above would work against us, the effect of the extra drug would be worse than the original problem)
that is ONE reason they can stop working.....
another possibility is that in somes cases the body reacts in proportion to the level of the drug that is ingested - the more ingested, the greater the reaction
(what we call an overdose is this - TOO much drug causing a reaction that is way in excess of that required to relieve the problem - basiclly, we lose on the trade off)
SOME maladys seem to be caused by departing from a balance point - either way - too much or not enough of a given hormone, enzyme or whatever will set off the problem
so, it is possible to overdose and go right past the "balance" point into an excessive situation and retrigger the problem
what I started out way back suggesting is that MAYBE imitrex is like this for SOME people, remembering that when migraneurs take it, they only take a dose or two, and then go a relatively long time without it;
in the case of CH, folks take it much more often, for lengthy periods of time without a break
when you also look at the frequent report that a MUCH LOWER dose seems to work for CH than is required for migraine, it suggests our systems have a greater reaction to imitrex - relative to the attack - than migraneurs
but as is often the case, there is no proven dosage level for CH, so docs prescribe according to migraine specs - this may be OK, it may be inadequate, it may be WAY too much - all depending on what the drug is, and what part of the CH biochemistry sequence it is acting through
I suspect we MIGHT find that the "rebound" problem with imtitrex is absent, or not as bad with the people using the reduced dosage mentioned in the "imitrex tip" article - topic button at left of screen
just an idea
but AS ALWAYS
if we're using a comnbination of treatments, it becomes VERY VERY difficult to accurately state just what each is doing, because sometimes the combination produces different effects than either of the individual drugs produce alone
EXAMPLE:
red pills make your feet swell
blue pills make your hair grow faster
BUT
if you take red & blue pills together,
your feet still swell, but your hair falls out instead of growing faster
I suspect there is a LOT of such unpredictable "crossfire" effects going on with CH people,
and we HONESTLY aren't always real good at seeing them, or sorting them out-
THIS and THIS ALONE can account for many many individual reports that sound real "strange"