Rls and Facial twitching

[Artistickiwi]

I've had RLS for about 3 years and take gabapentin 1200mg a day.

I have realised that muscles in my face twitch or spasm though I am unaware they do this (cant feel it happening) only realise due to taking video for social media. The muscles are the ones just above the mouth on both sides.

On talking to my husband about it he said he had noticed and sometimes its quite bad. Of course I am now quite self conscious.

Before I talk to the doctor has anyone else experienced this and do you think its related to RLS or something else entirely?

[Caravan24]

I had the same issue and it's a known side effect of gabapentin. Mine stopped when I weaned off gabapentin

[Artistickiwi in reply to Caravan24]

What do you take instead?

[Caravan24 in reply to Artistickiwi]

I decided to go off gabapentin and instead manage with 10mg baclofen and over the counter co codamol and zopliclone if really bad. Not perfect but better than the DA drugs that caused augmentation

[SueJohnson]

You might want to try switching to pregabalin. Although it is basically the same drug except you don't need to divide the doses, and the side effects are basically the same, some people find that the side effects that bother them on one don't bother them on the other. Divide the gabapentin amount by 6 to get the correct dose.

[Eryl]

Yes, it is related to RLS, I had it before I eliminated my RLS by avoiding inflammatory foods like refined seed oils and refined carbs.

[Jerry57]

Yes, it happened to me several years ago, but I could feel it. I thought it was due to stress and lack of sleep from RLS and/or a side effect of tramadol. I was not taking gabapentin. My Dr had no idea what could cause it. Thankfully it went away.

[Guitarpickin]

When my symptoms flair I often have facial twitching. Getting treatment helped and now it’s very rare and only a lip or eyelid. But before I got on medication (gabapentin), watched what I ate, and stretched daily, I had whole body twitching-so for me it definitely felt related to whatever was aggravating the RLS/PLMD.