Overload
Muscle relaxants
Category: Medicines
Type
Involuntary
Introduction and description
In the section on muscle diseases we have looked at the causes of these diseases - viruses, toxins, damage caused by surgery or accident, bacteria, fungi, parasites, radiation and pharmaceuticals.
A muscle relaxant is a pharmaceutical that is designed to treat the symptoms of muscle diseases. These class of drugs are not designed to cure, simply because they do not address the cause. According to Wikipedia
A muscle relaxant is a drug which affects skeletal muscle function and decreases the muscle tone. It may be used to alleviate symptoms such as muscle spasms, pain, and hyperreflexia. The term "muscle relaxant" is used to refer to two major therapeutic groups:
- Neuromuscular blockers - Neuromuscular blockers act by interfering with transmission at the neuromuscular end plate and have no central nervous system (CNS) activity. They are often used during surgical procedures and in intensive care and emergency medicine to cause paralysis
- Spasmolytics - Spasmolytics, also known as "centrally-acting" muscle relaxants, are used to alleviate musculoskeletal pain and spasms and to reduce spasticity in a variety of neurological conditions.
While both neuromuscular blockers and spasmolytics are often grouped together as muscle relaxants, the term is commonly used to refer to spasmolytics only.

In this section we will use this convention and only look at spasmolytics, simply because it is these drugs that have the record of producing spiritual experiences.
Muscle relaxants may help with acute musculoskeletal pain, when physical therapy is unavailable or has not been fully successful. Applicable conditions include acute back or neck pain, or pain after an injury. They may also be used to treat spasms associated movement disorders in neurologic conditions such as cerebral palsy, multiple sclerosis, and spinal cord disease. It is worth adding that although medications are commonly used for ‘spastic movement’ disorders, research has not shown functional benefit for some of these drugs. Some studies have shown that medications have been effective in decreasing spasticity, but that this has not been accompanied by functional benefits.
Categories of drugs
There are various classes of drugs within this category :
- Mixed receptor - First there are some that appear to have multiple receptor activity, which means that they will not only act on the muscle to relax it but may have numerous other actions as well via the other receptors e.g. Baclofen, Metaxalone, Tizanidine
- Anticholergens - Then there are a three anticholinergic based drugs that work principally via the muscarinic receptors - Cyclobenzaprine, Orphenadrine and Flavoxate
- Benzodiazepines – there are a number of benzodiazepines that are used as muscle relaxants, but I have excluded them from this description as they have their own section e.g. Bentazepam, Diazepam, Lorazepam, Nitrazepam, and Tetrazepam
- ‘Carbamic acid esters’ – these too usually have multiple receptor activity and occasionally it is not clear that all the receptors have been identified or are known. For example - Carisoprodol, Febarbamate, Meprobomate, Methocarbamol, Phenprobamate, Styramate
Side effects
In June 2016, eHealthme ceased to provide the information on which all the data in this section is based. On querying my friends in the USA, it would seem that many of the sites that provided similar information, have done the same. The links we provided to eHealthme also no longer work as this data too has been removed.
As to why all these sites have removed exceptionally important information, my USA helpers said that more and more people are questioning what they are being given – and demanding to know WHY the CAUSE of their illness has not been investigated. It appears that there has been a very heartening increase in the numbers of people who want to be healed – have the cause tackled and not the symptoms. And this is ‘not popular’ with the conventional medical community, who cannot make money from well people.
The statistics collected from eHealthme remain valid for the date they were collected. As such we have left this section as it is – an historical record. Please read this section therefore only as an historical record of the figures that were applicable on the date specified.
If we take at random one example drug such as Zanaflex, according to the Adverse Drug reports they have collated, the most common side-effects reported are shown below
Female | Male |
Pain | Depression |
Nausea | Anxiety |
Fall | Pain |
Fatigue | Back Pain |
Headache | Fatigue |
Asthenia | Asthenia |
Chest Pain | Drug Ineffective |
Depression | Drug Dependence |
Anxiety | Nausea |
Dyspnoea | Hypoaesthesia |
In addition to the side effects above, there is of course the ultimate spiritual experience - death. If we take again some of the main drugs in this category, the list that follows shows the figures from the eHealthme site. Please note that this list does not include every drug. The observations for each drug do, however, include figures:
Lioresal - On Jun, 1, 2015: 11,921 people reported to have side effects when taking Lioresal. Among them, 449 people (3.77%) have Death.
Baclofen - On Jun, 23, 2015: 20,415 people reported to have side effects when taking Baclofen. Among them, 359 people (1.76%) have Death.
Flexeril - On Jun, 5, 2015: 14,482 people reported to have side effects when taking Flexeril. Among them, 226 people (1.56%) have Death.
Soma - On Jun, 16, 2015: 8,631 people reported to have side effects when taking Soma. Among them, 117 people (1.36%) have Death.
Zanaflex - On Jun, 7, 2015: 6,740 people reported to have side effects when taking Zanaflex. Among them, 73 people (1.08%) have Death.
Methocarbamol - On Jun, 21, 2015: 2,773 people reported to have side effects when taking Methocarbamol. Among them, 42 people (1.51%) have Death.
Skelaxin - On Jun, 26, 2015: 5,162 people reported to have side effects when taking Skelaxin. Among them, 54 people (1.05%) have Death.
Metaxalone - On Jun, 26, 2015: 864 people reported to have side effects when taking Metaxalone. Among them, 25 people (2.89%) have Death.
Meprobamate - On Jun, 8, 2015: 1,508 people reported to have side effects when taking Meprobamate. Among them, 53 people (3.51%) have Death.
Equanil - On Jun, 26, 2015: 1,192 people reported to have side effects when taking Equanil. Among them, 37 people (3.10%) have Death.
How it works

There is no one way in which these pharmaceuticals exert their hallucinatory effects. Furthermore, there are drugs on this list where the manufacturers of them do not know what is in them. Some of them appear to 'work' via the GABAA receptor and thus we can look for their effects by examining the section on the GABA receptor. One 'works' via the NMDA receptor, yet others via the muscarinic receptors. I refer you to the main sections on each of these receptors to understand how they may execute their hallucinatory effect.
But if one was to step back and analyse things in a less 'receptor' oriented way, one would have to come to the conclusion, that they gave people hallucinations because they were toxic to them.
References and further reading
This is worth reading -Killed My Inner Self-Ephedrine, Baclofen & Diazepam by kt; no hallucinations just a message to the FDA and doctors everywhere.
Observations
The table below has been derived from the figures on eHealthme and was correct as at mid 2015. The link takes you to the eHealthme website where you can view current figures for hallucinations and deaths and see all the other side-effects.
Observation no |
Name of pharmaceutical |
No of hallucinations |
016874 |
159 |
|
016875 |
11 |
|
016878 |
19 |
|
016879 |
18 |
|
016880 |
29 |
|
016881 |
31 |
|
016882 |
80 |
|
016883 | Metaxalone | 11 |
016884 | Meprobamate | 10 |
016885 | Equanil | 9 |
016886 | Flavoxate | 4 |
016887 | Dantrolene Sodium | 4 |
016888 | Flexeril | 231 |
016889 | Cyclobenzaprine | 9 |
016891 | Carisoprodol | 14 |
016892 | Soma | 111 |
016893 | Baclofen | 300 |
016894 | Lioresal | 132 |
Total | 1,182 |
Related observations
Healing observations
- Dr Duke's list of Plants with Myorelaxant Activity 019681
- Mrs Grieve on Primrose 029608
- Riding The Wet Horse: On Onsen Orbital Orgasm Hot and Cold Bathwater by el forestero 017425
Hallucination
- Amrix 017997
- Baclofen 016893
- Baclofen-induced psychosis in a patient with tetanus 026091
- Carisoprodol 016891
- Carisoprodol by Aire EROWID 016890
- Chlorzoxazone 018202
- Cyclobenzaprine 016889
- Cyclobenzaprine hydrochloride 018832
- Dantrium 018843
- Dantrolene Sodium 016887
- Dicyclomine 005413
- Equanil 016885
- Flavoxate 016886
- Flavoxate Hydrochloride 018991
- Flexeril 016888
- Intense Sadness and Analyzing My Personality - DOI & Various by Psychedelic*Dreamer 016876
- Lioresal 016894
- Meprobamate 016884
- Metaxalone 016883
- Methocarbamol 016880
- Nabilone and Cesamet 017360
- Norflex 019703
- Norflex 016879
- Norgesic 019705
- Orphenadrine 016878
- Orphenadrine Citrate 019817
- Restoril 015698
- Robaxin 020009
- Robaxin and Robaxisal 016881
- Rocuronium Bromide 020011
- Skelaxin 016882
- Soma 016892
- Succinylcholine Chloride 020052
- The Netherlands Centre for Monitoring of Adverse Reactions to Drugs 1992 016811
- Tizanidine 016875
- Totally destroyed - Josh 016877
- Trancopal 020226
- Tranxene 002210
- Urispas 020333
- Vecuronium Bromide 020354
- Xiaflex 020384
- Zanaflex 016874
Wisdom, Inspiration, Divine love & Bliss
Out of time
- Intense Sadness and Analyzing My Personality - DOI & Various by Psychedelic*Dreamer 016876
- Riding The Wet Horse: On Onsen Orbital Orgasm Hot and Cold Bathwater by el forestero 017425