Anyone take Provigil and breastfeed?

 My daugter is 20 weeks old and has been exclusively bf. I need to start taking my medicine provigil (it's for narcolepsy) so i can stay awake during the days to take care of the kids and be somewhat productive.I've searched and searched online and even on Tom Hales website and have came up with nothing other than...we have no idea..so don't breastfeed and take it. The doctors and pharmacist are no help and don't care too much. Has anyone ever taken provigil while breastfeeding? 

Who prescribed your Provigil?  I would call their office.  Hopefully it is a sleep medicine doctor, not your primary care doctor.  A specialist knows more about Provigil and it's effects.

I actually work in a sleep lab and we have 3 sleep docs on staff who prescribe Provigil for most of our narolepsy pateints so I am very familiar with it, but don't know about how it works with breastfeeding.

You may also want to go to www.aasmnet.org and find an accredited sleep center in your area because they always have sleep docs on staff in you don't already have one.

 Thanks so much for your response :) Yes, it's a neurologist that prescribed this for me. I took it before I got pregnant and for the first 5 weeks I was pregnant ( before I poas). Anyways.. it's just so frustrating since nothing is known about it as far as breastfeeding and transfering into milk. I know it messes with the CNS and don't want my babies brain getting developed weird because of it. I contacted my local lactation consultant and she says she almost never tells a mom not to nurse because of a medicine, but in this case she thinks it would be best to not breastfeed if I am taking provigil. SHe did say though that she knows a lot of moms that take ritalin for narcolepsy and still breastfeed and maybe that would be better. Sooooo.. I;m going to see if the neurologist will prescribe ritalin instead and I'll give that a try. I really don't want to stop breastfeeding, but would love to have energy to do things instead of counting the minutes down for nap time! 

Wow, I have never seen Dr. Hale not know the answer before. Is there any other drug that would work for you that might have clearer information for breastfeeding? I'm sorry your doctor and pharmacist "don't care too much." That's just wrong.

 So.. I called a lactation consultant and she said she almost never tells a mom not to breastfeed because of a medicine. But in this case she thinks it would be best not to since so little is known about it (provigil). She said that she knows of a few nacroleptic mom that breastfeed and take adderall or ritalin and maybe this could be used instead? So.. after I got off the phone I did my own research and am having a hard time finding info on adderall and ritalin and breastfeeding. Also..I don't think I mentioned before that it appears the little Isabelle is also starting to have allergic reactions through my milk just like her brother did. UGH! With the constant mucousy green poo and breaking out in patches of excema. The doctor wrote me a script to start her on the elecare formula...maybe it would be best, I don;t know :( I love breastfeeding and so does she.. but I need to stay awake and be functional during the day. And if she is having allergic reactions through my milk too.. maybe it's better to change to the extremely hypo-allergenic formula elecare. Her brother that just turned 3 is still on elecare since he has so many allergies. What do you think I should do? 

Wow, this is a tough one. I hate to see a mom and baby who love breastfeeding not be able to continue. You really have two issues going on here, your medication need and possible allergies.

For the medication, I agree it's better to avoid nursing while on provigil since so little is known about its safety. But if one of the other options would work for your narcolepsy, you should be able to continue nursing. I just looked in Dr. Hale's forum, and it appears that Ritalin is the safest of your medication options. Here's his response to a question about adderall:

Adderal is just dextroamphetamine. On page 205 of my book, I have a complete rundown on this drug.

As for an alternative, I'd suggest Ritalin. While we don't have any published data, we've studied milk levels in several women and they are modestly low. Doesn't seem to bother the infants.

Tom Hale, PH.D. 

I don't have his book (Medications and Mother's Milk), but most LLL leaders and lactation consultants should have it if you would like to read more about these drugs.

 As for the allergy issue, do you know what allergies your son has (and your baby is likely to have)? Babies really cannot be allergic to breastmilk, but they can react to proteins that pass into the milk from foods the mother eats. If you avoid eating the allergens, she should not react to your milk. Dairy is the most common one. There are a couple of ways to approach this if you want to try to eliminate her allergic reaction. You could eliminate one allergen at a time to see if it helps, or you could go on an elimination diet and eliminate all potential allergens at once and then gradually reintroduce them. There may be some dietary sacrifices involved, but if you can eliminate the allergens, your milk is still the best thing for your baby and can potentially protect her from food allergies down the road. I'm sending you a PM about an article I wrote about allergies and breastfeeding.

I hope you can find an answer that works well for you. I'm sorry you are facing so many challenges to breastfeeding right now.