I first posted back in January, after having been on Toprol XL fo...

I first posted back in January, after having been on Toprol XL for 7-weeks. It's now been about 8-months and some of the side affects are still there, although lessened. My BP, as of two weeks ago, was 114/68. My pulse averages about 68 BPM, lowest in the AM (as low as 48 at times) and as high as 78 in late afternoon. After hard exercise my pulse will hit 110-120, but rapidly drops to 75 or 80 within 5-minutes. After taking my dose (25 mg), almost predictably I have weird chest pain and gas in the afternoon and some muscle cramps. The symptoms subside after a few hours. Other than that all other nasty symptoms have gone away. I still have extremely vivid dreams, but most are very interesting and the nightmares are all but non-existent. Here are some things that helped me. 1) Take the Toprol immediately after a meal and with a large quantity of water. 2) Take it at the same time every day. I tried several different times and for me with lunch works best. 3) Try to stick with the brand name. I switched to the generic version ($8.00 vs $39.00) and the side affects worsened. Anyone that says that a generic is equivalent to the "real thing" is full of crap. 4) Meals with a higher fat content seems to lessen the side affects. Not sure why, but I experimented with this and it works for me. I'm not promoting fatty food (I'm not overweight). 5) EXERCISE if you can. Even moderate exercise will help. I work out 30-minutes each day and this has helped tremendously.