I was prescribed 3 weeks worth of cipro (fluoroquinolone antibiotic) twice per day for a suspected prostate infection.  The doctor never performed a culture to detect for presence of bacteria or actual infection. 

I did not think anything of taking this drug Cipro; and had no inkling as to what was about to happen to my life and my body.  Around the time of finishing the prescription, I developed eye issues: depth perception issues, blurring of vision, double vision, floaters, and photophobia.  And my nervous system went into overdrive.  I began to feel heaviness in my legs and some pains in my knees.  It was as if a shotgun went off in my body and all of these strange symptoms occurred all at once.

Being a healthy young athletic male in my late 20s, I didn't think too much of all these symptoms...they were strange, indeed.  At the time I never made the correlation with my symptoms and the prescription of Cipro.

Later that year I was prescribed more Cipro and took it for one week.  At this time I developed even more disturbing and alarming symptoms throughout my body: joint pain in my knees, hips, ankles, wrists, and shoulders. I developed Achilles tendinitis in both Achilles, and my Achilles would stiffen up and claudicate so much that I could barely walk or move my ankle in a normal motion.  My legs began to pulsate, vibrate and throb with pain, as if someone had wired electricity into them.  My skin burned all over.  Eyes became very sensitive to light.  Ears began to ring (tinnitus) loudly and became very sensitive to normal sounds, let alone loud sounds like traffic or a loud ambulance siren.  My mind began to experience extreme anxiety, depersonalization, and depression.

Something was not right.  How could I be a normal healthy young male in peak athletic shape with a love for running and all of the sudden be in so much pain all over my body and barely able to walk down the street? I researched the side effects (or adverse reactions, ADR) of fluoroquinolone antibiotics (cipro, levaquin, floxin, tequin, noroxin) and realized that of the over 40 side effects I was experiencing, all were listed in the pharmaceutical drug insert for cipro.  Why did the doctor never warn me?

I stopped taking the drug immediately. It was too late. By that time I had consumed approximately 60 pills between the two prescriptions.  I read and researched all that I could --to survive and understand all of the life-altering adverse effects that were besetting me.

Went to the doctor to have everything else ruled out.  All blood work tested fine.

According to the doctors, I was the picture of health.  They could not explain these toxic side effects from cipro. They said I would have to deal with it.  My eyes tested normal when thoroughly examined by a neuro-ophthamologist four times in the first year of my floxing.  Floxing is the term used to describe the condition in which a person suffers a severe disabling reaction of many toxic side effects after taking a fluoroquinolone antibiotic (cipro, levaquin, floxin, tequin, noroxin, etc), This reaction may occur during drug therapy or many months after last ingestion of the drug.

After being looked at by so many doctors, combined with the fact that they could find nothing wrong with me, I knew I was on my own to deal with the intense pains and side effects increasing by the day!

The first month after I stopped taking cipro was the worst physical experience of my entire life.  I could barely walk, needed to use a cane, could not stand for more than 10 minutes at a time. I began to limp as my Achille would claudicate from the intense cutting and tearing pain in my ankles and legs.  My legs were constantly vibrating and pulsating in pain.  My skin burned off and on.  I had intense drug-induced physiological anxiety all throughout the day, and especially when trying to fall asleep at night.  My legs hurt and throbbed as I tried to walk. I had to stop my exercise regimen of running and jogging due to the crippling and debilitating leg pains caused by cipro.

I had to sit a lot.  Standing was a luxury at this point, due to the prostrating and crippling joint and tendon pains. 

The next few months were a continuation of the first month post-floxing. I could not walk for more than a block without having to limp and endure intense neuropathy in my legs. I was becoming depressed at the lack of physical activity in my life...but I had to go on to earn a living and take care of my life.

The pain in my in my legs would become so bad after various small amounts of walking (5 - 10 minutes) that I would have to find a seat anywhere, even if that meant on the ground. The pain was that bad.

At about 9 months after the last cipro pill ingested I was trying very light bike rides.

But I would come home and be in such pain afterward and have a difficult time standing for the rest of the day or night.

I tried a very light jog about one year out and was in pain the entire time. I could only last for about a mile. Then I had to stay sitting the rest of the night due to the severe leg and joint pains in my knees and hips. 

I could only try a jog once or twice per month.  Before I had the reaction to cipro, I could run 5 miles several times per week. That was out of the question now.  I began to battle this toxic syndrome but I was becoming lost, lonely and tired.

At about a year and a half later, I was able to run once or twice per month.  There was always knee, hip, ankle and Achille pain during the jog.  And afterward I could not stand for the rest of the day or night. 

Many other adverse effects from cipro continued:  all the eye damage--blurring, floaters, photophobia, drug induced over-stimulation of the nervous system; peripheral neuropathy--nerve pain in and around my hip and knee joints, burning and tingling in my legs to my toes, pulsating and throbbing in my lower legs constantly.

At 2 years after the initial floxing, I am about the same.  Some pains are less but still present.  The eye damage continues.  The nervous system damage is somewhat better.  I am no longer able to run competitively.  I can only last for a few light jogs once per month or so.  The damage is deep and long-lasting.  It has permanently changed my life in a debilitating way.   When pains become too severe, I have to sit while cooking dinner at the stove.  I cannot walk for more than 20-30 minutes without being in disabling pain and having to sit down.  I can only ride my bike 2-3 times per week.  And pay for it afterward with having to sit often to endure the debilitating knee and hip pains.  I used to be the epitome of athletic health, but all that changed after my encounter with the toxic antibiotic cipro.