I take 200mg of Topamax daily (100mg in the morning and 100mg at night), I take it for my anxiety and my repetitive intrusive thoughts. It has been somewhat helpful in the past. I am not overweight either but I wanted a medication for my anxiety that would not make me gain weight, weight loss is a possible side effect and it may not work for everyone, the higher the dose the more suppressed the appetite or the more weight lost usually. I lost about 6lbs and I have been on it for a few months (again not overweight, for someone who is overweight they might have lost more). I had read online that people who are very over weight have lost a lot on topamax, it does make you feel not very hungry.

As for other effects, well expect the first few weeks to be tough, like trouble focusing, losing your thoughts, feeling foggy, slowed down thinking (this part went a way after a few weeks once I completed increasing my dose), tingling fingers and toes, and forget about drinking soda because it will change the way you taste certain things, like for example soda will now taste strange. But my topamax did work for my anxiety so it was worth it.

I didn't really mention much about sedating, it never really felt like it sedated me.While it may calm me a little it is nothing like other calming drugs out there. I never got too tired or anything like that. The negative parts were the brain fog or not thinking clearly, some people say that never goes away, for me it only lasted a few weeks or until my dose stabilized and I stopped raising it, it is hard to think straight when that is happening and when your brain is adjusting. Sometimes it does feel like you can't think straight but I still maintained my job and things like that so it isn't like it was impossible to function, more difficult of course, but Topamax did help me atleast a little.