Something works for me, thanks to leads for research provided by online friends, and my thanks, very great thanks, for leading me to the solution.

Zetia (cholesterol medicine) gave me muscle damage so severe, my right leg will never be again as reliable as my left. Stopped Zetia, in two weeks, nearly recovered.

Started taking Simvastatin and it was about as effective for cholesterol reduction as taking an aspirin. Not.

Doctor put me on Lipitor generic and by golly didn't the pain start up again, nearly intolerable a month into the regimen. I could hardly walk.

And then, dear friend, you pointed me to an article about statins and muscle damage, which described the damage to the muscle as due to oxidative stress from the meds.

So, I started taking extra Vitamin C, Vitamin E, resveratrol (because that's what I had on hand, all three being antioxidants) and hurray! the pain in my leg subsided, I'm walking fine (though I'm always aware that my right leg may not ever again be as reliable as the left, so I'm careful with stairs).

Thank you, thank you, thank you, for giving me the information to puzzle out a solution. Now I can take my statins and be pain-free too.

(Just for the scientific curiousity of it, I stopped taking the extra antioxidants for a couple of days and the pain returned. I'm convinced there is cause and effect going on here.)

You rock!