Phenibut

[Treacle]

Yeah, contrary to what I believed, if you've not absolutely hammered your GABA-b receptors (by taking massive doses, for a few days, or longer), it is possible to taper very rapidly and get off comfortably. You can even chuck in the odd high dose day, and drop back down. I've found I can take it daily, for months, without really ending up with any discomfort, as long as I'm not a bell end with it. I've even stopped taking my pregabalin, and suffered no withdrawals. Does anyone find it makes them more emotional, in higher doses?

 

[coelophysis]

Thanks Treacle. I've always read many posts by you regarding phenibut and that one has particularly put my mind at ease. Although I did it quite frequently I always felt like I was being as careful as possible, all while knowing I was abusing it and breaking the golden rules of phenibut usage. At my worst I'd be able to take 2-3 days off before caving back into my 2.5-3g morning routine again. I'd just really like to have at the very least a full week off of the stuff before dabbling again. Just to be positive I'm not actually being tricked by it.

 

[Treacle]

I know exactly what you mean. Those sorts of doses are pretty sensible, though, so, you should be fine. You seem to acknowledge what can happen, so carry on.

 

[dopemegently]

I take phenibut fairly regularly, and I got a packet of pyrazolam yesterday. I prefer phenibut, I won't be getting pyrazolam anymore.

 

[scrooloose]

Ha just remembered, got a batch of phenny. Gonna go for 4 grammes. Perfect for a lazy Sunday.

 

[velmwend]

This may sound strange but I drank some cardamon pod tea today and it appears to have worked exceptionally well alongside my phenibut dose. :-/

 

[dopemegently]

I'm gonna take some picamillon with phenibut, I think that could work well. Also, picamillon could possibly help detox from phenibut. (I tried doing it with etizolam).

Edit: picamilon is just like phenibut; a cold war russian drug, it's basically gaba with an added ingredient to make it psycho-active. It's a gaba agonist like phenibut, and is supposed to be active at smaller doses.

 

[Shambles]

Still stuck on this stuff. Just cannot seem to get off of it. The vast majority of the time I'm only taking ~500-750mg or so a day just to keep w/d at bay but can skip a day and go up to 36h usually. But at the 36h point the w/d effects kick in hard and I have to dose... and quite often end up dosing repeatedly cos general anxiety levels are off the scale once w/d kicks in, and severe panic attacks are generally what heralds the overwhelming need to redose, so between the two I'm in such a state I tend to overcompensate undoing the previous however many days of very low dosing

Dunno quite what to do about it. Gotta stop taking the crap cos all I'm doing is putting off w/d, making it worse when it comes, and almost never dosing high enough to get any recreational effects anyway. Have tried the latter a few times since I've been on daily dosing and it just doesn't work anyway - all I get is the unpleasant peripheral effects and to feel like utter crap the next day. Suppose all I can do is to resign myself to daily dosing for some considerable time longer and just keep trying to knock a bit off slowly but surely. Such a pain in the arse to do cos just means I'm in constant low(ish)-level GABA w/d which is far from pleasant... but far closer to pleasant than acute and intense GABA w/d, admittedly :D

Was thinking of getting some GBL in as a kinda transition stage between daily phenibut and quitting proper. This could be a horrible idea, I'm sure, but I've never had any problems tapering and quitting geebee nor had any significant w/d from it. Just think I'd manage it a lot better. Gotta be worth a go. Will either work or won't and if it doesn't it's back to the phenibut and back to the drawing board, I guess

 

[StoneHappyMonday]

If you're talking of stopping the phen via getting a habit for geebee, which you can then kick without hassle when necessary - yeah, why is that a bad idea? Centuries (well, century) old tried and tested method for beating addiction, swapping one for another. I don't know why it's ridiculed.

 

[lurching]

Was thinking of getting some GBL in as a kinda transition stage between daily phenibut and quitting proper. This could be a horrible idea, I'm sure, but I've never had any problems tapering and quitting geebee nor had any significant w/d from it. Just think I'd manage it a lot better. Gotta be worth a go. Will either work or won't and if it doesn't it's back to the phenibut and back to the drawing board, I guess

GBL? Ill advised, Shamball, try for baclofen and/or pregabalin instead first.

SHM, because there are much better stuffs for tackling this kind of GABA withdrawal than the messy short-acting GBL with its enormous addiction potential of its own. On paper.

But, then again, whatever works for you...

I've never had any problems tapering and quitting geebee nor had any significant w/d from it.

 

[backroll]

Shambles! You surprise me!

Are things OK otherwise apart from your current phen persuasion?

EDIT!

Just read the mental health thread...get off the gabbas fella is all I can say and stay strong

 

[Shambles]

GBL? Ill advised, Shamball, try for baclofen and/or pregabalin instead first.

Baclofen did shit all for me when I tried it many years ago (admittedly for a totally unrelated reason) and nor did pregabalin when I tried it recently. My drug counsellor suggested pregabalin as an option to ask GP about when I was tapering benzos recently but I wasn't actually tapering benzos (cos I've not taken benzos regularly for years) so much as it being preferable to have my benzo script tapered rather than my codeine one whilst waiting to be switched to bupe for back problem. Once I got switched I just didn't bother chasing up the benzo script (cos was down so low I couldn't be arsed for the sake of a handful of 2mg diazzies a week) so never got around to enquiring.

Is it really any good for GABA w/d? Might be worth a go if it could be. Was planning on doing exactly as SHM describes cos I've never had a problem with GBL addiction or w/d. However, I've been taking phenibut daily for over six months (yes, I know ) and suspect my GABA system is so screwed GBL probably wouldn't be much help but would give me brutal w/d this time. Although could always switch back to phenibut if it did.

I will think about pregabalin again though if there's a chance it could be of any real benefit. When I tried it earlier in the year it just made me fall over a lot at first then had no noticeable effect at all (unless combined with ketamine when it most assuredly did ). This was before I got started on the phenibut so dunno what it would do at this stage. Do you basically mean use it to just replace the phenibut then taper pregabalin?

Shambles! You surprise me!

Are things OK otherwise apart from your current phen persuasion?

EDIT!

Just read the mental health thread...get off the gabbas fella is all I can say and stay strong

Meh. I seriously doubt half a gramme of phenibut a day is responsible for my mental state at the moment. Definitely isn't helping though, obviously. Hence trying to get off it

 

[backroll]

Meh. I seriously doubt half a gramme of phenibut a day is responsible for my mental state at the moment. Definitely isn't helping though, obviously. Hence trying to get off it

well of course it isn't, you have made that much clear! but like you said, getting off it would help. good luck

 

[lurching]

I will think about pregabalin again though if there's a chance it could be of any real benefit. When I tried it earlier in the year it just made me fall over a lot at first then had no noticeable effect at all (unless combined with ketamine when it most assuredly did ). This was before I got started on the phenibut so dunno what it would do at this stage. Do you basically mean use it to just replace the phenibut then taper pregabalin?

Well, I'd suggest tapering the phenibut as far down as possible while taking pregabalin AND baclofen to take the worst edge off. You may even be able to replace the phenibut altogether with them. Despite mixed results in the past you should probably give it a try, Bhamsalls

 

[Shambles]

Update.

Switched from phenibut to GBL last Saturday and had no phenibut since. First few days required pretty hefty geebee dosing - 2-2.5ml every hour or so. Last few days I've been down to 0.8-1.6ml every 2-3h - sometimes quite a bit longer. Could feel the phenibut w/d going on in the background for first 4-5 days but felt fairly comfy with the geeb atop it. Last couple days I've noticed significant reduction in phenibut w/d symptoms and have even managed to sleep through a couple nights without needing to redose... actually I've not really managed to sleep through cos I still wake up every hour or so and is more a kinda dozy haze than real sleep. Not woken up in the grip of any stupidly intense panic attacks last couple days though. And seem to be getting better at stretching time between geebee doses and/or taking less.

Still need to try to go without the geebee for a few days to be sure but is looking like I'm over the worst of the phenibut w/d. If I only have to deal with the geebee stuffs now that shouldn't be a problem at all. And in an absolutely ideal world I may even have enough geebee to have a lil spare for recreational purposes after this taper is over and done with

Unlikely but worth aiming for :D

So yeah, phuck phenibut. Those w/d are just fukkin nuts. GBL is sooooooooo much more manageable. For me anyway. Will see how it goes but so far is looking rather promising. GBL Fairies

 

[StoneHappyMonday]

Good to hear its going well Shambles. I first heard of this sort of treatment reading about nineteenth century opiate users swapping their habit for cocaine. And that worked too.

Nice one anyway.

 

[Shambles]

Hehe. Does kinda feel like I'm using heroin to kick a methadone habit but that actually makes more sense than the other way round to me so so be it :D

Seems to be working anyway. Weren't really any other options open to me as far as I could see. Drug counsellor said they could probably be persuaded to script me a bit o' Librium but seemed pretty doubtful and when I said it was likely to require pretty frikkin hefty doses of Librium to have any effect at all she went a bit quiet and seemed to be more in favour of my original plan of swapping Guice for phenibut and see how it goes.

Pretty sure it wouldn't work out so well for all but given my history with geebee is extensive and broadly benign it seemed worth a bash and providence provided in the nick of time so...

And yeah, cocaine was originally marketed as a "cure" for opiate addiction. Think it was specifically for heroin addiction. Heroin originally being marketed as a cure for morphine addiction. In both cases entirely accurate... although perhaps not quite in the way the turn-of-the-century patient would be expecting :D

 

[Shambles]

Updating me updatings...

I'm off the phenibut \o/

The GBL taper worked a treat. No problems whatsoever. Coupla hairy(ish) moments here and there where it seemed I'd need to be taking a veritable shitload of geebee daily forever but they always passed and, as it turned out, was a bit of a doddle as it wound down.

I probably could've done it a lot quicker if I'd really pushed myself but I took it steady as the Drug Fairy (Drug Fairy ) supplied a fair bit more geebee than I had ever hoped for so must admit to having had a few recreational daze on the way down. A boy needs to have some fun now and then to avoid relapse and/or insanity though so

But yeah, it worked a treat. I kinda doubt anybody else would be stupid enough to get themselves into such a situtation, but if they ever did then GBL was my saviour

For the sake of completeness, I've not taken phenibut or GBL (or owt related) for the last fortnight or so and, although still noticably drained of GABA, I'm long past withdrawals and essentially just hanging around waiting for brainchems to restock. The taper was pretty much exactly as you'd expect: start high, plateau, drop, plateau, drop, plateau, drop and so on. Didn't come across any significant problems on the way down but was very glad I had enough geeb to play with.

I'm freeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!

(definition of irony: i'd ordered another 50g of phenibut shortly before i started on the geebee taper (cos i wasn't sure it was happening) but it never arrived. as such, i was incredibly glad said geebee did arrive in time. coupla months of tapering, eventual refund from *a popular auction site* for phenibut that never arrived... it arrived within a coupla days of me finishing tapering )

(but obviously haven't touched it)

 

[phactor]

Updating me updatings...

I'm off the phenibut \o/

The GBL taper worked a treat. No problems whatsoever. Coupla hairy(ish) moments here and there where it seemed I'd need to be taking a veritable shitload of geebee daily forever but they always passed and, as it turned out, was a bit of a doddle as it wound down.

I probably could've done it a lot quicker if I'd really pushed myself but I took it steady as the Drug Fairy (Drug Fairy ) supplied a fair bit more geebee than I had ever hoped for so must admit to having had a few recreational daze on the way down. A boy needs to have some fun now and then to avoid relapse and/or insanity though so

But yeah, it worked a treat. I kinda doubt anybody else would be stupid enough to get themselves into such a situtation, but if they ever did then GBL was my saviour

For the sake of completeness, I've not taken phenibut or GBL (or owt related) for the last fortnight or so and, although still noticably drained of GABA, I'm long past withdrawals and essentially just hanging around waiting for brainchems to restock. The taper was pretty much exactly as you'd expect: start high, plateau, drop, plateau, drop, plateau, drop and so on. Didn't come across any significant problems on the way down but was very glad I had enough geeb to play with.

I'm freeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!

(definition of irony: i'd ordered another 50g of phenibut shortly before i started on the geebee taper (cos i wasn't sure it was happening) but it never arrived. as such, i was incredibly glad said geebee did arrive in time. coupla months of tapering, eventual refund from *a popular auction site* for phenibut that never arrived... it arrived within a coupla days of me finishing tapering )

(but obviously haven't touched it)

If I were you, I would just throw the Phenibut out. I have been in similar situations, once with phenibut. Immediately upon receiving the item it went straight into the trash. Feels liberating almost. Years and years ago, I remember throwing out some poppy pods out in a dumpster. I totally flipped off the the bag I had thrown away while I drove off with a smile on my face. Kinda embarrassing thinking about it now.

Congrats on getting off the phenibut. For anyone else reading this and considering trying phenibut I recommend you do not if you had previous problems with downers (booze, benzos etc). It is just too tempting. The first few times you take it is amazing, but after that it is a total crapshoot. I would sometimes get positive effects and then the next day would get nothing (even after taking a higher dose).

Congrats on getting off the stuff. I didn't have access to GHB/GBL but I did find that some beers in the evening and neurotin during the day helped me quite a bit.

 

[amanitadine]

Congrats Shammy....you are the only crazy bugger I can think of who could use GBL to taper off phenibut! But I guess you've always been blessed with an idiosyncratic relationship to the guice. Bless you indeed!

Phenibut is some nasty stuff...I've been addicted to anything and everything the past few decades, and the phenibut is frankly the most terrifying and daunting of them all...only ever used it in the past to get off GBL, and haven't touched the guice in probably 4 years, after a decade plus of on/off ridiculousness...but have been on 60 mg of baclofen a day since then. Anyways, quit a massive Kratom habit about 6 weeks ago, used phenibut to help sleep for the first few weeks, and it instantly raped me and terrified the shit out of me. Some nasty, nasty withdrawals....and it happened so fast! My ol' GABA-B receptors are obviously fucked....as are the GABA-A's too, as I'm 5 months into an Ashton method taper using diazepam to get off a massive etizolam habit. Ahh yes, such a complicated little dance!

Anyways, after much trial and error, trying different approaches, talking to people, I seem to have stabilized on the phenibut and have tapered down from 5 grams daily to now at 2.2. I take small amounts throughout the day...it burns through my body so quick that even a large dose had me in massive withdrawal within 8 hours. So I divide the dose 4 x daily, and am slowly reducing. This avoids that horrendous glutamate shitstorm and all of it's lovely excitotoxicity. I take magnesium Glycinate (a slight NMDAR antagonist to dampen the glutamate release, and it does relax you), a few grams of taurine throughout the day, a large dose of tryptophan at night to help sleep, and periodic grams of L-theanine. Who knows what works and what is placebo, but what was a nightmare has become manageable.

Phenibut is seriously vicious stuff....especially if you have already fucked your GABA system. Congrats on being off Shambles...no small feat! I was never able to taper the guice, as tempted as I am to try your approach, but that's likely just an excuse to get my geebee on. It's been a while. But being here in the states last time I checked there weren't too many willing to ship. Probably for the better....I don't think I'd have your luck! I'd have to get back on the phenibut to get off the GBL, ad infinitum. Story of my life!