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Benzo Taper Plan?

H

henryparsons1

Greenlighter
Joined
Dec 1, 2008
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4
Hi.

I have been reading on this site for a long while, however never have joined and posted.

Well, I've gone and gotten myself into a pickle, shall we say. I am addicted to clonazepam, as well as 8 mg/day of suboxone.

What I want to do is get off the benzos. I am not legally prescribed these, and will never have a reliable source to get them. My only connection just dried up for diverting his klonopin. I am so tired of the fear of being left benzo-less. Anyhow, now the facts:

I have 110 1 mg tabs left. I also have around 45 carisoprodol.

The bad thing is, I require about six-eight mg per day at this point (less if I take the carisoprodol) . I think I can taper down to the 1-2 mg range quickly, but who knows? The only reason I believe I can get down to a much lower dosage quickly is simply that I was on 1 mg a day for a year and just bumped it up due to family stress; stayed on the high dose for 2 months, but now it's time to come down.

Anyway, can someone write a taper plan that uses my limited resources to bring me to a relatively painless withdrawal?

Much Thanks in Advance,
DBS
 
Almost forgot

I also take Wellbutrin and Remeron. These are both norepinephrine reuptake inhibitors, and I can certainly say that these reduce the effectiveness of benzos. I also smoke, and I assume that contributes as well? This is why my dose is so high right now.

Am I really up a creek? I have no access to benzos once those 110 mg are gone. They were not legally prescribed.

DBS
 
I have no special source for clonazeapm but normally nicotine interacts with the cytochrome P 450 enzyme system and a lot of (all?) benzos are metabolized via the cytochrome p 450.

So youre smoking should cause a lower plasma level of clonazepam. If I remember correctly it sure does so for diazepam. Hope this was helpful. greetz
 
I've been there a few times and I think your primary problem will be psychosocial. How will you do for yourself what the Klonopin is doing for you now? How will you keep yourself from going back to whatever drug made you have to take the suboxone in the first place?

Taper to 2 mg Klonopin per day for the next five days: one in the morning, one at sunset. Discontinue the Wellbutrin right away or you may have a panic attack and/or psychotic episode during the taper. Stay on the Remeron. Keep the Somas for emergencies. After the first five days, take 1 mg Klonopin in the morning and .5 mg at sundown. 10 days afterward, try to drop yourself with .5 mg twice a day. You will be feeling like dogshit but at least you'll avoid seizing. Stay away from booze, neuroleptics, barbiturates. After about a month into this, try to have entire 24 hour periods without benzos. Have a reliable friend hold your stash. Stretch the benzo-free intervals to 30 hours, then 36, then 48. Once you can stay off the stuff for 48 hrs, go cold turkey.

Make arrangements with work and all that, just in case you need to disappear for like a month.

That is, if you really want to get off the shit just to get off the shit. If not, there must be a gazillion prescribers in your area you can give some kind of story to.

One last piece of advice: don't think about brain chemistry. I've seen people kick major benzo habits cold turkey with just plain ball-power (including my wife, who has no balls). Don't let the substance play head games with you: the biggest hurdle is psychosocial.
 
I had a benzo habit. I used to take all kinds of benzos, but mostly midazolam which I took 75-100 mg daily. I was also on suboxone at the time, I still am, but due to circumstances I had to quit the benzos last january (I lost the sources).

Just go cold turkey... it feels bad for the first few weeks but you'll get over it. Just stay home, get some movies to watch, sleep as much as you can. Try some non-benzo sleep medications - I used lots of amitriptyline.
 
Please don´t go cold turkey immediately. Seizures, psychosis is a very real problem in your case. Especially Clonazepam is known for a risk of seizures when withdrawing.
 
thanks guys for the responses. i am going to taper very fast and get rid of this drug. i really am sick of it; i feel it is ruining my marriage via sexual dysfunction.
 
There are non-benzo medications you can take to counter the seizures... just go to a doctor and tell him you are quitting a benzo habit.
 
Seep's plan is sound, but I recommend a slightly more gradual taper to 2mg.

I also agree that the wellburtin ought to be stopped.

Buprenorphine lowers seizure threshold, and so does wellburtin. You are facing a much higher risk of seizure than others normally quitting benzos.

Good luck on your taper - here is a piece of info to motivate you more: once you stop taking benzos, your testosterone will spike up and your sex-drive will go through the roof ;)

A WORD OF WARNING: carisoprodol is known to cause seizures, even though it feels like a sedative. I definitely do NOT recommend taking it during benzo withdrawal!
 
Thanks so much guys. I couldn't tell ya why I keep putting myself in this situation, but at least I'm not the only one.

I'm going to discontinue wellbutrin, stay on remeron, and take just enough clonazepam to keep me from going mad. My goal is to be off all medications by spring; it may take a little longer to discontinue the suboxone, however. I've been down that road and the first time it took 2-3 months before I felt normal. Ughh.
 
dread said:
There are non-benzo medications you can take to counter the seizures... just go to a doctor and tell him you are quitting a benzo habit.
Click to expand...

Do any of these also mask all the other symptoms too?

There's a relatively new drug out now called Stiripentol. It's an anticonvulsant that's also a GABA reuptake inhibitor. I don't think it's efficacy in ameliorating benzo withdrawal has been studied, but it sounds like it could maybe be effective. Problem is, I think it only has EU (EMEA) approval thus far (for severe myoclonic epilepsy).
 
Dear God, dont go cold turkey. You would be at serious risk for depression, psychosis and not to mention a nasty seizure.

And ropping from 6 mg to 2mg too fast isnt gonna be comfortable. Soma may also cause seizures, so be careful there too.

Hell, I'm a chickenshit. I'd find a doctor and just tell them I had been on them and needed help.

Oh, friend of mine went off her k-pins and they put her on nuerontin during the taper. Maybe that would help?
 
seep said:
Do any of these also mask all the other symptoms too?
Click to expand...

Well yeah, if you take another GABAergic drug, but then it wouldn't do much for your addiction, it would just be replacing one GABAergic with another GABAergic.

Something like carbamazepine, which is used in the detox of opioid & benzo addicts around here, could be useful.
 
Dont the gaba's include lyrica and nuerontin? Could those help someone like me with a low habit? (1.5-2 mg xanax daily)
 
Gabapentin is a GABA-analogue, but in itself appears to be devoid of GABAergic action.

That said, I still found it indispensable for benzo withdrawal.
 
yeah i find gabapentin works, it gets rid of that i need benzos now feeling. It also gets rid of that i going to twitch or seizure feeling i have 4-8 300mg gabapentin on and off most days as i try to taper off benzos. so fucking hard its so up and down i find rotating different benzos helps
I been trying to quit for a fuckin year it seems impossible
 
Yeah don't have over 8 300mg soma's i have had seizures off them. i can't wait to get more soma's they great to mix with things.
 
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