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Harm Reduction Clonazepam

C

chrisalt

Bluelighter
Joined
Jan 28, 2012
Messages
369
Been through clonazepam W/D twice and it was beyond hell for 6 months during the taper I was taking 4mg a day for 2 years total peroid combined

Question is im falling into bad habits for various legit reasons. i have taken anywhere from 2mg to 4mg a day(with no tolerance) for about 2 weeks but if I it stop completely right now should i expect crazy w/d?? or pretty much none at all?? i cant do that again. Or the amount of time it took to taper the second time, im just gonna stop cold i cant take another 6 months .Btw the last time i finshed a 6month taper it was end of march 2012

Can anyone tell me when i should expect???? Also ive never had a seizure from the 2 difffernt times i went through benzo w/d the first w/d i jumped off 4-6,mg cold turkey after taking those dose for a year. This was when i was 19(stupid i know the second time i did it right tho with a 6 month taper)

Any thoughts on what i should expect after 2 weeks at 2-4 mg if i stop cold? is that safe?

bump. can anyone put my fucked up mind at ease? like im flushing the 1000 various benzos after this. i dont care. Fuck drug abuse these things are gd poison.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
You were taking 2-4mg per day for two weeks? You need to be more specific for us to help you.

You will probably want to do a small taper just to make it more comfortable. Don't flush all your benzos as you may need them to help you taper down here.
 
Thanks guys, ill taper like you said tricomb. No need to feel discomort for no reason as im already a chronic pain patient.


Cheers,
Chris.
 
I switched to diazepam from clonazepam a few days ago. Tapering clonazepam is much more difficult because it's so strong. I started WD at 3 mg/day but as I had reached 1,5 mg/day tapering became unbearable. Even a slight reducing in the dose of clonazepam was percentually a big part of my daily dose.

I also got hospitalized due to seizures from clonazepam WD earlier this summer, and it was on a slow taper! Clonazepam is horrific to quit and I strongly recommend switching to diazepam.
 
^ Actually, in Sweden at the Karolinska Institute back in the late 80's and early 90's used clonazepam to help wean temazepam addicts off of it. Temazepam has been banned in Sweden for a very long time now.

Clonazepam is actually one of the milder benzos to withdraw from, along with diazepam, oxazepam, chlordiazepoxide, and a bunch of others.

The worst I've heard is temazepam, followed in no particular order by lorazepam, nitrazepam, alprazolam, and a select few others.
 
kokaino said:
^ Actually, in Sweden at the Karolinska Institute back in the late 80's and early 90's used clonazepam to help wean temazepam addicts off of it. Temazepam has been banned in Sweden for a very long time now.

Clonazepam is actually one of the milder benzos to withdraw from, along with diazepam, oxazepam, chlordiazepoxide, and a bunch of others.

The worst I've heard is temazepam, followed in no particular order by lorazepam, nitrazepam, alprazolam, and a select few others.
Click to expand...

That's interesting. But diazepam has a much longer half life than clonazepam, and it's practically impossible to make as small tapers with clonazepam as diazepam. With diazepam I can now taper with much smaller doses than clonazepam. The equivalence of 0,5 mg clonazepam is 10 mg diazepam, so you can reduce the dose much more smoothly with diazepam.

Alprazolam was horrific. I got WD symptoms 1-2 hours after a forgotten dose, I had to take it 4 times a day. But IME (and I've used a lot of different benzos the last 8 years) clonazepam is very nasty to quit, I got these horrible seizures from it that were scary as hell.

I'd still say diazepam is the "easiest" to WD from, and it's usually the standard to switch to it at some point.
 
Diazepam is definitely not the easiest to withdraw from. Oxazepam and chlordiazepoxide (Librium) are the easiest.
Diazepam, like most benzos, has relatively milder withdrawal symptoms. Clonazepam is not nasty at all. It is actually a mild benzo to withdraw off. There is no evidence or anything in the medical literature that says anything about clonazepam having a very difficult withdrawal syndrome. On the contrary, its been seen as a mild one to come off of, believe it or not. Prazepam, clorazepate, tetrazepam, estazolam and most benzos have relatively mild withdrawal syndromes. I mean the withdrawals are still tough, but nothing compared to benzos like temazepam, lorazepam, alprazolam, nitrazepam, and a lot of the other hypnotic benzos.

A study I read claimed that the seizures are actually very rare in benzo withdrawals. They can occur, but just because you are withdrawing it doesn't automatically mean you are going to get a seizure. The study claimed that less than 1% of those going through benzo withdrawals will experience a seizure.

Temazepam withdrawal from medical literature:

Abrupt withdrawal after long term use from therapeutic doses of temazepam may result in a very severe benzodiazepine withdrawal syndrome. There are reports in the medical literature of at least six psychotic states developing after abrupt withdrawal from temazepam including delirium after abrupt withdrawal of only 30 mg of temazepam and in another case, auditory hallucinations and visual cognitive disorder developed after abrupt withdrawal from 10 mg of temazepam, 5 mg of nitrazepam and 0.5 mg of triazolam. Gradual and careful reduction of the dosage, preferably with a milder long-acting benzodiazepine such as clonazepam or diazepam, or even a milder short to intermediate acting benzodiazepine such as oxazepam or alprazolam, was recommended to prevent severe withdrawal syndromes from developing. Other strong hypnotic benzodiazepines, whether short, intermediate or long-acting are not recommended. Antipsychotics increase the severity of benzodiazepine withdrawal effects with an increase in the intensity and severity of convulsions. Depersonalisation has also been reported as a benzodiazepine withdrawal effect from temazepam.
Abrupt withdrawal from very high doses is even more likely to cause severe withdrawal effects. Withdrawal from very high doses of temazepam will cause severe hypoperfusion of the whole brain with diffuse slow activity on EEG. After withdrawal, abnormalities in hypofrontal brain wave patterns may persist beyond the withdrawal syndrome suggesting that organic brain damage may occur from chronic high dose abuse of temazepam. Temazepam withdrawal has been well known to cause a sudden and often violent death.
Click to expand...
 
I stand corrected. But I still do believe what makes diazepam superior in withdrawal compared to most other benzos is firstly the very long half life, and it has an active metabolite that has an even longer half life. Secondly the high equivalence dose, which means you can reduce the dose in much smaller increments than, say, clonazepam.
 
Cyanoide said:
I stand corrected. But I still do believe what makes diazepam superior in withdrawal compared to most other benzos is firstly the very long half life, and it has an active metabolite that has an even longer half life. Secondly the high equivalence dose, which means you can reduce the dose in much smaller increments than, say, clonazepam.
Click to expand...

Yeah that's true. But in cases where addicts are addicted to doses of 5000 mg of temazepam a day, clonazepam can be used. This was the case in Sweden. Across Europe there was a bad temazepam abuse epidemic, especially in the UK back in the 80's and 90's. That's where the idea of using diazepam, chlordiazepoxide, clonazepam or oxazepam for benzo withdrawals came to be. At first they didn't know how to treat the temazepam addicts except through reduction using temazepam itself - but that made things worse. So doctors looked for other options and came to the use of long acting mild benzos. In Sweden, they used clonazepam for addicts who were hooked on massive doses of temazepam. Temazepam basically fries your brain at those kinds of doses, as you read in my excerpt above.
 
i think clonazepam is easier to get off, perhaps it's because it has minimal active metabolites (if any) compared to the mess load in diazepam.

diazepam withdrawal is essentially withdrawal from several compounds.

any benzo bender always ended with clonazepam for myself because it was always the easiest to get off.
 
when i was in detox the first time, i shared a room with a guy my age who had a horrid flunitrazepam habit (20-40mgs a day). he'd had multiple seizures and had just switched from methadone to diamorphine substitution, which was the impetus to get rid of his dependence. they also used clonazepam to taper him off.
 
The three times I've gone to an inpatient detox, they have always used clonazepam for benzodiazepine withdrawal, and chlordiazepoxide for alchohol withdrawal.
 
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