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Benzos Flu like symptoms from benzo WD?

ryand123

ryand123

Bluelighter
Joined
Jul 8, 2011
Messages
206
I am currently waiting on a refill of my alprazolam. I take 1mg tid and I have used more than that on quite a few days. So for the past few days I have been only taking .5-1mg a day. I feel like I might getting a cold or flu on top of the WD though. I have a sore throat and I?m cold and hot at the same time and have an overall feeling of malaise. When I took another .5mg and some NSAIDS my pains greatly diminished. I have also had some colored mucus over the course of the day today. Any experiences like this with benzo WD it is it more likely the cold or combination of both?
 
Benzo W/D can bring about a host of symptoms that are not unlike a cold/ flu depending on the severity of the W/D. While things like diarrhea and thermal dysregulation or the feeling of TD at least are not uncommon at all, green sputum sounds like something in addition to, or a rare, outlying symptom. This time of year in the northern hemisphere a cold or upper respiratory infection is very likely and would lend itself to Occam's razor. The general malaise or dysphoria, anxiety, irritability and insomnia can be from either or both conditions. On this one I think it will take a refill of meds or some time to get over the cough to pinpoint the culprit, though they both are probably contributing..
 
Thanks for the quick reply JA. I agree the colored mucus is strange. It?s green and brownish. I?m a moderate cigarette smoker though so the color may be due to tar. I took the .5mg about an hour ago and my thermoregulationnis much better and my throat feels about 75% better. Luckily only 1 more full day before my refill. I actually take the Xanax for a severe IBS-D condition, and knowing I would be having to cut back, I got some Kratom for the impending waterfall from my ass. It has helped slightly with my cough but not as much as I was expecting it to. I will update when I get my script and let everyone know if I get magically better. I?ve recently been trying to find a WD timeline from benzodiazepines. People have posted similar timelines of opiate WD but a benzo WD would be very helpful for people going into benzo WD and wanting to know what to expect over the course of their discontinuation. Like something like from the beginning symptoms to the end of the WD, both with a taper and cold turkey.
 
The problems with benzo timelines, at least on the W/D part is the wide inter-subject variability. Some are drinkers which mitigates it, others use gabaergic meds like Gabapentin which also ease and lengthen the the time to onset. I do agree something roughly estimating W/D times would be helpful.

Sooo the ol' I forgot to mention I'm a filterless Lucky Strike man eh? No just kidding, but that might have a very plausible connection. Anyways, not long now so hang in there and do let us know. Hang in There!
 
Another theory I am having is that the WD is causing a lowered immune system, making me much more susceptible to the horrid flu strains going around this year. I work in a plasma collection center and the people who donate plasma usually are jobless and can?t afford health care, so this time of year some of our donors are sick with something that I might have caught during this time of lowered immunity. Anyways, yeah I let everyone know. And I?ll research some benzo WD data and see if I can come up with a timeline for WD, at least in the short acting benzo category. Long acting benzodiazepines tend to have a much more elongated and gradual withdrawal then xanax and triazolam and the such. People should be able to find out if they are in dire need of a benzo and just don?t know it, rather than thinking they will be just fine then all of a sudden the confusion and seizures hit.
 
Update: this morning I woke up feeling like a truck had run me over. Pounding headache, fever, cold sweats, racing heartbeat, and tons of mucus. I took a tablespoon of Kratom dried leaf powder, ibuprofen and acetaminophen, and .125mg xanax. Within an hour or so I was at 85% of my normal self. Still some shakiness and residual anxiety but my thermoregulation is much better and my sore throat is nearly gone (but not completely). I am starting to think that my benzo WD is minor but has lowered my immune system and now my body is in overdrive trying to protect me from the bacteria and viruses that are looking to invade my cells.
 
Final update:
Got my benzo script yesterday, all of my symptoms disappeared when I took my benzos, except the horrible sore throat. Went to the urgent care center and found out that I also have a massive bacterial infection in my throat. It?s gotten to the point of coughing up blood soaked mucus. Was prescribed a Z-pak and steroids for the inflammation (no cough syrup unfortunately because the doc was concerned about the interactions of xanax and codiene/hydrocodone ugh). So I guess my benzo WDs were feeling more sever than normal because of the infection. Anyways, since I got the answers to my questions, feel free to close this thread OD mods if you want to. I will still be doing research into a benzo WD timeline and will post it once I have the data and references. Thanks everybody.
 
I'm glad you figured out a cause of your suffering, OP. I think people are way too quick to blame substances for their suffering--usually it's a different substance or habit, one they'd prefer to keep using/doing.

At the same time, a lot of people who abuse drugs are masking the suffering from some other illness. Sometimes they don't know they're sick, or realize how bad it's gotten, until the get clean.

Or you can be so used to feeling routinely sick from past drug abuse you aren't even aware that feeling sick isn't normal. Yeah, you aren't supposed to wake up in your vomit, who knew? Then you don't realize how much damage you're doing to your body with your new drug because your last one was so fucking awful. Such is the superpower granted to former drunks; our only loss is the understanding and sympathy of the suffering others experience from their drug withdrawal.

But the internet itself can make a person suffer more than any drug. I think benzo users especially need to watch out for trolls trying to convince them their low-dose, short-term usage is somehow uniquely terrifying, or get them sucked into an almost collective hallucination of anxiety symptoms. They are a population of users more likely than average to have an anxiety disorder in the first place.
 
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