You need to taper using a benzo or even taper using small amounts of alcohol if you are doing massive drinking binges and then just stopping abruptly. It can and WILL kill you and even more often it will cause terrible, horrible seizures that sometimes result in death themselves. If you drink a lot every day for a long period or even for a short period, you must taper for a few days or you risk experiencing one of the most serious of events.... seizure and/or death.
Fun Fact: Benzodiazepines and Ethanol Alcohol are the only two drugs that can cause a potentially lethal withdrawal if you don't taper off of them slowly. Taper for at least 3-6 days or even up to 1.5-2 weeks when you plan to stop. Do NOT abruptly quit if you are a heavy binge drinker or an alcoholic. If you don't taper and happen to get away with not dying (after stopping a real drinking habit abruptly) there's still probably about a 90% chance you're going to have a seizure at some point or if you get super lucky and don't have either... there's still a good chance that something unrelated could set one off easily since the seizure threshold would be lowered so much. Basically... taper with benzos or alcohol slowly and reduce your dosage a little bit each day before quitting or there is a very good chance (still, it depends on how much and how long and how often you were drinking) that you may have a seizure at some point and i'll say it yet again... you could also die. I have seen some reasonably heavy daily functional (beer) drinkers get away with quitting super abruptly but I have a feeling they were not drinking every day for very long periods or may have been only having the equivalent of 6-7-8 beers a day or so but not doing it every single last day. And I'd bet when I thought they were quitting abruptly that they still snuck in a beer or two somehow, at least for the first couple of days. Personally, I would also taper even a 6 beer a day habit. Without a doubt, even 6 beers a day is enough that you'll wanna taper for a few days if you've been drinking that way for a few months or years.... just in case if not for any other reason.
I wrote an even longer, really long, real, real, real, long (like my money, har har, I make a joke just now) response to this a minute ago that had a lot of taper recommendation details but, silly me, I accidently hit the back button and now all that I had written is now gone for good. I think the save button is like tapering an alcohol addiction... if you don't do it... you might be gone forever before you expect it. Oh well. Just... MAKE SURE U TAPER BEFORE U QUIT A SERIOUS ALCOHOL ADDICTION OR BINGE, OR BENZO ADDICTION OR BINGE! Else, I'll act like your alcoholic stepfather and beat yo' ass, son. Gonna come @ u like a spider-monkey bro!!! The only good thing you ever did was make a hot daughter! If you don't chew big red... fuck you!
Sorry, I had to get those last few quotes out of my system... they've been stuck in here for days now. Back to the serious talk: As you now know,you can use small amounts of alcohol to taper or you can use a benzo to taper... do it for about 3 - 6 days (ideally) before stopping completely and don't forget to reduce your taper dosage a little bit each day until you're down to about .25mg of clonazepam (which is preferred for an alcohol taper due to it's longer half life, but there are others with an even longer half life and to be honest, almost any benzo will do just fine.) Personally, I prefer alprazolam (Xanax) just because it has the shortest half life and quickest onset/peak plasma and I don't actually drink so I don't need to use it to taper. I also have managed to avoid a benzo addiction somehow... strange considering I'm an opiate man. Just use (virtually) whatever benzo you want.... any of them that come from a real doctor will work fine. That means... don't use phenazepam (cheap as fuck online with a 72 hour half life) or you might wake up in jail 3 days later having purchased a brand new $20,000 piano on ebay... If you're using alcohol to taper... try to get it down to about a shot/drink/beer twice a day or maybe one midday and one before bed... however you prefer... just get it down to one or two per twenty for hours before stopping completely. Also, if you don't have benzos to use for alcohol withdrawal and for some reason only are able to get enough alcohol to taper for one or two days... do it, it'll help. Any kind of a taper could make a very big difference (still, I would aim for 3-6 days of slowly lowered dosages.... you can always add an extra day or two as long as you continue to lower the dosage) and could perhaps mean the difference between life or death.
.. time to pull back and rejoin a better way of living.. the end game in alcohol is IMO the worst game I have ever seen.. I think it has to do with the fact that booze so numbs our frontal lobes that can act like insane losers when that is the farthest thing from what we are. boozing in the end is truely hell. Please pull back and figure out a way to stop as getting the shakes means you are getting close to physical dependence and IMO booze has to be the worst drug ever to detox from a physical dependence and also IMO will do such terrible things to your health and life. you can figure this out, which is good cause your going to have to
.. the very best of luck