Support/feedback for benzo withdrawal...

[BurialAtSea]

Well, haven't posted here in quite a while since I was dealing with my drinking problem, which I am proud to say that I have seem to overcome despite a slight relapse a couple months ago...

Anyway now I'm on to tackling my next seemingly more daunting challenge of tapering and getting off this goddamn klonopin. I've been prescribed this for around two and half years, I think...looking back it is actually hard to remember, my memory seems so skewed.

I have been down this very road before, previously being up 3 mgs a day, when I decided about a year and a half ago to go off this shit, under the supervision of my doctors who I blindly trusted in the first place (wish I had never gone on this shit, my anxiety is even worse than it was before I was on this crap). They put me obliviously on a rapid taper, which ended up with me going from 3 mgs down to 0 in a month resulting in a near psychotic break, where I had some kind of rapid mini seizures. Guess that's what I get for trusting these overpaid pill pushing pricks. I then went back to 2 mgs a day up until about a week ago.

I have felt trapped by this fucking pathetic masking medication for what seems like an eternity. I am so tired. So tired of so many things. Twenty-three years old, and I feel like a mentally decrepit bastard child, whose mind has been rung through the rusted wheels of modern medicine for centuries. It's almost too frightening, too disturbing to me to even acknowledge how bad things really are. I am a shell of my former self.

So, after much contemplation and fear of withdrawal I finally have decided to try and come off this shit again, albeit with more knowledge on my side, and a much slower taper plan (.25 per month, i guess). I already feel symptoms intensified from this first drop... depersonalization, anxiety, heart palpitations and some intense headaches. All these I have had for about the past half-year, as I believe I was in withdrawal the whole time due to tolerance.

Well, I know this is turning out too long already, but I just need to get it out somewhere.

I am so entrapped by my own fear, it's hard for me to look ahead to the months/years it could take for me to possibly return to baseline.

One thing I was curious is if anyone had experience working while going through benzo withdrawal and how manageable it was for you, I am afraid that I will not be able to continue being employed during these waves of withdrawal... blah I'm just gonna hit submit now, i have so much to say I just can't seem to get it out right...

 

[ocean]

Well, good on you for quitting drinking!
That's a difficult thing to do!!

As far as the klonopin goes- reducing the stress in your life is going to be very very important while trying to taper.......
You might want to look into some different alternative methods of bringing calm into your life (breathing exercises, meditation etc.) while you are trying to do this.

I too am trying to EVENTUALLY get off of my klonopin. I take a very low dose but even on such a low dose I have found it difficult. I am back down to my regular dose of 1 mg/day. Everyday I am trying to give myself at least 30 mins of relaxation and alone time. I would suggest taking small small steps-

Let us know what you are doing, how its working and what you've found that helps or hurts in your process!
Lots of luck to you, honey!

 

[panic in paradise]

it took me 3 years to go from 6mgs, to .25 comfortably.
once i was going every other day with .25, and tried to go 3 days,,, the shit and the kitchen sink hit the fan, and then me!
twice i think..!

i am tapering again from 1.25mg...
im not going past .25mg a day with out valium assistance, an attentive MD, and i really dont feel comfortable pushing it any less then 4 months of tapering now.

i weaned from way to much alcohol, as you, enough to try to give me seizures or wake me up with them, before 4-6 beers and klonopin. i needed to take the kpins, but when i did while weaning from the booze, i noticed that the pills would seem to make the alcohol w/d pick up; like smelling a cig while kicking.

after all this, i still feel very naive to the very subtle deadly power in the drugs... please please, if youve been on them, no matter how long, but 6 months plus, do this with a doctor, there is nooo other way. there is no will against your minds wiring, and the electro-activity now regulated by benzos is deadly dependent on them, and your CNS and everything that follows....

it is more important then anything to understand and respect this stuff firstly.
this is what i employ you to do.
secondly, not worrying!
doing as ocean suggested, weaning off the pills, flooding natural patience and inner comfort is as crucial in ways - and then after perfecting, yours to utilize from then after, harmlessly anywhere anytime.

oh, and check out OtherDrugs, there is a mass of info there in the form of personal experiences; good and bad.
please keep us updated,,! ill be rooting for you as im about to start this journey, again myself also.
this time, no chatting me back on the lil devils.


do you have a feel for the half-life in you, i notice w/d symptoms after 12-16 hours.
i internalize them, unless its really really on.
hallucinate, sensations of doom, malaise, disorientation, static, confusion, objects lunging towards me, etc.

others get fucking pissed and are outwardly aggressive with their w/d's.
either way it ends the same.

 

[BurialAtSea]

Thanks for reading and responding, it's good to know others are struggling with a similar situation, and I wish you both the best of luck on your journeys respectively!

I have read very many accounts on tapering and the effects of long-term use of benzos. I find it sad that so many people are unknowingly put on these destructive chemicals by uninformed "professionals," who rarely know anything about the true nature of these drugs, and the idea of a proper taper. My doctors (from a reputed psych. hospital in this state) think with this slow of a taper I should feel no effects at all, that's a laugh. I even mentioned to them the notion of slowly titrating to diazepam for a longer-acting benzo to taper from, and she argued with me that clonazepam was actually longer lasting. It really disappoints and upsets me how everytime I go into that place with the best intentions only to be shut down by such sheer ignorance. It's really gotten to the point where I feel like just giving up at times.

And yes Panic, I can really relate to those symptoms... I see things out of the peripherals of my vision flying by like little spots, undulating shapes and shifting walls... It's so common, I rarely take heed of it anymore. I also have a near constant tinnitus which sometimes gets so bad it's as if my hearing just goes away in one ear. And the fucking headaches that feel like an eternal tightening ring around my brain. One of the worst symptoms though, are these sort of internal tremors and shaking, especially when I am outside and near other people... I suppose stemming from my social phobia.

It's so hard to think that so much suffering will be worth it, but it's the only hope I can seem to cling on to, to get through this no matter if takes me years. I cannot let myself get lost in this pointless speculation and fear about the future, it's too bleak and uncertain.