Looking for information about clonazepam withdrawal and post-withdrawal

I've been taking benzos occasionally for insomnia and for dealing with extreme stress for over 20 years now. By "occasionally", I mean maybe once or twice a month. I went through a period of extreme stress during my divorce 10 years ago where I started taking up to 2 mg/day clonazepam for several months. I was able to taper off successfully at the time over a period of several months. I don't remember the exact details, but I was taking clonazepam in some amount daily for less than a year counting the taper. I believe the kindling effect is real, since I used to be able to take an occasional xanax or klonopin with no issues. After that long term period of daily use, I would sometimes get mild withdrawal after a single pill after not taking any for weeks or months.

I went through another extremely stressful period about 6 months ago where another long term relationship was ending. My long term insomnia issues get so bad in these situations that I get desperate for relief. I ended up getting back on clonazepam at doses up to 2 mg/day just to have some hope of sleeping and keeping my job. I started tapering off in June, and I managed to get down to 0.25 mg/day by early August. I had a setback at that time (losing my job) where I went back up to 2 mg for a few weeks, but I've managed to taper back down to around 0.21 mg as of today. I'm tapering by crushing my generic clonazepam tablets, weighing out each dose of pill powder on a milligram scale, and keeping a log of my daily doses.

I've been reading this site for information about tapering, withdrawal, and what to expect post withdrawal. I don't feel like I'm psychologically addicted to benzos, since I don't crave them or even enjoy how they feel. I do seem to have a problem during periods of extreme crisis (losing a long term relationship or being laid off from a job) where I turn to what I know will make me feel better at the time (benzos and booze). These things don't happen very often, obviously. I would like to learn about other ways to cope and be able to sleep at night when they do come up. I would also like to learn how to manage my long term insomnia issues without being tempted to use benzos even occasionally. My goals right now are to finish this taper, deal with the remaining withdrawal over the next several weeks, and stay off for good.

Hello m314, welcome to BenzoBuddies,

I can see you're fully informed about tapering and kindling, and I agree with your assessment that you are so its good you're taking it slow.  I can see your dilemma though, we all need to learn how to live life without reaching for a pill that does more harm than good.  Its tough when we've been programmed all of our lives and its reinforced daily through advertisements, the medical profession and those who we're in daily contact with.  Just take a pill, that will fix what ails you.

I hope the rest of your taper goes well and hope too that we can help you learn new coping skills.  I'll provide some links to the forum but please let us know how we can help you.

Pamster

Colorado Consortium Benzodiazepine Deprescribing Guidelines

Planning Your Withdrawal (Taper)

Withdrawal Support (during your taper)

Chapter 3 Ashton manual, list of symptoms

I took my last dose of clonazepam on September 29th. It has been 14 days now. I won't post in the Success Stories forum while I'm still going through withdrawal, but I know in my heart that I'm done with benzos for good. I haven't been tempted to take any more since I quit despite feeling like crap for the last couple months of tapering and quitting. Other people here have had it worse compared to me. These are some of the things I've noticed in the last few weeks.

My startle response has been insanely strong lately. My cat sneezed in bed next to me the other day. My reaction felt like a strong and painful electric shock. I'm not normally the anxious type. This particular cat has been like this his whole life. He seems shocked and terrified when there's any kind of unexpected sound. Now I feel like I understand what he's going through. He was a feral cat who was rescued as a kitten, so I think it might come from some traumatic experience in his early life. His sister who I adopted at the same time is more confident and sure of herself.

Pleasurable sensations during sex also feel like electric shocks at times. Orgasms are literally painful. I still get horny and want sex, but having an orgasm feels like I'm being shocked from head to toe. It's weird. This hasn't stopped me from being horny or having sex.

I've been a weightlifter since I was a teenager. I took a break for a few months recently with everything that's been going on, but I've been getting back into it. This hasn't seemed to have affected my strength, but my entire body feels shaky now when I'm lifting. I feel this paranoia at the gym, like everyone's noticing how I'm shaking while I'm lifting. This is also weird for me. I've always naturally felt like I'm at home while I'm at the gym since I've been lifting weights for so long.

My long term insomnia issues have gotten worse, but it's not as bad as I had feared. I've basically been on an alternate night sleeping plan lately. I struggle to sleep more than 2 or 3 hours one night, then the next night I'm so exhausted that I can sleep more. This has been way worse in other times in my life when I've been stressed out about something.

"Benzo belly" has been by far the worst thing about this experience. For the first week, my body from my upper chest to my lower abdomen felt like a wall of pain. Any movement felt excruciating. This alone might have convinced me to get back on clonazepam and taper off more slowly if I had to worry about being productive at my job. Luckily I have been unemployed since I got laid off in August. I'm free to suffer through this until I get over it. It is still semi-bad this week, but this has been the one area where I've seen improvements over the last two weeks.

I'm looking forward to posting my own thread in the Success Story forum in the coming months. I won't forget about this, but I'm looking forward to this being part of my past, not something I have to think about all the time.

Thanks for the update, m314!

I also took my last dose of the klonopin taper on September 29th.  Anxiety and akathisia have been my worst symptoms, but had one night I didn't sleep at all the whole night, and multiple nights of just say 4 hours of sleep.  And I wake up every 1 1/2 hours or so throughout the night (but go back to sleep without much problem).  Yesterday I had a nice window - felt pretty close to my normal self from late morning through the evening.  I also get windows during the late evenings fairly often.  But today the akathisia is back, and it also feels like my brain is "itching" inside.  All part of benzo withdrawal.