Three months free after 25 years of Xanax use

[[Buddie]]

Thank you I really needed to hear this tonight, I have the same symptoms. My mind is shot , mid sentence is sometimes a nightmare for me ! I am at .0125 and holding on Xanax. I can’t wait for the last dose .

[[Buddie]]

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[[Buddie]]

Thank you for sharing as I am in the same boat you were in.  25+ years of Clonazepam.  My memory is truly failing me.  I was tested for this a few years back thinking it was dementia.  I am 66. I am so upset that this "top" neurologist did not even suggest I try to get off the benzos!!!  OR maybe he did and I just do not remember!?  They did find I had Mild Cognitive Impairment due to slowing of my brain waves on EEG in the area of brain that shows depression/anxiety. 

So I am literally in week one of my taper.  I have to keep going back to your story to remember what you said.  Unbelievable.  I have literally jumped from 4x  0.5mg of Klonopin to 3 x a day.  So far I don't feel any difference (nothing bad)>  I will do 3x a day dosing for a bit, maybe a month then cut one of the pills in half. I know my benzo is longer lasting than Xanax , so I think it might be a bit easier for me? At any rate I am DETERMINED if nothing else.

I am so sorry you were so sick the entire year!  I will pray your memory will return as it used to be. It has only been 3 months to please give your brain time to heal!  I would love to hear back from you. I am brand new here.  Ekg35

[[Buddie]]

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[[Buddie]]

I am so happy for you!

Your story gives me some hope. And I really need hope.

Thank you for sharing.

[[Buddie]]

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[[Buddie]]

I took my last dose of Xanax three months ago today and I feel great. I was prescribed this medication about 25 years ago and have taken it regularly ever since, only stopping twice for a week and then once for 3 months because of a stay at a drug rehab. The prescription was for three .5 Xanax pills a day.
I won't go into the whole story but what I will say is that a long, slow taper does work, and (from what I've experienced) the brain does heal.
My taper lasted almost an entire year. By the time I was finished taking Xanax I was breaking a 0.5 mg pill into 25 pieces and weighing the crumbs. I would partially empty out milk thistle capsules and put the Xanax in them. This made it so that I could carry the pills around during the day without weighing them each time.
The taper was awful. I felt sick constantly for an entire year and couldn't tell anyone what I was going through. Nobody knew I took this drug and I wanted to keep it that way.
My advice would be to take it very very slowly if at all possible. I didn't tell my doctor I was tapering off because I was afraid she would stop prescribing it for me, so I was lucky to have the luxury of time.
One thing I will say about this site is it made me fear taking that last dose. I thought I would go through the entire taper then once I took my last dose I would be hit with a wall of withdrawal symptoms. That never happened. It was such a slow and gradual withdrawal that by the time I finished taking it there were no more symptoms left. It's been 3 months and I don't feel perfect but I do feel great. I still have tinnitus and occasionally my body will heat up to the point that my skin turns red and I will break out in a nervous sweat, but that comes and goes.
I feel absolutely free! Sometimes I have to just stop and remember what it was like to be a slave to this horrible medication... Taking it every few hours every single day. Ugh it makes me sick to think about it.
The reason I needed to stop, by the way, is that Xanax ruined my ability to swallow properly and my memory is almost gone. I don't recall a lot of the last 25 years and I'm starting to forget what I'm saying right in the middle of a sentence.
To anyone reading this, I hope you find the strength within yourself to go through this process so that you can come out free on the other side. Life is so much better over here.

Wow! 😁