My best guess is there is a flaw in the spreadsheet.
The amount of water you use determines the length of the taper. If you use 300mL the taper would take 300 days. If you use 180mL, the taper would take 180 days. HOWEVER, this assumes that all goes well. As [...] has explained, this assumption is unlikely to be met. Indeed it is not uncommon for individuals to report that they ‘hit a brick wall’ using this approach.
There are several reasons for this. One of them is that this approach uses a fixed amount reduction. Consequently, the taper rate increases over time until it sometimes reaches a ‘tipping point’ where the individual can no longer tolerate it. For example, if you started with 300mL of water, over the first month, you would decrease the amount of liquid ingested from 300mL to 270mL … this would be a 10% reduction in dose. By the fifth month, you would decrease the amount ingested from 180mL to 150mL … this would be a 17% reduction in dose.
The fact that you have experienced issues discontinuing two other benzodiazepine receptor agonists (Valium/diazepam and Imovane/zoplicone) suggests you should be proceed very carefully with tapering lorazepam.
How did you discontinue the Valium and Imovane? Did you stop suddenly (i.e. cold turkey) or did you taper? If you tapered, how did you taper?
How long have you been taking 2mg of lorazepam? Are you experiencing any signs/symptoms of tolerance? Interdose withdrawal? Are you taking any medications or supplements that interact with lorazepam?
I’ll close by sharing one final obsevation about the do-it-yourself water titration approach demonstrated in the video:
The liquid created is a (very temporary) suspension. This means there is no guarantee that each and every milliliter of the liquid will contain exactly the same amount of drug. If you try this approach, be sure to shake the liquid vigorously before measuring the reduction amount. It’s also import to measure the reduction as quickly as possible before the water insoluble particles of drug and excipient(s) settle out of suspension.
ADDENDUM:
Just checking … are you aware of our general guideline to keep reductions in the range of 5 to 10%? The reduction you just made from 2mg to 1.75mg is a 12.5% reduction. If you have not already done so, I encourage you to read the benzodiazepine deprescribing guidance document below, especially section 3 on tapering principles.
Link:
Benzodiazepine Deprescribing Guidance Document (2022)
https://corxconsortium.org/wp-content/uploads/Benzo-Deprescribing.pdf
