Ativan/Lorazepam dry taper- pill weight issues?

This is for a friend….

 

With Ativan/Lorazepam .5mg generic tablets, has anyone found the scale has a tough time reading as this tablet is so small already? Wanting to ensure dry taper with shave and weigh can be done with these so any feedback from Ativan dry tapers is helpful!! Thank you!

Hi Boges11,

I am doing a dry cut & hold taper off of Lorazepam and yes, my scale bounces around.  My starting dose was 1.5mg, and I am down to .84mg.  I don't have any great suggestions, just that I re-weigh several times, have to "tare" the scale & turn it off & on more than once during my weighing until I get the correct weight on at least 2 weighings.  It does take awhile on most days.  I've considered biting the bullet & purchasing an expensive scale that's more sensitive at the lower weights, but I'm just using a Gem20 right now.  I really don't want to switch to liquid, but I  may consider a water taper if I get really low on the dosage & it gets too difficult to weigh. I'd be interested in any suggestions from your friend, as well.

BWarrior

Ask your friend if the tablet is a green colour and do they put it under their tongue?

 

If so, that’s a sublingual Ativan. Popular in Canada.

 

Can’t dry cut that one! Can’t even measure it on a scale!

 

Shirley li was able to get a compounding pharmacy make that into a liquid and is crossing over now, seems to me working.

 

That’s my only thought, otherwise dry cut using a jewellers scale is what works for most.

Some have gotten a fancy scale that is expensive, but necessary as they get low.

 

Winnie

I’m tapering Valium, but I always put a 5c piece under the tiny plastic saucer before taring so the scale is never weighing in its lowest range. I don’t know if it’ll help in this instance, but it may be at least worth trying out.

Thanks y’all!! She was going to go to the oral tablets not sublingual and then do spilt taper between tablets and liquid compound part to taper…. Unfortunately had severe symptoms making change over from the sublinguals so now back to trying to make it work with those. winters sun that’s a good point, putting on a heavier weight with it and then maybe that helps out?

 

Thinks she’s going to consider that compound of sublinguals bc she’s in same area as other user in Canada that’s doing the crossover with sublinguals. Hoping she can get a foothold bc I know how bad she wants to be successful in this!

 

I’ve been using K and when I was doing dry with scale it was more manageable weight wise but I still questioned my Gemini and broke down and got a very expensive scale. Come to find out they weight the dang same. I ended up switching over to a compound liquid at .16mg so I’ll have to see what a teeny tiny piece looks like with both scales (or maybe I won’t even care to see if that purchase would have been worth it and just assume it would have been if I stayed with tablets!).

 

Best wishes to all!! Keep persevering!!

 

 

Boges11--

I hope your friend is successful whatever method she tries.  It's great that she has you as a friend to help her with her taper.

I have a question about your scale--would you say then that purchasing the expensive scale was not worth it?  I'm considering doing so as I get lower, but if it ends up jumping around the same as my Gem20 I'll just stick with that.

Thanks, and good luck to your friend,

BWarrior

Hi there, thanks, met thru this ordeal and so we all just gotta help each other out however we can!

 

The higher priced scale (I got off Amazon and Hanchin analytical balance was name) doesn’t jump around and reads to .0001g, and can’t remember, was maybe $600 (ughhh)…. Thing was it read same as what my Gemini did in terms of that one being let’s say .045g, the high priced one might say .0451g or .0449g so I just didn’t think it was worth it after it was so similar. How I kept using it until I switched to liquid compound.

 

We all have to try out whatever can help us feel more comfortable/ confident in this process, so do what you need to do for your process !

Thanks for your response, Boges11.  The issue with my scale is that it jumps around a lot when I'm trying to weigh the doses. so it's hard for me to determine if it's really accurate.  I do my best.  Did your Gem scale bounce around like that?  If the more expensive one doesn't bounce around it would be worth it for me.

Thanks again,

BW