Daily dry cut micro taper of diazepam/valium

1 gram is 1000 milligrams, so the tablet in this case weighs 176 mg. I would prefer to weigh the tablet by itself to get a more accurate reading without the 10 mg weight.

 

I'm doing something similar now. One of my generic 2 mg clonazepam tablets weighs 170 mg. I crush a few tablets at a time and put the powder in a little jar, then I use a little knife and a scale to measure my dose each morning. 85 mg of the powder contains 1 mg of clonazepam. My dose this morning was 18 mg of the powder or about 0.21 mg of the active ingredient. I'm keeping a log of daily doses using the pill weight, so I'm not doing the math to calculate the active ingredient dose every time.

 

I'm doing a faster taper than most, so you should probably listen to more experienced members in terms of schedules. My strategy right now is to reduce my dose just a little every day until the withdrawal gets too uncomfortable. When it gets to that point, I hold at the same dose until I feel comfortable in reducing it again. If I wanted to hold at this dose for a few days, it doesn't have to be exactly 18 mg. Anything from around 16 to 20 would be fine.

 

Getting accurate measurements with this scale starts to become difficult when weighing under less than 5 or 6 mg. When I get to this point in my taper, I'll hold at that dose for a few days and then quit completely. I might space out the doses at the end a little more. Instead of taking a dose every 24 hours, I might wait 30 hours or 36. Either way, I'm looking forward to jumping off for good and not having to deal with this every day.

Hi m314,

I just want to apologise to you, if you hadn’t have posted, I may not have picked up on where I’d gone wrong with my taper calculations for MP. Damn benzo brain! I confused myself by focussing both on the API and Tablet weight and ended up calculating by API instead. Ive modified the post now and added the correct calculations using tablet weight alone. I would have to suggest that this is a very good example of why taper advice and calculations should be done on the forum, not via PM… as via the PM, there are no outside eyes to point out any mistakes. Again, I do apologise. Thank You!

WS

Hi m314,

 

I just want to apologise to you, if you hadn’t have posted, I may not have picked up on where I’d gone wrong with my taper calculations for MP. Damn benzo brain! I confused myself by focussing both on the API and Tablet weight and ended up calculating by API instead. Ive modified the post now and added the correct calculations using tablet weight alone. I would have to suggest that this is a very good example of why taper advice and calculations should be done on the forum, not via PM… as via the PM, there are no outside eyes to point out any mistakes. Again, I do apologise. Thank You!

 

WS

There's no need to apologize. I have a long history of weighing things in small amounts, but I don't have the same kind of long history with benzos that many on this forum do. This is the second time in my life that I've tapered off semi-long term clonazepam use (meaning maybe 6 to 9 months at a time). These two times in my life were years apart. I'm good at math, but the dosage advice here from more experienced users is more relevant to most people here who are working on tapering off and quitting. I feel that my personal tapering schedule is correct mathematically but more aggressive than most longer term users would prefer.

I've personally decided to speed up my taper. I went from 18 mg of the crushed pill powder to 15, 12, 10, and 10 mg in the last 4 days. That's ~0.12 mg of actual clonazepam. I will probably cut the dose for another day or two before jumping off. I feel like crap today, but I felt like crap before while I was slow tapering. It's not that much worse now. I'm in a unique situation at the moment where I got laid off from my job while having enough savings to not have to worry about being out of work for a few months. I'd rather get this over with now instead of dragging out the process longer to minimize the withdrawal symptoms. I plan to be benzo free and withdrawal free by the time I start my next job.

Hi m314,

Thanks for the reply, much appreciated!

Although your taper is fast, it seems to be working well for you, aside from feeling like CRAP. So glad to see you are nearly there…!

Wishing you a happy benzo free future!

WS

I began my taper (this is my second taper off benzos) after using 2 mgs of Xanax for about 3 months to control symptoms related to hyperthyroidism. I did not choose to go back on benzos after my first horrible experience with them 10 years ago, it got "slipped" into my medications during a hospital stay as a result of my doctor-induced extreme hyperthyroidism. I have no thyroid, and my doctor gave me way too much synthetic thyroid hormone that almost killed me (high heart rate, High blood pressure, tremors, etc). I found a new endocrinologist who was able to lower and balance my thyroid hormone intake.

I crossed over to 40 mgs of diazepam per day, and found cutting 2mg per week to be tolerable. As I got under 20 mgs, I was finding it difficult to cut .5 mgs weekly. At 16 mgs I decided to buy a scale and dry micro taper off the remaining 16 mgs of my taper. So far, I have had some randomly crummy minutes, hours and days, but previously when cutting .5 mgs once per week I always had 2-3 days of pure misery a couple of days after each .5 mg cut.

Now that I am dry micro tapering every day (I am still cutting .5 mgs per week, or 0.07143 mgs per day), I find my "waves" of symptoms to be much less intense. I still get nausea, headaches, etc, but they are less debilitating and seem to pass quicker.

Below is a copy of a spreadsheet I created using Apple Numbers. The bright green squares mark off each day I've completed. I have the sheet set up to take me all the way down to 0, and hope to be at 10 mgs by December 10th. I try to remind myself that .5 mgs of diazepam is roughly 0.025 mgs of Xanax, and this keeps me optimistic.

You may need to zoom in to read the numbers on my sheet. The numbers in red are numbers that I can edit/change. Each page in my worksheet represents cutting 2 mgs of diazepam every 28 days, as I am using 2 mg pills that I cut/shave to get my desired weight and dose.

Miss Piggy , you are doing great!  I have the commercially manufactured liquid and don't understand the dry cutting at all!  Hat's off to you for doing this yourself!  It's a daunting process, especially for the benzo brain!

My husband is a Math person and figures out my taper for me and we keep it in an Excel spreadsheet- I have several medication syringes- all different MLs and he makes my taper for me every night, so all I have to do is take it before bed and in the morning.  We even bought those magnifying glasses on amazon (a cheep pair) the dentist uses so he can see the small doses in the syringe.  My memory and brain are struggling right now (I do have some windows) but could never have gotten this far without this board and my husband to figure out the math part! 

Also, I do hold when symptoms slam me!  Even with the DMT, they still catch up to you!  With the Holidays coming up and family coming into town, I will most likely hold during this time, so I can be a human and try to enjoy my family!  LOL

It's OK to go slow, we are all different.  Believe me, I have had days where I was questioning everything, then come on here and just keep on keeping on and hold until it gets manageable.  I just came off of a long hold for travel, but also needed a break!  My CNS thanked me for taking a break!  This is not a race, you will eventually get there! 

You are doing great and not giving up!  It doesn't matter how fast you get there!

Miss Piggy , you are doing great!  I have the commercially manufactured liquid and don't understand the dry cutting at all!  Hat's off to you for doing this yourself!  It's a daunting process, especially for the benzo brain!

 

My husband is a Math person and figures out my taper for me and we keep it in an Excel spreadsheet- I have several medication syringes- all different MLs and he makes my taper for me every night, so all I have to do is take it before bed and in the morning.  We even bought those magnifying glasses on amazon (a cheep pair) the dentist uses so he can see the small doses in the syringe.  My memory and brain are struggling right now (I do have some windows) but could never have gotten this far without this board and my husband to figure out the math part! 

Also, I do hold when symptoms slam me!  Even with the DMT, they still catch up to you!  With the Holidays coming up and family coming into town, I will most likely hold during this time, so I can be a human and try to enjoy my family!  LOL

 

It's OK to go slow, we are all different.  Believe me, I have had days where I was questioning everything, then come on here and just keep on keeping on and hold until it gets manageable.  I just came off of a long hold for travel, but also needed a break!  My CNS thanked me for taking a break!  This is not a race, you will eventually get there! 

 

You are doing great and not giving up!  It doesn't matter how fast you get there!

Hi cooper

This is not me unfortunately. I am struggling at the moment.

Take care MP

Miss Piggy,

I was replying to your original post- so sorry if I didn't attached it on to this one and so sorry for the confusion! 

I was giving my Hat's off to you!!  I know you are struggling, but you are doing amazing figuring out your doses by yourself!  I could never do that!  I apologize if my message came out wrong (I am struggling to with this Benzo Brain)!! 

I am sorry you are struggling so much right now!  I pray it gets better for you soon and you get some some relief as least for a little bit. 

I wish you all the BEST!

Miss Piggy,

 

I was replying to your original post- so sorry if I didn't attached it on to this one and so sorry for the confusion! 

 

I was giving my Hat's off to you!!  I know you are struggling, but you are doing amazing figuring out your doses by yourself!  I could never do that!  I apologize if my message came out wrong (I am struggling to with this Benzo Brain)!! 

 

I am sorry you are struggling so much right now!  I pray it gets better for you soon and you get some some relief as least for a little bit. 

 

I wish you all the BEST!

Sorry cooper now I get it! Apologies from me....

I am totally stuck just now. Have not been able to make a reduction since August.

Are you having any horrible symptoms that are with you all the time? X

Hi Miss Piggy,

Oh Yes!  Cognitive as you can see!  LOL 

I am so sorry for the confusion with my post! 

I also get migraines really bad and dizzy when I lay down or bend down to pick anything up.  Right now, I mostly suffer with cognitive issues, Migraines and IBS.