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Am I already in acute, possibly? Warning depressing post.


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Currently taking ~.09 mg Valium/day, taken in two doses of .045 morning and night.  I have tapered pretty slowly by almost anyone's standards (see sig), and although I have many decent days, the waves have gotten worse and I'm at a point where I just don't know if I can take it anymore. The derealization is crushing me. This was a feeling I was hoping to avoid by tapering slowly. I just can't bring myself to jump because if it gets any worse I'm going to have to burn my entire life down. Hanging on to work by a thread. I have some savings but they won't last more than 6-8 months before I'm seriously screwed.

Part of me thinks maybe I should just go back to, say, .5v a day and stay there forever. I can't sit around sick and dying for 2-3 years. I won't make it through. And it seems like every g****amn post I read about someone jumping is the same: "I was ok for a couple months, and then things got really bad." I really don't know what to do. I might just take a shorter life and stay on the pills, knowing I'll get dementia or some other horrible thing 35 years down the road.  Is all the suffering really worth it? And how much worse would it get if I stopped taking this poison altogether?

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Hey Brooklyn,

 

I was once where you are now and I know what you are going through.  The truth of the matter is that it looks a lot worse going into it then it does looking back.

 

I did, by necessity a fairly rapid taper and say my "acute" stage lasted through the last month of my taper and 1-2 months post jump.  I still had symptoms after that but they were much more manageable.  I had to work through it also and there were days when I really didn't think I would make it.  But somehow I did.

 

What I would say about staying on the V is that sooner or later you would need to up it just to say the same and we all know where that would probably lead.  I am personally glad to have the klonocide out of my system.  I feel better now then I have in years.

 

Hang in there!!

 

:smitten:

China

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You're so close to jumping, so don't even consider being on benzos for the rest of your life. It will eventually become a nightmare. Right now the symptoms can be at their worst, and after PAWS is done, you should start feeling a lot better. Hang in there kiddo. There's no where else but to go up. You're sooo close my friend. Betsy
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You are too close to turn back now. Look at all the good work you have done tapering. I say full steam ahead. If you can't stabilize after about 3 weeks, then perhaps making the next cut anyway might be  useful. You are almost there. I jumped from 0.5mg V with not too many problems, but a lot of people find the lower doses quite difficult. Keep on keeping on because benzo free is just around the corner.
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Brooklyn.....I have been exactly where you are....every day wondering if just going back on a small dose would make it all go away...You have done the long slow work of tapering, I hope you decide not to throw that away. It is so worth it to see it through.

....After tapering, you really don't know how your body will react to reinstatement. It can backfire and you could end up going c/t and set back in your progress. I did a medical reinstatement ( very poor medical advice) at 3 months off. It was a nightmare...it made all my s/x worse and set me back. ....I am not suggesting this would be everyone's experience,but why risk it after you are so so close. ....

.......I wont sugar coat it....there are tough times after a jump,  but things typically shift after 2-3 months off...some BBs report significant improvement by 6 months...not healing but relief.  I am 5 months off ( never thought I would get this far). I told myself I would delay all decisions regarding reinstatement until I was 6 months off...every day I would think about it...but here I am almost 6 months off and feeling improvement.

...Hold on Brooklyn ...you will heal and your life will be yours again I agree with everyone who has said that eventually, if you reinstate, the drug will want more and more of your life...we are here to help through the hard days.  Coop

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Thank you all for the advice. I had really hoped to have a lot more confidence at this point, having read some pretty reassuring stories from "high-profile" micro-taperers around here.. I didn't micro taper but I have been moving very slowly. I've been under 1mg Valium for well over a year.

 

I still don't feel good today, lots of derealization at work, everything feels ominous like there's a dull hum of evil attached to everything. Hard to describe. Not a normal anxiety. Very terrible, but it does let up after a period.

 

I think I need to just figure out a way to talk positively through this "experience" or else it's going to kill me.  Maybe just moving forward  as slow as I've been is the thing to do, and maybe by the time I get to .01 Valium I will be confident that my symptoms won't be tremendously worse than they already are. Right now I just don't feel that way.

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  • 3 weeks later...
Update: wave has passed, am doing much better. I feel the need to add that OVERALL, I continue to experience positive changes as I taper lower, slowly. I don't want someone beginning their taper journey to stumble upon a thread like this and decide to slam on down to just get off the drug. I believe that tapering slowly has allowed me to continue to work and live and function, but sometimes symptoms are unavoidable. The waves always pass, every time.
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Glad to hear you are doing better Brooklyn. 

 

Now, if you happen to wind up in another wave you can pull up this thread for reassurance that you will get through it.  :thumbsup:

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Glad the wave has passed Brooklyn.

 

I am not at all happy with the way I am feeling and I am way up at 2.9 mgs Valium equivalent, I find it despairing that so many are still feeling strong symptoms at such low doses, the whole idea of tapering long and slow so far is not delivering the results I had so hoped for.

 

People say 2-3 months things can be bad after jumping but what if a long term user like myself winds up feeling bad for an extended period of time? I mean 2-3 months of feeling terrible is a long time as it is... it really makes me wonder if I am going to make it off this after all these years.

 

Seeing a Doctor this week because I need to sort something out but I think I have been on this drug for too long to get through this...

 

You are really low now, there is no point in giving that up now, you are so close so stick with it.

 

 

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Hey Oscar,

 

All I can say about tapering is that sometimes when I hit a particularly nasty spot, I would hold for several weeks and if I did not get the relief I expected, I would make another small cut anyway and it would often times help.  I don't have an explanation for it, it's just the way it worked out for me. During the rough spots, I know how easy it is to get caught up in thinking "I was on for too long," or "my dosage was too high" and we start making assumptions about future results that may or may not happen. I know all too well how things start to spiral down when we look back at how sick we were, and how we still don't feel well know, and how much farther there is to go. It starts to feel inevitable, and the fear feeds the fear.

 

I have been so fearful of what will happen after I jump, but my personal truth is that things are not where I'd like them to be NOW while I'm still on, so I have to either keep moving forward or back up completely.  When I think about reinstating, I think about how terrible I felt taking 1 or 1.5 mg of klonopin/day.  I felt NOTHING good -- no love, no elation, no joy.  I have pictures of how completely awful I looked in 2010 - 2011. Could barely keep my eyes open, skin looked like crap. I look and feel worlds better now.  Although I didn't take benzos for years and years, I did take quite a bit of klonopin and drank heavily while taking it which presents its own set of challenges.

 

I don't know you that well because I don't post so often, but have you considered possibly upping your tapering schedule?  I felt pretty symptomatic from 4mg v down to 2 mg.  Less so from 2mg to 1mg, and really started to get some good relief <1mg.  Now, despite a couple negative posts last week, my life is closer to 75% good vs. 25% bad.  I even managed to get on an airplane last month to go to Puerto Rico! Never would have been able to do that two years ago while on 4mg v. I am learning real, actual coping skills because I have to.

 

I do still have fairly strong symptoms, but they are punctuated by the fact that I am actually feeling so much better most of the time. My baseline has improved to a point where when I get stuck amidst some heavy DR, it bothers the s*** out of me whereas before I lived in it 24/7. I am trying to get my head on straight so that the next time it comes around I don't let it bother me as much. Either way, I'm not giving up, and neither should you. When I think about reinstating, it's only while in a wave and it's this imaginary lifting of all symptoms.. the reality is that my life on benzos was no life worth living, and even if going back on would alleviate some symptoms, I would not really be there to enjoy it.

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I only have one thing to say.... :yippee:.....now remember this and don't let that nasty benzo ever win!!!  :oXo:

 

Great job my dear  :thumbsup:

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That is a great post Brooklyn... I agree with pretty much everything, being on benzo's is the easy way out but a life on benzo's is not much of a life at all long term, although I was OK on mine, I knew it was taking the joy out of life... hard to describe but I was flat and always wondering when life was going to get good again you know?

 

I am going to hold on to the hope it gets exponentially better at 2 mg and below... at some point it simply has to...

 

I think you are doing a great job and I wish you all the best.

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