Benzo Free

It has now been about a week since I took my final 0.5mg dose of Valium! I posted a couple weeks ago about some nasty night time symptoms I was getting (waking up with panic attacks, nightmares, confusion etc) I’m happy to report that these have now passed. I’m feeling a bit anxious at night time before falling asleep, and the same again when I first wake up – but other than that I feel fine. In fact I’ve been having some quite positive “symptoms”, like feelings of overwhelming happiness, almost euphoric states for not much reason. I’m sure this is down to withdrawal but I’ll miss these feelings when they stop!

This forum was very helpful to me throughout my tapering process. I got advice on tapering schedules etc. and perhaps even more importantly I got to speak to people who had gone, or were going through the same experience as me. This really is a great resource, I’m sure it has had a huge positive impact on many peoples lives – keep up the good work everybody!

The main thing I would say to anybody tapering from benzo’s is to be patient and remember that withdrawal symptoms do always go away in the end. Your brain adjusted to having these drugs in the system, now it has to adjust to not having them – this is going to take awhile! The only times I ran into real problems was when I tried to go to fast, or when I broke my schedule and took a higher dose (this always messed me up for a number of days – definitely NOT worth it). Another thing I think is important is to bear in mind that withdrawal is not an entirely negative experience, as the drug leaves your system you should start to feel benefits, I think with the WD symptoms it is sometimes hard to focus on the positive stuff but it’s worth trying.

I’ll post an update in a few months time to report how I’m getting on.  Thanks for the help everybody!

Congratulations, Jake.      I've started a celebration thread for you; I'm sure members will be posting their congrats, too, over the next few days. 

http://www.benzobuddies.org/forum/index.php?topic=11683.0

Thank you for the encouraging words to those still tapering and healing.  It means a lot. 

Hi Jake,

I am so happy for you!!  Thanks so much for posting your story here! It is helpful for others to know that there is light at the end of that dark tunnel!! Speedy healing to you!!

T2

Hi Jake,

I don't know how I missed this but I am so, so happy for you.  Will look forward to your next update.

Patty  xoxoxo