how do you know if its anxiety or withdrawal?

I've had anxiety my entire life, even as a child. How do you know the difference between anxiety and withdrawal symptoms since they feel the same? My doc doenst want me off the xanax..??....but said if i do i will need an SSRI....she says this even though i have told her repeatedly of my bad experiences with those kinds of meds and i WILL NOT TAKE THEM. i wont trade one pill for another. so...how do you know the difference and what exactly do those of us who have had anxiety our whole lives do? thanks !

Kate, exactly. I have had anxiety forever as well. I tapered, and didnt have it. Five days off and the anxiety that hit me was like a truck running through me. It had a different intensity to it, and physical symptoms I had never experienced too. For some time I had been hardly taking any klonopin at all, and things were good.  The timing of when it hit let me know that it was w/d. I had to reinstate last week. after a couple doses at only.25 it subsided some..thats not enough med to really calm regular anxiety. It is enough in my case to ease w/d.  The only way to know is to wait it out. I couldnt take ssri either, and started cymbalta last summer. Never could get it up to a therapeutic dose, but dr said stay on the mini dose I had worked up to...well...its not worth it.

Also now that I think of it...the anxiety in w/d had really intense heartbeat, tingling...stuff thats not my regular symptoms. Perhaps you can think of things you are going through that are different as well.- good luck and strength to you

i am 7.5  month off  the xanax and i am going through very strong anxiety.this my forth attempt to get of benzo in 12 years i can they from my failed attempts that if you off an anxiety medication who have to expected to five times  the anxiety you Had before the medication . but i do not think that having benzo again even a small dose will help after being off because xanax is a short acting benzo you will have a rewind to your W/S again i think they call it mine withdrawal

I think too a huge part of it is the fear that you wont be able to get more Xanax, or not have it with you during an attack. This was true for me anyway. I dont go anywhere without a couple of xanax in my purse. i am sick of that. i do worry that my anxiety prone personality will not function well without meds. still going for it lol..thanks

yes katex  having   xanex  around can make you safe but after a time you will get tolerance what after you will increase the dose until i become hocked on it and i still having anxiety .so it dose not help at all

I used to carry klonopin with me everywhere, even tho it takes forever to kick in, and I never took it anywhere but at home. Mademe feel like I had the worst case scenario covered. I too worry as you do about what I will be like w/out it. Weird tho, cause I was off it for five years, and am still here. Its possible. and after a while as Alexander says, its not going to work as well w/out continually increasing. Part of dealing with the whole anxiety beast is not backing down...I say this for both of us- Susan

I hope you don't mind if I ask this, but have you tried an SSRI for your anxiety? You said "those kinds of drugs" but I'm not sure if you meant that particular class. I only ask because I have found that a low dose of Paxil (10 mg) has relieved my anxiety about 99 percent of the time. If I try a higher dose, I do get side effects, but the low dose is very tolerable. The thing about SSRIs is that it takes a while for them to kick in, and then it can take more than one try to find the one that works best for you.

 

I have noticed on this board a bias against antidepressants, and maybe for someone who going through w/d, it's scary or inadvisable to add a new drug to the mix. And I don't think your doctor should be insisting that you take a medication. But I just wanted to point out that the SSRIs can be helpful in treating anxiety.

I hope you don't mind if I ask this, but have you tried an SSRI for your anxiety? You said "those kinds of drugs" but I'm not sure if you meant that particular class. I only ask because I have found that a low dose of Paxil (10 mg) has relieved my anxiety about 99 percent of the time. If I try a higher dose, I do get side effects, but the low dose is very tolerable. The thing about SSRIs is that it takes a while for them to kick in, and then it can take more than one try to find the one that works best for you.

 

I have noticed on this board a bias against antidepressants, and maybe for someone who going through w/d, it's scary or inadvisable to add a new drug to the mix. And I don't think your doctor should be insisting that you take a medication. But I just wanted to point out that the SSRIs can be helpful in treating anxiety.

 

I cant take SSRIs ...tried several in the past and had bad reactions to them. besides wouldnt you be trading one pill for another?

I guess I don't see it as trading one pill for another, but if you've tried them before and they haven't agreed with you, then I understand why you wouldn't want to try them again.

 

I have noticed on this board a bias against antidepressants, and maybe for someone who going through w/d, it's scary or inadvisable to add a new drug to the mix. And I don't think your doctor should be insisting that you take a medication. But I just wanted to point out that the SSRIs can be helpful in treating anxiety.

 

Hi sushideluxe,

 

I don't agree with your observation about the use of SSRI's being frowned upon here at BenzoBuddies.  Many of us have used them to help us through benzo withdrawal, even Dr Ashton says they can be helpful.  I do agree however that the introduction of an A/D during withdrawal can be a little tricky.  Heck even some supplements can bring about unpleasant symptoms so everything must be weighed before attempting.

 

Pam

A/D's...

Not to get too far away from Kate's issues, but my GP wanted me to go on Lexapro  (anxiety) or Seroquel (sleep), but I just didn't want to add to the mix. 

I read that Lex can take a while to start working, and in the meantime, could ramp up your anxiety problem... and Seroquel had the potential for some other serious issues.

 

I haven't taken either, and the problems have begun to resolve themselves to some degree. 

Time, the great healer, deserves more credit, plus learning to cope with the problem, and trying to reduce the fear.

 

When I feel the symptoms coming on, the first thing I do is take some deep breaths, just to get some fresh air in my lungs.

 

I try to keep a water bottle around, and take a few sips.  I've got sugarfree peppermints in my pocket, to distract me, and make my brain refocus on the taste of the mints. 

 

If I can get up and move around, I will, and maybe go outside, especially if it's cooler. 

At work, I go to the restroom and wet my face and neck. 

 

It's all about changing the subject in your mind, and if possible, avoiding stress for the time being, until it passes or moderates.

I do these things over and over again, whenever it's necessary, and as simple as they are, they seem to help.

-David

As far as the ADs are concerned...my whole game plan was to get on one and then after it had time to kick in, taper off the klonopin. Well, I too couldn't handle more than a lower than low dose, and after being on it for six months, it sure did not help at all with w/d anxiety. I have tried Paxil and about every other one, hate the head rushes and insomnia...worse anxiety. Just my experience tho.

In Fall 2008, I saw a new internist a few months after my c/t over the summer. I had stabilized back on 5mg of valium after a trip to the ER with vertigo.  I had become tolerant and updosed to 7mg that Fall during a particularly stressful period,  but then foolishly cut back to 5mg over about a week to ten day period.  I was extremely anxious having dropped 2mg in a short time, was talking fast and clearly presented as having a lot of anxiety.  The internist offered me a few weeks of lexapro samples and suggested that after a few weeks on lexapro, I could take two weeks to taper off the remaining 5mg valium.  I had not come across the Ashton manual or any benzo forum yet, but just felt this did not sound right.  When I asked the previous internist over the summer for the valium scrip for jet lag for my trip, he suggested prozac could help with sleep. My trip was the following week! This tells me that there are doctors out there who have poor information about these meds.  For one thing, I heard it takes weeks if not a month for prozac to take effect. 

 

I eventually found a "benzo-wise" doctor who hands down suggested that if I could tolerate tapering without adding meds, that it was the best way (for me).  He mentioned that prozac specifically as well as other SSRIs could increase anxiety, both in the initial weeks of adjusting and possibly beyond.  I'm not saying SSRIs or perhaps another A/D aren't the right choice for some.  However, I would research carefully before deciding.  Another internist tried to give lexapro to my elderly father last year.  He was justifiably down after a long hospital stay.  His mood is much improved now after a month of recovery at home and physical therapy which has helped him to regain his strength.  He is  sleeping better now that he's over his bacterial infection which has in turn improved his mood. 

 

I understand that when anxiety really starts to increase and when that interrupts sleep, it may feel like anything might be a welcome supplement.  I've been there.  I found that meditation and deep breathing sometimes helped calm the anxiety. Its a paradox because if you try too hard to "relax", it can actually make you more agitated as many of us know.  Sometimes an attitude of acceptance, not freaking out over the increased anxiety can help neutralize some of it.  There's a book called "Embracing Fear" whose title encompasses the general idea that resistance or avoidance sometimes increases the problem.

 

As to distinguishing anxiety from withdrawal, I'm not sure it matters what you call it as long as you understand the basic process.  Withdrawal from benzos can lead to a number of physical and psychological symptoms.  I refer to my baseline anxiety before I ever took a blue pill as "pre benzo" anxiety. 

 

Some of us who are predisposed to a little more anxiety than others sometimes make the "mistake" of frowning on anxiety as if its the enemy.  Anxiety by itself is part of every person's make up.  It is what prepared our ancestors and us for fight or flight for survival.  Unfortunately, somewhere along the way, anxiety reactions for some of us started to escalate for non survival situations, sometimes panic feelings appear in situations that most would not feel as bothered by.  Then comes the avoidance cycle, perhaps agoraphobia, fear of going out and having a panic attack... I did not have panic attacks but some family members have.  I believe there is also a biological component passed on from parents or grandparents that can predispose us to having a more "anxious" trigger built in or simply being raised by anxious people can make us more likely to have not learned skills to cope with stressful situations. 

 

Whether anxiety is on the rise from withdrawal or whether its the anxiety that is one's "normal state", trying to "get rid of" the anxiety may not be the best strategy.  I believe one way  to try and "deal with" anxiety when it starts to become too much is to have some strategies for improving our ability to be with it, to observe it as it starts to surface and to understand the process. 

 

Meditation or even cognitive therapy can be helpful, or a branch of cognitive therapy called ACT (Acceptance and Commitment Therapy) is more geared towards not having to change ones reactions but accepting and understanding how it escalates and how it can be contained.  There are some good books on Acceptance Therapy available on Amazon or other sites.  There's "The Worry Trap" by Chad Lejeune.  There's Accetpance Therapy for Anxiety by John Forsyth and Steven Hayes.  The Happiness Trap by Russ Harris is another good one. I don't have all the answers myself, am a fellow journeyman on the anxiety path.

Good Post Verti!