Under .125 Klonopin Club

Well, I haven't worked outside of the home for 2 weeks now. Most of my normal metrics that I had to gauge my symptoms are gone since I can't tell how I feel when I'm at a workplace. My sleep isn't totally solid, but I'm not having nightmares anymore like I did at the start and middle of my taper. Hope everyone is hanging in there!

 

Wow!! That must be "nice"! Pass that on over to me

 

Jeff

 

A 50% cut? I think that would make most people go a little bonkers. That's a brutal cut, but I do realize that everyone is different. Good luck!

 

Jeff

 

It was a brutal cut, and I was definitely going way too fast (again). It’s just hard for me to reconcile the fact that I was cutting .25 mg every 3-4 weeks for awhile without terrible repercussions, and now a .0625 mg cut is like being run over by a train.

 

I’ve finally learned my lesson though. If it takes me another 9 months to get to zero, so be it.

 

A 50% cut? I think that would make most people go a little bonkers. That's a brutal cut, but I do realize that everyone is different. Good luck!

 

Jeff

 

It was a brutal cut, and I was definitely going way too fast (again). It’s just hard for me to reconcile the fact that I was cutting .25 mg every 3-4 weeks for awhile without terrible repercussions, and now a .0625 mg cut is like being run over by a train.

 

I’ve finally learned my lesson though. If it takes me another 9 months to get to zero, so be it.

 

Yep, it usually catches up with people, but you're doing the right thing now...adjust and move on. Trial and correction is all we can do. You've got it and you'll be fine. Have a positive day!

 

Jeff

I decided to cut today from .0625 mg to .05 mg, a 20% cut, which isn’t too much, and gets me down to the equivalent of 1 mg Valium.

 

How long do you guys generally wait in between cuts when you only cut 20%?

When you are so close to zero, the percentage change from even a small reduction becomes large. 

When I was at your position, I would have waited about 2 weeks between cuts.

I know this because I was reducing 0.001 mg per day which, for your reduction, would be 12.5 days.

 

Bob,

 

After reading your post a few days back, I changed my new dosage from .05 to .05625, going with .019 g pill weight instead of .017g.

 

I get that lesser cuts are smoother, and I’d love to be able to drop by .001 mg per day, and I’ve watched your videos showing you grinding up the pills, mixing them with filler, and pouring them into the pill husks, but I just don’t think I can pull all of that off right now. I live alone, and COVID19 is blowing up in my area of the country, so I’m pretty solitary right now.

 

Anyway, thanks for the post. As always, your kindness and experience is very much appreciated.

Bob,

 

After reading your post a few days back, I changed my new dosage from .05 to .05625, going with .019 g pill weight instead of .017g.

 

I get that lesser cuts are smoother, and I’d love to be able to drop by .001 mg per day, and I’ve watched your videos showing you grinding up the pills, mixing them with filler, and pouring them into the pill husks, but I just don’t think I can pull all of that off right now. I live alone, and COVID19 is blowing up in my area of the country, so I’m pretty solitary right now.

 

Anyway, thanks for the post. As always, your kindness and experience is very much appreciated.

You are very welcome.  I hope the best for you.

Bob

I got my second terrible ear infection in less than five months at the beginning of July. My ear swelled shut, my face swelled on that side, there was a sense of fullness in that ear, and the sound of liquid swishing around inside. The symptoms got worse when I lay down.

 

Based upon what happened when I had the same thing occur in February, I refilled my Cefdinir antibiotics prescription. I was supposed to take 300 mg, 2x/day, but the s/x from the antibiotics came on pretty quick. I ended up taking 21 pills over 15 days, and it was enough to knock out the ear infection, which was a blessing, but the s/x from the Cefdinir were nearly unbearable.

 

I’ve gone pretty aggressively in my taper from 2.5 mg K, but by far, the two most harrowing periods of time during my taper have been when Ive had to deal with the ear infections and Cefdinir s/x. In February, both ears were infected, and that was a hell on earth, as I could not hear anything, and lying down made everything so much worse.

 

Both times, the antibiotics have caused me terrible insomnia, with body jerks, total inability to get to hypnotic sleep, and breathing problems that made me wake up 10x per night. The shortness of breath and air hunger forced me to try to sleep sitting up in a chair, which didn’t work. At one point, I slept maybe 90 minutes total over a span of 40 hours. I fell to the floor at one point, because I took Benadryl to sleep, kept waking up, stood up in my bedroom and positioned myself in the hallway to my bathroom, with my hands holding me up on the walls, and briefly fell asleep until I hit the floor.

 

Anywho, I took my last Cefdinir on 7/19/2020, and on 7/29/2020, I wrote on my calendar that I was cured from the antibiotics.

 

I still have shortness of breath, and some insomnia, but last night, I slept 8 hours over 10. It’s like 1 hour, followed by 45 minutes, followed by 2 hours, followed by 4 hours, which is a godsend.

 

During this time, I thought I was losing my mind a couple of times, but I read this thread from beginning to about page 67ish, and Bob’s guidance throughout has been key.

 

I now take Vitamin B Complex, 44 mg of Zinc Picolinate, and L-Theanine each night an hour before bed, and put hypnotic sleep videos on my TV from YouTube, and I take 600-1200mg of NAC in the morning, & 400 mg of magnesium Glycinate in the afternoon.

 

I’m beginning to feel like a human again.

 

Once again, thank you Bob. I hope you know that you’re helping people when you don’t even realize it, through your older posts.

I feel very special. Thank you for taking the time to tell me.

I'm also very happy your ear infections are over with.

You are very special. So many times I wanted to post something to let you know my appreciation, but I just didn’t have the strength, or the presence of mind to do so.

 

You are doing God’s work. I hope you never stop.

You are very special. So many times I wanted to post something to let you know my appreciation, but I just didn’t have the strength, or the presence of mind to do so.

 

You are doing God’s work. I hope you never stop.

 

Bob7 for President!!!! (sure can't hurt)

You all put a big smile on my family today.

Something very unexpected, and wonderful, happened to me today.

 

I had a song stuck in my head, so I told Alexa to play it (“It’s Alright,” by Big Head Todd & the Monsters). Not a great song, but a song that was kind of popular in the mid-‘90s when I was in college, and one that my friends and I always heard at a bar with a stage and live music that we frequented.

 

When I heard Alexa play it, I experienced a brief feeling of joy. I remembered what it was like to be 19 years old, sitting on a deck outside of a bar in Nashville, TN, drinking beers with my friends on a sunny day, and more importantly, I remembered that I used to feel emotions and feelings, like joy.

 

I’ve had a medium-difficulty taper, I would guess, certainly nothing I’d ever want to go through again, but I often forget how bad the last 7 years of my life habe been on Klonopin. I was prescribed 3 mg a day along with 10 mg of Ambien per day, and I don’t know how the combination, along with drinking, didn’t kill me. It’s almost as if my doctor had been trying to kill me.

 

Anyway, as rough as this taper has been, I’m grateful for every second of it. I needed it. I’ve grown, and learned lessons that I desperately needed to learn. Life was too easy for me, so I allowed myself to get tied up in a prescription medication that robbed me of my personality, my feelings, and ultimately my personal relationships, and some of my family. It wasn’t that I was out of control, or mean; I just stopped caring about everything, except for my work.

 

Coming down off of this drug, Im realizing that the scariest thing is feeling emotions again, and losing the numbness that I could rely on Klonopin for. But I’m so ready to feel things again.

 

Last night, I tried to sleep, and couldn’t. Restless leg was bad, shortness of breath was bad. So I got up. I walked the dog, read on the internet, watched some TV, took a water pill, then went back to bed, and slept ten hours over and eleven hour span. It was glorious. The diuretic has been helping since my problems with the antibiotic. I don’t seem to have to use the bathroom a lot afterwards, but it makes my shortness of breath go away.

 

I hope everybody else is having a great weekend.

Hi Loveisalluneed,

 

I am so happy for you.  That is wonderful.  Nothing like recalling day of youth but in particular, if you get a window out of our benzo withdrawal, so much the better.

 

One more thing.  About restless legs.  Taking extra iron seems to help but even more helpful is this.  As soon as the restless legs happen, get out of bed, sit in the bathtub, turn the water on as hot as you can stand it, once the water covers your legs, wait for a couple of minutes and your done.  Restless legs are gone for the night.  You could also soak in the tub to relax but you really just need to dilate your leg's vascular system (my take on it).

 

Bob

 

The hot water trick worked perfectly! The buzzing quit in my legs, and I was able to go right to sleep, without really working at it, for the first time in over a month.

 

Thank you!

I am glad you tried it.  It works for my restless legs too, every time.

 

Jeff,

 

I agree 100%: Bob for Prez. It would be nice to have someone in office who believes in science, if nothing else.

 

It looks like you may be winding down your taper at around the same time I am. How are you feeling? What are your s/x. I read that you’ve been on a long journey with your taper. That has to give you a sense of accomplishment and pride in a job well done. What are your plans to reach zero Benzo?

 

I plan on stepping off at some point this month. Things could change, though, and I would be fine with that.

Dropped down to .0265 mg today. Almost at the equivalent of .5 mg Valium.

 

For the first time, I crushed up a pill, weighed out the powder, and ate the powder. It was definitely different. I don’t think I like it. It almost makes me feel “high.”

Oh the things we endure to get off this drug.

You are doing well.

Keep it up.

 

Jeff,

 

I agree 100%: Bob for Prez. It would be nice to have someone in office who believes in science, if nothing else.

 

It looks like you may be winding down your taper at around the same time I am. How are you feeling? What are your s/x. I read that you’ve been on a long journey with your taper. That has to give you a sense of accomplishment and pride in a job well done. What are your plans to reach zero Benzo?

 

I plan on stepping off at some point this month. Things could change, though, and I would be fine with that.

 

Well, I'm definitely better than I've been in recent years. The sleep thing (or non-sleep thing) is still a huge challenge and, as you know, it affects all the areas of life. I'm at a super low k dose, so I can't understand why it's still as big of a challenge as it is. The full-time working hours have also been a really big issue. I get paid peanuts (a hospitality area on southeast coast, Hilton Head), but I had to go to full-time over a year ago to help with financial issues. Very little sleep at night combined with a fairly long commute to a sitting job has been rough. I used to run marathons and ultramarathons which was great for anxiety challenges, but that went away after a couple of bad car accidents and two surgeries on my back. So, sitting is rough. The taper has made it tough as far as recovering from excessive exercise (which I've always loved), so I had to really drop back on my exercise during this taper since it takes me so long to recover after exercise that's too aggressive. GI issues can still be a problem, but I'm ever so much better in that department. Obviously, 26 years of putting k in my body has made me so mega-sensitive to just about everything, so I've had to taper super slowly and over a long time period. That's why I'll probably get to a much smaller dose before I jump. My tiny cuts are still felt fairly strongly at this point, so I'll continue on down to where my heart tells me to go for it. That'll be an awesome day . All in all I'm really grateful for how I feel and I'm glad to still be alive to experience it. It's an attitude, so I try to take things an hour at a time. Something really good could be just around the corner .

 

You're jumping this month? Celebrate THAT!! I'm hoping to be off in several months, so we'll have to party together. What are your symptoms at this point?

 

Hugs to you!

 

Jeff

I just want to encourage you Jeff that there is hope.

I am nearly two years since I finished my taper and I am still seeing improvements month by month.

Hang in there.

Bob

I just want to encourage you Jeff that there is hope.

I am nearly two years since I finished my taper and I am still seeing improvements month by month.

Hang in there.

Bob

 

Yep, I'm riding on that hope. The freedom will be fun when it gets here!

 

Take care,

 

Jeff

Hi everyone, hope you are all feeling somewhat ok. Ugh. I wanted to know if w hff en you got to a lower dose if your sx were more intense. I did cut alot a couple months ago and gave been holding. I'm down to .333 or so MJ erhing like that. I have been stabilizing, but have a new set of sx. P.us more chemical anxiety and muscle cramps and sensitivites like crazy. Sorry for talking about sx. Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.

Jeff, I’m in the SE US too, on a small resort island off the coast of South Georgia. You’re doing an amazing job on your taper. I don’t know if I could’ve hung in there as long as you have. I like your attitude. I need to remember that a window may just be an hour or so away. I feel like when the waves come, I forget that windows even exist, and I just assume that I’ll feel bad forever. I was pretty down today, after making a somewhat sizable (for me) cut yesterday, but reading your post made me remember that the slog is always temporary.

 

My s/x recently have been insomnia due to a lack of being able to get my mind to a suitable place at bedtime, and more and more “dumbness” for lack of a better word, during the day. I used to have a really quick mind, but I constantly feel myself searching for words and not able to grasp pretty simple movie plots without rewinding ten times, and forget about reading, which used to be a great love of mine. Feeling “dumbed down” tends to depress me a bit, too. Also, I’ve been having such shortness of breath over the last two months that I’ve gotten two (negative) COVID tests because I’ve been sure I’ve had it.

 

Dehytq, my s/x were worst in the beginning, but ramped up to nearly unbearable twice when I had to take antibiotics for ear infections. When I cut from .125 to .0625, the worst s/x came back, but that was a pretty big and foolish cut for me to make. The best thing about cutting and holding for me, was coming out of the fog during week 3, and having 4-5 days of normalcy before jumping back in and cutting again. While doing my version of a micro-taper,  my s/x have been milder, but more constant. I think I prefer getting hit harder by s/x, but having a nice, long window to look forward to. Bob is a pro at helping people with their s/x. He told me about magnesium citrate for muscle issues, and it’s helped me a lot.

 

I hope everyone is getting good sleep tonight, and has a great tomorrow!

Thx loversalluneed,

I'm sorry you are having such bad sx. Your not alone! Me too. I feel dumb b myself. Hard time 3 vd en putting a sentence together. I cant wait till this is over. What can we do. I feel windows on and off through the day. My muscles kill. I hate the cog fog! The chemical depression and anxiety. I made a pretty big cut to. It's getting better last few days. Hope we get relief soon. I think all the stress last few months definitely aww amped  up sx.  I'm glad you dont have covid.