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Help with starting Valium taper with Gemini scale


[CM...]

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Hi

 

I take 2mg of Valium in the am and 2mg in pm.

I just purchased a Gemini scale as I want to use this for tapering

 

My question is about each pill being a few decimals off per pill.

How do I go about this? Some are .170 - then .168 - then .171

Do I crush a few pills up at once in a mortar and pestle and take the average weight of the pills?

Or do I crush one pill at a time and use that weight to do it?

I’m so confused. Some people say crush the pill. Some say shave with a razor blade.

 

I want to start tapering my morning dose (2mg) - So what would be the best way to go about this.

I was reading on here that someone wanted to use 120 days to get off 2mg so she took the weight of her pill (.170) and divided it by 120 days = .0014 reduction per day. So she subtracted .0014 each day from her dose. Is it better to do it that way then to do say 5% of the .170 and hold?

 

I’ve never done it on a scale before and I’m quite nervous and having a hard time understanding how to go about this. Anyone who can help if you could please respond I would really appreciate it. Thank you.

 

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Most people weigh 10 pills and get an average and use that as their starting weight for the dose. I prefer micro taper daily over cut and hold. It seems much gentler to the brain.
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Do I crush 10 pills at once and then use that powder to weigh out my dose every morning? Or do I just crush one pill in the morning into powder and use that?

 

Trying to understand if people crush one pill a day or crush a bunch at a time and use that to get their dose every day

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Hi CMZ18 :smitten:

 

Due to manufacturing process hardly 2 tablets have the same weight, even in the same batch within the same bottle. To address this problem, weigh a batch of 10 tablets and take the average. This is the value to use in your calculation. Once this value is obtained, crush the 10 tablets to fine powder. You will weigh out the needed quantity directly from this powder.

 

Example: 10 tablets weigh 1.684 g. Each tablet average weight will be 0.1684 g. Suppose your tablet contains 0.5 mg of medication. If you want to take 10% of the drug (= 0.05 mg) then 10% of 0.1684 g is equal to 0.01684 g (or 16.84 mg) of powder. So you must weigh out 16.84 mg of powder to get 0.05 mg of drug. As the scale cannot weigh lower than 0.001 g (or 1 mg), the scale will display 0.017 g (or 17 mg) as the value is rounded.

 

Hope it helps.

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Thanks for responding.

I’m still having a hard time understanding

So if I crush 10 pills, and say .170 is 2 mgs (one pill) - I would just take out .170 every day? Even after I take out .170, the next day, using the same remaining powder, if I take out .170 is that still going to be 2 mgs?

What would be the benefit of doing this as opposed to crushing one pill a day?

 

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Ok let me ask it this way...

Say I take 5 pills. I crush them. Each pill (2mg) weighs .170.

Now I have a powder of 10mg that weighs .85

 

Now say I want to get off of the 2mg over 120 days.

So I divide .170 by 120 and I get .0014 (which now gives me my daily cut amount)

 

Now do I reduce from that 5 pills of powder every day by .0014?

So the first day I would take .170 minus .0014 =.1686

 

So I would take .1686 the first day.

Then the second day reduce .1686 by .0014 and continue doing it this way until 5 days is done?

 

Then start over with a new batch of pills/powder?

Do I have this right?

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Hi CMZ18 :smitten:

 

Take a look at this schedule:

 

pQzDDLE.png

 

This is a taper plan for 4 mg Diazepam with a reduction of 5% every 14 days. The 1st day, in blue, you will take 0.339 g, the 2nd day 0.338 g, the 3rd day 0.336 g and so on until the end.

 

We ought to separate the calculation of the weight of one pill and the quantity of powder to prepare. They are 2 distinct things and have NOTHING in common.

 

As you DON'T KNOW with precision what is the weight of each pill you will weigh 10 of them to have a good average. In the application I used to generate your schedule the weight of 10 pills is required. Should the weight of each pill never change then this operation wouldn't be required. As each pill weighs differently from the others, with 10 pills weighed together the differences between them will self cancel thus giving us a reliable weight per pill necessary to our dose calculation.

 

As for the amount of powder, you can reduce WHATEVER number of pills to powder, it could be 5, 10, 20... This number little matters provided you have enough powder for a few days. When finished, you can crush others.

 

The 1st day, with the gram scale you will weigh out 0.339 g of powder and drink it with water. The 2nd, you will weigh out 0.338 g and drink it, the 3rd day you will weigh out 0.336 g and drink it.

 

If not clear, please ask.

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Hey Jim

 

I plan on tapering just my morning dose first. I think I want to leave the 2mg pill at night alone until I’m off of the 2mg in am. And then I will repeat this step with that pill when the time comes.

 

If  I crush 10 pills (and the average weight of those ten pills is .170) then I would reduce each day by the .0014 (using the 120 days to get that number) ?? Does that seem right

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Hi CMZ18 :smitten:

 

I plan on tapering just my morning dose first. I think I want to leave the 2mg pill at night alone until I’m off of the 2mg in am.

Fine.

 

kjAC7pB.png

 

If  I crush 10 pills (and the average weight of those ten pills is .170) then...

The way you ask let me think you still are wandering lost between what you take every day and the quantity of pills you need to crush. As a matter of fact you can crush whatever number of pills you wish as it has little to do with what you daily take.

 

I would reduce each day by the .0014 (using the 120 days to get that number) ??

1. Could you please show me how you came up with this 0.0014/day by using the 120 days?

2. Why 120 days and not 100 or 150 days? Is this time-setting supposed to be the desired duration of your tapering 2 mg of Diazepam?

3. From my calculation, 0.0014 mg/ day means 0.02 mg/14 days (0.0014 x 14). As you take 4 mg total a day, it is a reduction of 0.5%/14 days (0.02 / 4 x 100). As the general recommendations are to reduce between 5%-10% every 10-14 days to minimize withdrawal symptoms, your taper pace is actually 10 times slower. Unless you do it purposedly following rough symptoms, I think you might have made an error and your planned cut would have been 0.014 mg/day instead of 0.0014 mg/day.

 

 

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Why is none of this making sense. I’ll try to explain it better

 

1. I understand it doesn’t matter how many pills I crush

2. I came up with 120 days as just a time frame that seemed reasonable and read on here people used to taper off half of their daily dose.  I have no issues with going faster or slower if need be.

3.i don’t know how you got that math.

Reducing by .0014/day doesn’t mean .02 MG every 14 days

I’m speaking in weight. That .0014 is weight, NOT mgs.

So it means .02 WEIGHT OF PILL every 14 days which is .2MG every 14 days.

 

If you take the weight of the pill which is .170 and divide it by 120 you get .0014. Which means if you reduced by .0014 every day for 120 days you would be done in those 120 days.

So reducing by WEIGHT of .0014 every 14 days I’m reducing about 5 PERCENT Of my total dose(4mg) every 14 days, which is what you’re reccommending.

 

I don’t know why we’re both not understanding each other. Obviously one of has this wrong but I’ve gone over this a hundred times and I’m almost positive I have it correct lol.

 

I think you’re assuming every 14 days I’m only reducing by .02 MILLIGRAMS and actually it’s .02 WEIGHT of the pill which is .2 MGs of a 2mg pill. Please let me know what u think. Thanks Jim.

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Hi CMZ18 :smitten:

 

I realize that I won't be able to explain better :(. I'll let other people more capable to step in and help you more efficiently. I apologize for the time you have spent bearing with me with no result.

 

All the best.

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Your daily reduction numbers looks fine. The problem you will run into is your scale will only measure to .001g. I never crushed my pills into powder but you most certainly can. I weighed ten pills and got an average rate and then used that as my starting point to reduce from.

 

You can crush ten pills and use that to weigh out your daily dose. I never did. Once I got the average of ten pills I just cut the tablet in big chunks and added chunks until I got the amount so needed. Hopefully this makes sense. But your saying about daily reduction sounds right in. Just decide if you are crushing or not crushing and stuck with whatever you decide. I don’t think it would matter if you crushed one pill a day after the initial 10 or continued to do 10 at a time as long as you are weighing out the right dose.

 

This video might be helpful:

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Your daily reduction numbers looks fine. The problem you will run into is your scale will only measure to .001g. I never crushed my pills into powder but you most certainly can. I weighed ten pills and got an average rate and then used that as my starting point to reduce from.

 

You can crush ten pills and use that to weigh out your daily dose. I never did. Once I got the average of ten pills I just cut the tablet in big chunks and added chunks until I got the amount so needed. Hopefully this makes sense. But your saying about daily reduction sounds right in. Just decide if you are crushing or not crushing and stuck with whatever you decide. I don’t think it would matter if you crushed one pill a day after the initial 10 or continued to do 10 at a time as long as you are weighing out the right dose.

 

This video might be helpful:

 

Thank you very much for responding.

My question to your post is how would chunks work if I’m micro tapering daily? Wouldn’t I need to crush them into powder in order to get small jncrijments each day? I don’t see how using pieces would work?

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As long as the number goes down daily it doesn’t matter how you get there. Some file off of the tablet until they get the weight they need. Whatever you do just be consistent with it.
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As long as the number goes down daily it doesn’t matter how you get there. Some file off of the tablet until they get the weight they need. Whatever you do just be consistent with it.

 

I have a question about something that’s concerning me...

When I crush the pills, which I plan on doing, say I crush 5 pills, after 5 days of using that powder to get my dose out, the 6th day there will not be enough powder for my 6th day dose.

—-Do I need to clean my mortar out and start with new powder or can I just put more pills in the remaining powder and crush them?

—-After 5 days there will be only like .007 left in powder remaining. If I add another 5 pills doesn’t it throw the dosage off in the new powder having that .007 remaining from the left over powder from the first batch of pills that were crushed?

This is my concern.  Hopefully you can ease my mind on this. Thanks again so much.

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I believe you could do it either way. You are going to be weighing the dose to take the right amount so it shouldn’t matter what is left in the mortar and postal but maybe others will chime in. Find a way that works for you and just do it. We can overthink all these things until it drives us crazy. Trust me I have been there. It will never be perfectly precise but we do the best we can.
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That’s true. So I have the scale that the person used on the YouTube link that was posted in this thread. The scale has this very small bowl that goes on top of it where u put the powder into it.

 

Once I put the powder into this bowl and it’s weighed to the correct dose and I’m trash to take

It, how do I go about taking it? Do I put it into a drink?

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I believe must just lick it up with their finger if they crush pills. Maybe you should ask that question on another thread. She doesn’t say what she dose in the video. I re capsule mine because my pills come in capsules.
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Hi CMZ18 :smitten:

 

I try to put your figures in a spreadsheet. Hope it answers somehow your queries.

 

b1WiNx6.png

 

Hey Jim, question

 

When I crush my next batch of pills, if the average weight isn’t the exact same as the initial weight average, do I just keep using the initial weight average despite be small variance the new average may be?

 

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Hi CMZ18 :smitten:

 

The idea behind weighing a batch of several tablets, say 10, instead of one at a time is because of the different weight of each tablet even in the same bottle. Although weighed together the average weight per tablet remains reliable enough, it does not exclude that the next batch of 10 will have a different value. Nevertheless this difference is insignificant from a therapeutic viewpoint. So to answer your question, you can stick to the first batch weight until you change to a new bottle.

 

Hope I answered your question.

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