Does dosing round the clock help anyone?

Hello there,

 

Wake up early in morning (3-3:30) probably due to my last dose being at 7:30 pm the night before. i usually can’t get back to sleep. Could this be because my body needs another dose and waiting from 7:30 pm until 6 am is too long?

 

I’m thinking if I am waking up that early then i should just take it then instead of waiting until 6 am which is when I normally take my first dose and by that time I’m a panicked mess.  (I typically dose at 6 am, 10 am, 2:30 pm and then 7:30 pm).

 

Thoughts and/or experiences? Thank you in advance.

 

Middlechild67

I would definitely try spreading your doses out a bit. Clonazepam has a long half life (18-30 hours), but its "effective range" averages at about 8-9 hours. Keeping your blood levels more consistent should help.

 

Also I will mention that the only time I suffered interdose withdrawal was when my pharmacy gave me the Accord brand pills. Any recent changes in brand for you?

I would definitely try spreading your doses out a bit. Clonazepam has a long half life (18-30 hours), but its "effective range" averages at about 8-9 hours. Keeping your blood levels more consistent should help.

 

Also I will mention that the only time I suffered interdose withdrawal was when my pharmacy gave me the Accord brand pills. Any recent changes in brand for you?

 

Thanks Waves! Actually they switched me from Solco to the BRand name Klonopin by Roche. However, my psych doc told me that even though I was currently taking 1.11 mgs (I’m currently in a DLMT), she said with the brand name, I should only need 1 mg of the brand name. Didn’t sound right to me.

 

Anyway, I think she was wrong because I feel I am in full withdrawal. Wasn’t that an 11% cut? I’m suffering big time. Anxiety, insomnia, rapid pulse, akathisia, panic, can’t eat etc.

 

This sucks! And i refuse to updose now as it’s been five days since the cut and Klonopin change but I hope this gets better soon because I feel like I have every symptom in the withdrawal book.

 

Middlechild67

Sorry you are feeling so awful. Since generics are allowed so much wiggle room on amount of active ingredient, keeping the dose exactly the same switching to the brand name could have already been a cut (or an updose). To minimize fallout, rather than guessing what the difference might be and adjusting doses when switching, it makes more sense to me to keep the dose stable, evaluate, and then make changes if needed.

 

If the amount of active ingredient in the pills were equal, it would be a 9.1% cut to go from 1.1 to 1. But since the solco could have more active ingredient in it than the brand name (who knows? Probably not even Solco!), it could have even been a 20% cut. :/

 

Hope your symptoms will resolve soon and you can continue with your taper! Sending positive energy your way.

I personally didnt do well on name brand, and yeah thats a huge cut. Sure the name brand is guaranteed to be 1mg or at least closer to it than generics, but I found TEVA worked far better than name brand (go figure), solco worked for me and I recently went back and updosed

Was solco not working for you?

Hey Byr,

 

Solco was giving me interdose withdrawal. I didn’t feel it had a stabilizer in it at all and the pills were crumbly and hard to cut equally into doses smaller than half in my opinion. Getting an even cut even with a quarter of a pill was a challenge as well.

 

Middlechild67

Sorry you are feeling so awful. Since generics are allowed so much wiggle room on amount of active ingredient, keeping the dose exactly the same switching to the brand name could have already been a cut (or an updose). To minimize fallout, rather than guessing what the difference might be and adjusting doses when switching, it makes more sense to me to keep the dose stable, evaluate, and then make changes if needed.

 

If the amount of active ingredient in the pills were equal, it would be a 9.1% cut to go from 1.1 to 1. But since the solco could have more active ingredient in it than the brand name (who knows? Probably not even Solco!), it could have even been a 20% cut. :/

 

Hope your symptoms will resolve soon and you can continue with your taper! Sending positive energy your way.

 

Thanks Waves,

 

Personally, I doubt the Solco brand has more than the allotted .5 mgs ( if it even had that) as I was having big time interdose withdrawal while on them but hey, who knows, right?!

 

I cannot wait to be off this terrible medicine. Even considering 8 day rapid taper (all inpatient with Flumazenil) through American Addiction Center in FL but unfortunately I haven’t heard good things about this treatment as most people end up reinstating their dose, so what’s the point of going through it.

 

Middlechild67

 

BTW, thanks for always being there for me. I’ve asked so many questions and you are always so kind in responding on this forum.

Aww, thank you. And you're welcome. I am happy to help however I can.

 

I hope you decide against the detox. There has got to be a better option than that, it seems so dangerous. My primary care doctor tried to get me to do that because she didn't want to help with a taper. I called the place near me that does it a few times, talked to several nurses who work there, and literally all of them recommend I taper off instead. That sent me a clear message and thankfully I found another physician to help me. I know your right answer is out there and that you are going to find it. Keep it up. *hugs*

I'm so sorry you had issues with the solco! I seem to be experiencing interdose withdrawals or SOMETHING lately, not sure what the heck is going on tbh.

I was fine with the solco for 2 months before, but it made me cranky...so I switched back to TEVA!

 

I think its so odd that many people with toxic sleep on here wake up at 3am!! For me, even drugged, its 3am and 6am

I just started this during a hold of lorazepam. Not sure how long the effective dose lasts but I was having peaks and valleys. I now take every 6 hours around the clock, setting an alarm for the 4am dose and just go back to sleep. I wake feeling fine now because I’ve had a dose at 10 Pm and another at 4 am. I just divided up what I take each day into four doses now. I was doing 2 doses and that was awful once I made a big cut from 2-3 mg daily all the way to 1 mg. I have settled on 1.25 for now, not wanting to go to 1.5 to stabilize unless I can’t function.