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Do holds really help?


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I have been tapering valium for 7 months now from 15 mg to 9 mg.  I just kind of feel like I need a little break, so I was wondering from those of you that have held for a while if it seemed to help any? ???

 

The wd sx are starting to ramp up some even though I am tapering fairly slowly.  Most noticeably, my patience and agitation have gone through the roof.  My family and co-workers have been telling me that I am starting to get angry over little things that used to not bother me.

 

I have read that other BB that began a hold found it hard to start tapering again, and I have come too far to back up now.  I am just not sure what to do, so any experience on the matter will be greatly appreciated.

 

JoJo :smitten:

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Yes it helped me to hold, and I am glad I did, having two tapers that I went all the way to 0, and crashed and close to having a stroke times 2, well, I finally learned my lesson. I never felt that I could not resume my taper, I knew that it was just going to take a long time and I accepted that. Your rate of taper may be catching up with you, the Brain needs lots of time to adjust to cuts. Stay Strong, and think about what you want...to get off fast and crash and burn, or a slower taper that allows you to function. Everyone is different, but I felt healing all the way down. Stay Strong, and be true to yourself. You can do this, but may need to go back to drawing board. 💖Peace and Healing.
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Hi JoJo Dancer,

 

Love your name!  Little holds helped me and I only held long enough for my symptoms to subside.  I've made little (flexible) "rules" for myself based on how I'm feeling.  For example, as long as the majority of my days in a week are good, I keep tapering. If the bad days in a week become a majority, I stop tapering and take a hold.  Then if I have one full week feeling better, I start tapering again at a slower pace.  I used this strategy of holding and slowing down for a while while experiencing symptoms half the time.  Finally my body reached an equilibrium a couple months ago. I've been in a "window" for two and a half months, slowly reducing a micro amount every day. (I also do everything I can holistically to support my health which I believe is important).

 

Anyway, that's my experience, I know we are all different.  I hope you find the best strategy that works for you where you suffer the least!  My heart goes out to anybody having difficulty continuing their tapers. One day at a time with hope for the future.

 

Best wishes,

 

Luey

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Thanks Luey and begood for your words of experience and kindness.  I do think it is time to re-evaluate my taper.  I think I will hold at 9 mg for a week or so to see how my body reacts.  If things start to get better, I will continue tapering and experiment at a slower rate.

 

I forgot to mention that I do a DLMT of .025 mg per day using both pills and liquid dosing twice a day.  I may slow that down to .02 mg per day which would take 50 days to taper 1 mg and hope that helps. When I started at 15 mg, my DLMT was .03 mg and I had to slow down between 11 and 12 mg. I think a lot of our stress comes from the patience and time that is required to get off these horrible meds.

 

Again, thanks to both of you for your caring thoughts,

JoJo

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Jojo,

 

    I tapered quickly from 30 mg to 10 mg of Valium.  I was on only ONE (1) mg of Ativan but my GP gave me too much Valium for the switch.  I didn't know about the exact amount to switch.  So basically he Updosed me radically which caused me to become more sensitive as a result. 

 

    Was able to taper off 20 mg in 3 months & by the time I got down to 10mg my CNS was on FIRE.  I was having BP levels at 255/140 EVERY DAY.  It was frightening and ER did NOTHING.  I HAD NO CHOICE but to hold and that HOLD took THREE MONTHS before my CNS began to settle a tiny bit.  (I would not wish that experience on anyone).  At that point, I began a taper of only 5% a MONTH.......knowing how sensitive my system was and bp still spiked ...the next month I increased it to 7% a MONTH...and that worked for me from March to October of this year.  I still had insomnia throughout and only by October I began to finally sleep after over a year of no sleep at night.  Then I increased my taper to 8% a month and now it's back to Insomnia and Inner Trembling and BP did spike one day.  But I don't want to be on this Medication forever.  So it is the CHOICE I had to make. 

 

  I am able to cope for the most part but today is very bad with zero sleep of late and inner trembling.  But for the most part I was exercising and doing well.  I think today is just a very bad day.  I tried to push myself today but so awful, I could not even push myself and that's a first for me. 

 

    I'm taking it all one day at a time.  Being that I am kindled thanks to my own ignorance and the ignorance of my GP, I just have to deal with it and take it one day at a time and suffer through day by day till I am off this stuff.

 

    So basically what I am saying is ........you basically have to just listen to your body.  There will be some discomfort when you taper, so we have to expect that.  I would NEVER HAVE HELD if my life had not been threatened with a heart attack from BP Spiking too high.  I even had to go through a Heart Cath and all is clear.  It was all the fast taper that caused my CNS to react so violently.  So I learned a good lesson there and what can happen if we taper way to fast.  I was tapering off 2 MG A WEEK!  Just to give you an idea how fast I was coming off. 

 

  Others have come off that fast, but they were not Kindled like I was/am.  So again, our chemistry is different for all of us, we have to go by what our bodies will allow.  Again, I would NEVER have held except for the fact that my CNS was not going to tolerate any more.  I had no choice.  But now that I'm tapering slowly, I am able to cope, even with bad days like I am having today and continue to taper.  Which makes me happy because I am moving FORWARD not holding and not having to updose. 

 

    These are choices each of us has to make depending on our bodies and how they are healing and what they can tolerate and not tolerate.  These are only my personal experiences and opinions.  You must choose for yourself after all your research what works best for you.

 

  Hope I helped.

 

  Kimmie

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Yes it helped me to hold, and I am glad I did, having two tapers that I went all the way to 0, and crashed and close to having a stroke times 2, well, I finally learned my lesson. I never felt that I could not resume my taper, I knew that it was just going to take a long time and I accepted that. Your rate of taper may be catching up with you, the Brain needs lots of time to adjust to cuts. Stay Strong, and think about what you want...to get off fast and crash and burn, or a slower taper that allows you to function. Everyone is different, but I felt healing all the way down. Stay Strong, and be true to yourself. You can do this, but may need to go back to drawing board. 💖Peace and Healing.

 

Begood, how long did you hold between your second reinstatement and your third taper may I ask?

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Kimmie,

 

I am so sorry to hear how much you had to suffer because of GP not knowing the equivalencies between the two drugs.  I find I feel my best when I keep my taper between 6% and 8%.  When it gets around 9% is when I start having problems.

I agree we are all different and our tapers are going to as long a need to come off smoothly with as little sx as possible.  Good luck and I wish you the best.

 

JoJo

 

 

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Yes it helped me to hold, and I am glad I did, having two tapers that I went all the way to 0, and crashed and close to having a stroke times 2, well, I finally learned my lesson. I never felt that I could not resume my taper, I knew that it was just going to take a long time and I accepted that. Your rate of taper may be catching up with you, the Brain needs lots of time to adjust to cuts. Stay Strong, and think about what you want...to get off fast and crash and burn, or a slower taper that allows you to function. Everyone is different, but I felt healing all the way down. Stay Strong, and be true to yourself. You can do this, but may need to go back to drawing board. 💖Peace and Healing.

 

Begood, how long did you hold between your second reinstatement and your third taper may I ask?

I think it was almost a year, I just wasn't sure I ever wanted to go through a bad taper again, so the need to try one more time, kept coming up and I decided to to it a different way and do it one more time forever, it was going to be this time or never. :smitten:
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Yes it helped me to hold, and I am glad I did, having two tapers that I went all the way to 0, and crashed and close to having a stroke times 2, well, I finally learned my lesson. I never felt that I could not resume my taper, I knew that it was just going to take a long time and I accepted that. Your rate of taper may be catching up with you, the Brain needs lots of time to adjust to cuts. Stay Strong, and think about what you want...to get off fast and crash and burn, or a slower taper that allows you to function. Everyone is different, but I felt healing all the way down. Stay Strong, and be true to yourself. You can do this, but may need to go back to drawing board. 💖Peace and Healing.

begood, I am so glad to hear you finally finished your taper after three tries and I wish you all the best and continued healing.

How long did you have to taper the 10 mg for it to finally be successful?  Don't get me wrong, I am going to let my own body determine my taper rate.  I am just interested in your experience with your journey to success.  Thank you again for all the support. 

 

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Yes it helped me to hold, and I am glad I did, having two tapers that I went all the way to 0, and crashed and close to having a stroke times 2, well, I finally learned my lesson. I never felt that I could not resume my taper, I knew that it was just going to take a long time and I accepted that. Your rate of taper may be catching up with you, the Brain needs lots of time to adjust to cuts. Stay Strong, and think about what you want...to get off fast and crash and burn, or a slower taper that allows you to function. Everyone is different, but I felt healing all the way down. Stay Strong, and be true to yourself. You can do this, but may need to go back to drawing board. 💖Peace and Healing.

begood, I am so glad to hear you finally finished your taper after three tries and I wish you all the best and continued healing.

How long did you have to taper the 10 mg for it to finally be successful?  Don't get me wrong, I am going to let my own body determine my taper rate.  I am just interested in your experience with your journey to success.  Thank you again for all the support.

In reality my first two tapers, looking back was pretty on track with others that taper here...but what I found out was for me I had to go super slow this third taper, I did not realize how sensitive I was to cuts. Of course I used the percentages and forgot that as we go down the % goes up, and did not adjust and was slammed. So my taper was a matter of years...more than most would ever want to attempt, but so far I am OK post walk off. :smitten:
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There is nothing wrong with holding, keep in mind that when you do make a cut and hold blood levels will continue to decrease for probably 7 to 14 days with the majority happening in the first week, so it's not like you're giving up or slowing progress down by holding for a bit. Your body is actually still cutting but at a slower rate. I'm so impatient I want to keep cutting but slow this time has been extremely beneficial for me.
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I'm holding at the moment. This is my longest hold yet.  I can relate to being snappy and having little patience. I also sometimes have derealization symptoms. My job requires a lot of public speaking, and my anxiety goes through the roof. I'm taking it super slow, I think a hold is okay as long as you don't increase. However, everyone has different life circumstances and some may be able to hold, some may updose, and then I'm sure there are some people that have to keep it moving. It's such an individual process. 
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Yes it helped me to hold, and I am glad I did, having two tapers that I went all the way to 0, and crashed and close to having a stroke times 2, well, I finally learned my lesson. I never felt that I could not resume my taper, I knew that it was just going to take a long time and I accepted that. Your rate of taper may be catching up with you, the Brain needs lots of time to adjust to cuts. Stay Strong, and think about what you want...to get off fast and crash and burn, or a slower taper that allows you to function. Everyone is different, but I felt healing all the way down. Stay Strong, and be true to yourself. You can do this, but may need to go back to drawing board. 💖Peace and Healing.

 

Begood, how long did you hold between your second reinstatement and your third taper may I ask?

I think it was almost a year, I just wasn't sure I ever wanted to go through a bad taper again, so the need to try one more time, kept coming up and I decided to to it a different way and do it one more time forever, it was going to be this time or never. :smitten:

 

Thank you Begood. It took you a whole year to stabilize or how many months did it take? Sorry for all the questions. This is the last one, I promise. At least in this thread!

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Yes it helped me to hold, and I am glad I did, having two tapers that I went all the way to 0, and crashed and close to having a stroke times 2, well, I finally learned my lesson. I never felt that I could not resume my taper, I knew that it was just going to take a long time and I accepted that. Your rate of taper may be catching up with you, the Brain needs lots of time to adjust to cuts. Stay Strong, and think about what you want...to get off fast and crash and burn, or a slower taper that allows you to function. Everyone is different, but I felt healing all the way down. Stay Strong, and be true to yourself. You can do this, but may need to go back to drawing board. 💖Peace and Healing.

 

Begood, how long did you hold between your second reinstatement and your third taper may I ask?

I think it was almost a year, I just wasn't sure I ever wanted to go through a bad taper again, so the need to try one more time, kept coming up and I decided to to it a different way and do it one more time forever, it was going to be this time or never. :smitten:

 

Thank you Begood. It took you a whole year to stabilize or how many months did it take? Sorry for all the questions. This is the last one, I promise. At least in this thread!

9-12??  :smitten:
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Begood thank you so much. I'll hold a year if needed. Our history is very similar as I came off in the past, first CT, no issues, then a taper, no issues, then this taper, hell on earth. Thanks for caring. I see you're not getting much slept. It's 12 pm here right now so soon you can have lunch  :smitten:
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Begood thank you so much. I'll hold a year if needed. Our history is very similar as I came off in the past, first CT, no issues, then a taper, no issues, then this taper, hell on earth. Thanks for caring. I see you're not getting much slept. It's 12 pm here right now so soon you can have lunch  :smitten:

It is 5am here, I average 4hrs sleep a night, but I do not dwell on it, I feel rested and am thankful for what I get, I had to learn to think differently and not get bogged down with things, for me it has been a Godsend. :smitten:
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