Issue Crossing Over

Hello!  I recently went through an episode where I started tapering down way too quickly from 1mg of Klonopin down to .5 then .375 and just decided to stop because I seemed fine.  I woke up in the middle of the night having very hard and fast heart palpitations, my arms and legs were cramped up and burning, it was hard to breathe, my chest was tight and I was basically convlusing.  I have been on benzos for years.  I was getting off of them because I wanted not to rely on them anymore.  I took .375 after the cold turkey episode and it calmed me down but I was afraid to go to sleep so I never did after.  I started having air hunger on .375 and went back up to .5.  Nothing was any better and I had severe panic attacks for several hours each night keeping my fiancée awake and with my parents on the phone, thinking I needed to go to the hospital.  After going to urgent care a few days later everything checked out fine and I have seen that it is a very common symptom of benzo withdrawal.  After I realized that I wanted to take 1mg to really check if that's what it was and I felt way better.

 

I started taking 1mg for about a week and thought that I just needed to "recover" from the cold turkey episode and theb get off of them much more slowly.  I decided that I would use the Ashton Method so my doctor switched me over to 20mg of Valium.  I have been on Valium before and I thought that the slow cross over would be unnecessary as long as there were benzos in my system, but I was wrong.  I experienced another feeling of cold turkey from Klonopin while on 20mg of Valium, so then I decided to cross over more slowly. Which I still did too fast. In about 9 days rather than the recommended 28 or so.

 

My question is this: I have now been on Valium for 29 days, and off of Klonopin for 19 days.  My understanding was that Valium's active metabolite desmethyldiazepam should have maintained steady blood levels by 4 weeks in order to protect me from the Klonopin withdrawals.  However, I am still having air hunger and chest pain and it is driving me crazy.  Has anybody else had issues with cross over that persisted beyond a month and then calmed down after that?  Does anybody have more information about desmethyldiazepam and how long it may take for some individuals to build up?  Could it take longer than a month?  Have any of you felt withdrawals from Klonopin underneath Valium for longer than a month after switching and did it ease up?  And once the Klonopin withdrawals were over did you feel that the Valium quelled symptoms of remaining anxiety so that a long taper could feel more manageable?

This process teaches some painful lessons, we think we can take shortcuts or avoid the damage others have encountered but are soon humbled, I'm sorry this has been so difficult for you.

 

May I ask, did you ever feel stable once back on the 1 mg of Klonopin, did your symptoms disappear?  I don't know the answers to your question about desmethyldiazepam, but I do know that people tapering don't feel good, the best they seem to hope for is being stable which means being able to perform daily functions.  This is when they know its time to make another reduction.

 

You may get replies to this thread but I would suggest you also post on this thread, they have experience with Valium.  Valium Support Group

 

I'll alert another member who may be able to offer some advice to your situation.

Thank you so much for your response.  Yes I have definitely learned to take it slow! 

 

As for feeling stabilized, I would say that even on the 1mg of Klonopin the breathing problem never completely stopped.  It started to go away or would only come in waves and I was able to leave the house.  Now I am not able to function at all or try to leave the house to do anything fun as I had been because the breathing and chest problems are just too much.  I would drop some Klonopin and add some Valium  and feel uncomfortable for a few days, but things would ease up.  Since I have dropped the Klonopin completely and switched over it seems like it hasn't eased really at all!

tenpercent, you're in a pickle for sure.

 

I was in a similar pickle. I was on Ativan and was having horrendous side effects as well as interdose withdrawals. I crossed over SLOWLY and gradually to the equivalent dosage of valium and it was still a miserable struggle. The long-acting benzo (valium) did not in any way make up for the short-acting benzo (Ativan). I took weeks and weeks for the crossover to "settle" down and for me to stop feeling the absence of the Ativan.

 

Reading your story, I can't help buy wonder if you are suffering from a couple of similar things. One: you reduced your klonopin way too fast, then decided to stop. No wonder you felt awful. (I should just mention that 6 months before my Ativan to Valium cross, I cold-turkeyed my Xanax. I felt like my life was ending. My doc put me on Ativan, which didn't help, and then I crossed to Valium. So I get your distress).

 

Then you went back up to 1 mg of klonopin and felt better. That was an important clue, I think. In my opinion, you should have stayed there for a LONG TIME until you felt a lot better and able to handle a SLOW crossover, not an omg sudden substitution of 20 mgs of valium for the klonopin. What was your doc thinking? Your poor brain! And body. And then you decided to do a really quick crossover.

 

So here you are. You feel rotten. You're off klonopin and "stuck" on valium and feeling basically like s**t. I felt basically like s**t on my crossover and I did things really slowly. Once I was crossed over I never did feel the absence of the shorter-acting benzo, but it sure took awhile How long? Several months.

 

So what to do now? Hang in there? You are so uncomfortable that I wonder if you even could. What's the alternative? As odd as it sounds, maybe going back to the last place where you DID feel comfortable and functional -- your 1 mg of klonopin.

 

When I got in trouble I always went back to the last place I felt functional/comfortable. For you, it would sure mean a lot of backtracking but the goal of all this is to feel okay while we're tapering, not to be in hell. Suffering on a benzo taper is not ennobling, it's just nuts.

 

I'm not sure how you would cross back, but I sure wouldn't ask your doc for help. I hope some of the more experienced folks on here (Bob 7 or slownsteady) will come along and give their input here.

 

So it seems you have two choices, as I said: hang in there not knowing if or when you will stabilize, or do something different.

 

I'm sorry for you pickle, tenpercent. I know what I would do, having done the three-benzo dance. I'd go back to the place where I felt okay, get stable, and come down again. But you may well have other thoughts about this.

 

Please post your situation on the valium thread, as Pamster suggests. You may get some help there, too.

 

Best to you,

 

Katz

 

 

I have sort of wondered about that.  :/ If it doesn't get better really soon then I may have to consider backtracking and doing that!  I did post on the Valium thread now and hope I get some more helpful answers.  I got one so far.  Did you happen to have air hunger and chest pain/tightness??  It is definitelt confusing because I see in the Ashton method thst it mentions to slightly increase your dosage durint cross over if you're still feeling bad withdrawals, but she also mentions once you've taken a cut to just stay there and not go back.  So it's a little confusing :/ haha.  I have only taken the cut from 20mg V to 19 so far and probably shouldn't have even done that yet.  Going to see about staying on the 19 for a little bit I think if I end up getting stable on it!

I didn't have air hunger but I certainly had chest pains and palpitations. They took me to my cardiologist more than once.

 

I think many of us had to amend Ashton's schedules for our own use. I got into serious trouble following her down from 15 mgs to 5 mgs where I crashed and burned. The cuts were just too big and too frequent for me. Hindsight is 20/20 right? I had to go very very slowly after I got "in the weeds".

 

Yes if I were you I'd not reduce any more until I had a good long think about what to do.

 

Best o you,

 

Katz

For chest pains my doctor gave me buspar and it worked and I got off it no problem.

 

Buspar allowed me to continue my taper after I had tapered too fast.

 

What happened:  I tapered too fast, got very sick, held for 5 weeks, got buspar for 3 more weeks, felt stable, resumed taper.

See my signature.

 

Thank you!!  Did Buspar have an immediate effect at all or did it take time to build up?

Within a day or two.

Must learn how to use it.

I didn't like it at bed so I switched to mornings.

I had chest pains - my doctor said, in benzo withdrawal, you get anxiety, the anxiety makes muscles (like chest muscle) tense all the time.  After a while, they get tired and hurt.

So buspar took the edge off anxiety.