Off benzos for several years now with some practical advice

I've been off benzos since 2018.  I was on klonopin, I can't even remember the dose, for 15 years.  The details prior don't matter, because I believe the state I was in right prior to jumping off is what matters.  Get to where I was and you will be successful. 

 

Fair warning, this is long game advice, but I am VERY confident that if you follow it, you will be successful in getting off benzos.  This advice is mainly for those that would like an alternative to the often too-hard-to-handle taper down to zero, either because they tried it and its been too difficult, or maybe it just fits your personality type better. I'm very much a tear the band-aid off kind of guy, so this worked perfectly for me.  Much of the advice here applies no matter what you do.  So use whatever you think will help.  Here is what I did and what I suggest:

 

First, I did cognitive behavioral therapy to extinguish my panic and fear of panic.  If you do this with a competent CBT therapist you will not even understand why panic ever bothered you.  Spoiler: You will be doing exposure therapy.  You will learn that panic is your minds reaction to fight or flight sensations in your body.  The physical sensations are NOT the scary part, its the almost immediate interpretation of your brain that the sensations are dangerous.  CBT clears all this up.

 

Second, learn mindfulness and get good at it.  Go here for free meditations by an expert.  You might even consider doing the eight week program.  In fact, I'd recommend it. https://palousemindfulness.com/.  You can also look into Jon Kabat-Zinn.

Anxiety is caused by anxious thoughts.  Mindfulness teaches you that thoughts are just thoughts, and it allows you to observe them with objectivity.  When tapering and jumping off, mindfulness will be your go to tool. 

 

Third, cross over to diazepam and taper to 6mg, or taper your current benzo to the equivalent of 6mg diaz and cross over.  Whatever gets you to 6mg of diaz.  Personally, I did 2mg 3x daily of diaz, so it's all I can formally speak to.  If you're at 3mg twice a day maybe that will work, but I don't know.  Ultimately as long as your below what would be considered CT dosage you will likely be OK.  But of course I cannot guarantee anything.  I spaced the 2mg pills 7-8 hours apart.  This was my jump off dosage.  I know, I know, you're thinking that's too high.  No it's not.  First, I recall the Ashton manual (or other source, I'm sorry, I can't remember exactly) saying that 6mg of diaz is not considered cold turkey.  Second, you want to stay on this dose for a good 6 months, maybe a little less, maybe a little more, maybe a lot more.  However long you need to settle into the dose and get back to feeling good.  This whole "slowly taper, and right after you've felt like total shit for months or longer and when you're at your wits end with the whole thing" then jump off.  NOPE.  I chilled on my 6mg of diazepam.  Went to work, lived my life, felt good, got myself back in top mental shape, THEN jumped off.  Get yourself nice, comfy and calm with the dose.  When you jump off, you'll be totally acclimated to the dose, and you'll have some rocking CBT and mindfulness tools at your disposal. 

 

When I jumped off there were times I felt high anxiety and panic.  But CBT and mindfulness really took the teeth out of these things.  You'll be able to tell yourself its OK and temporary, and BELIEVE it (its true, BTW).  I felt acute withdrawal for 3-4 days.  I am being honest when I say that after those 3-4 days I felt basically normal from an anxiety perspective.  Yes, I was damned tired, and had a NASTY benzo flu for, if I recall correctly, about 7 days afterward.  And some weird ass numb feeling in my feet on occasion.  But these are just bodily sensations and nothing more.

 

During jump off, if you can find a way to get off work for a week, do it.  I don't think I could have done it if I had to go to work.  You'll be able to chill at home and relax.  Also, find funny movies and shows to watch.  I binged The Orville.  I have a place in my heart for Seth McFarland now because of how much this show helped me during those 3-4 days.

 

Life is a marathon, not a sprint.  The same is true of getting off benzos.  Don't be afraid to play the long game.

 

 

 

 

 

Hi BJD

would like to know more of your jump.

Where/what did you read that made you jump

Since that time are you symptom free?

Was your taper hard prior?

I ask because a friend of mine told me a similar story.

Congrats on your success

Joeb

I never jumped to Diazepam from the Z-Drug, but the way I understand it, is that it's supposed to make it easier for people to jump off the short half-life benzos. Which is why I don't get the point if the jump doesn't actually help you. There's people on here that are living the exact same hell, before they jumped to it, and afterwards. And yes I agree, I see people here tapering Diazepam to 0.002mg. At that point, what is the point? If I had had to do it, I would have reduced to 2mg spaced out twice, and then jumped afterward CT from that dose.

I never jumped to Diazepam from the Z-Drug, but the way I understand it, is that it's supposed to make it easier for people to jump off the short half-life benzos. Which is why I don't get the point if the jump doesn't actually help you. There's people on here that are living the exact same hell, before they jumped to it, and afterwards. And yes I agree, I see people here tapering Diazepam to 0.002mg. At that point, what is the point? If I had had to do it, I would have reduced to 2mg spaced out twice, and then jumped afterward CT from that dose.

 

2mg twice a day would have made the jump even easier, theoretically.  But that low dosage of diazepam doesn't last long enough to take only twice a day.  At least for me, 3 daily was necessary.

Hi BJD

would like to know more of your jump.

1) Where/what did you read that made you jump

2) Since that time are you symptom free?

3) Was your taper hard prior?

I ask because a friend of mine told me a similar story.

Congrats on your success

Joeb

 

I numbered your questions within the quote to make responding easier.

 

1) I don't understand.  Do you mean what made me think I could jump at that dosage, or what made me want to stop benzos, or something else?

 

2) I have no symptoms and haven't for quite a while, at least two years.  For a little while afterward, I don't recall exactly, maybe a few months, I had some funny bodily sensations.  Mainly this thing in my feet where it felt uncomfortable to stand.  It's hard to explain, but kind of like if I put too much pressure on them they'd cave in or something.  NOT painful and not particularly unpleasant, just weird.  It would last a few minutes at a time.  The other one was seeing some spots.  Again, not unpleasant, and not anxiety provoking, just odd.  Mindfulness enabled me to be like "hmmm, that's odd.  And there's me worrying it's permanent." When one knows mindfulness, unpleasant and over-reactive thoughts and emotions don't last very long. 

 

3) Definitely wasn't fun.  But not overly hard, because I did it slowly and had CBT and mindfulness tools.  At first I'd reduce about once a week, then as dose got lower once every two weeks.  And take breaks if I felt I needed one.  I ALWAYS made sure I was back to the prior base state before doing another cut.  If you ask me, its a recipe for disaster if you reduce while you still feel like shit.  Again, I was in a very good place prior to taper because of CBT and mindfulness and knew my mind and emotions very well.  On this forum I see a lot of people who clearly should workout their anxiety and other issues before trying to stop.  IMO that is the reason they fail.  They can't deal with the difficult emotions that this process is all about.  I'm not judging.  I have limitless compassion for them and I hope they read my story and take my suggestions seriously. 

Hi BJD

would like to know more of your jump.

1) Where/what did you read that made you jump

2) Since that time are you symptom free?

3) Was your taper hard prior?

I ask because a friend of mine told me a similar story.

Congrats on your success

Joeb

 

I numbered your questions within the quote to make responding easier.

 

1) I don't understand.  Do you mean what made me think I could jump at that dosage, or what made me want to stop benzos, or something else?

 

2) I have no symptoms and haven't for quite a while, at least two years.  For a little while afterward, I don't recall exactly, maybe a few months, I had some funny bodily sensations.  Mainly this thing in my feet where it felt uncomfortable to stand.  It's hard to explain, but kind of like if I put too much pressure on them they'd cave in or something.  NOT painful and not particularly unpleasant, just weird.  It would last a few minutes at a time.  The other one was seeing some spots.  Again, not unpleasant, and not anxiety provoking, just odd.  Mindfulness enabled me to be like "hmmm, that's odd.  And there's me worrying it's permanent." When one knows mindfulness, unpleasant and over-reactive thoughts and emotions don't last very long. 

 

3) Definitely wasn't fun.  But not overly hard, because I did it slowly and had CBT and mindfulness tools.  At first I'd reduce about once a week, then as dose got lower once every two weeks.  And take breaks if I felt I needed one.  I ALWAYS made sure I was back to the prior base state before doing another cut.  If you ask me, its a recipe for disaster if you reduce while you still feel like shit.  Again, I was in a very good place prior to taper because of CBT and mindfulness and knew my mind and emotions very well.  On this forum I see a lot of people who clearly should workout their anxiety and other issues before trying to stop.  IMO that is the reason they fail.  They can't deal with the difficult emotions that this process is all about.  I'm not judging.  I have limitless compassion for them and I hope they read my story and take my suggestions seriously.

Hey BJD Thanks for the reply, my first question was what made you confident or think you could successfully jump at that dose, since we are all different and many others suffer for many months

I’d love to get off this crap without tapering for what seems like forever and not knowing if longer makes one even more addicted. Even stable till sucks

Thanks and best to you

Joeb

Hi BJD

would like to know more of your jump.

1) Where/what did you read that made you jump

2) Since that time are you symptom free?

3) Was your taper hard prior?

I ask because a friend of mine told me a similar story.

Congrats on your success

Joeb

 

I numbered your questions within the quote to make responding easier.

 

1) I don't understand.  Do you mean what made me think I could jump at that dosage, or what made me want to stop benzos, or something else?

 

2) I have no symptoms and haven't for quite a while, at least two years.  For a little while afterward, I don't recall exactly, maybe a few months, I had some funny bodily sensations.  Mainly this thing in my feet where it felt uncomfortable to stand.  It's hard to explain, but kind of like if I put too much pressure on them they'd cave in or something.  NOT painful and not particularly unpleasant, just weird.  It would last a few minutes at a time.  The other one was seeing some spots.  Again, not unpleasant, and not anxiety provoking, just odd.  Mindfulness enabled me to be like "hmmm, that's odd.  And there's me worrying it's permanent." When one knows mindfulness, unpleasant and over-reactive thoughts and emotions don't last very long. 

 

3) Definitely wasn't fun.  But not overly hard, because I did it slowly and had CBT and mindfulness tools.  At first I'd reduce about once a week, then as dose got lower once every two weeks.  And take breaks if I felt I needed one.  I ALWAYS made sure I was back to the prior base state before doing another cut.  If you ask me, its a recipe for disaster if you reduce while you still feel like shit.  Again, I was in a very good place prior to taper because of CBT and mindfulness and knew my mind and emotions very well.  On this forum I see a lot of people who clearly should workout their anxiety and other issues before trying to stop.  IMO that is the reason they fail.  They can't deal with the difficult emotions that this process is all about.  I'm not judging.  I have limitless compassion for them and I hope they read my story and take my suggestions seriously.

Hey BJD Thanks for the reply, my first question was what made you confident or think you could successfully jump at that dose, since we are all different and many others suffer for many months

I’d love to get off this crap without tapering for what seems like forever and not knowing if longer makes one even more addicted. Even stable till sucks

Thanks and best to you

Joeb

 

The point of tapering is so one doesn't quit "cold turkey."  At some point the dosage of each benzo is low enough so that sudden stoppage is no longer considered cold turkey. It may not be as low as the Ashton manual method, but still within professional guidelines.  The top end of that non cold turkey dosage is the earliest one should consider jumping, meaning, going from some benzo to no benzo.  You may know all of this already.

 

Anyway, I read somewhere, I can't remember where, and can't find it online anymore, that sudden stoppage at 7.5mg of diazepam and below is not considered cold turkey.  That is why I chose 6mg.  It was below 7.5 and it was the minimum dose I could take (2mg whole pills each) without having to start cutting pills, that didn't make me feel like I was withdrawing in the 7 hours between dosing.  I then stayed at this lowest not-requiring-cutting yet still effective dosage for a while.  At that point I actually didn't have a clear cut plan to stop.  The idea was to get as low as possible and without having to oh so annoyingly cut pills, get my mind right and my shit together and stop at some future point.  I stayed on the dose for a few years actually, while in the back of my mind planning to stop one day, but not sure when.  The morning I woke up wanting to stop I just did.

 

Whatever I read turned out to be correct because what I went through was clearly not a CT withdrawal.  Don't get me wrong, it wasn't pleasant, but it's doable for someone with their head in the right place.  I know for a fact that I would have failed if I tapered below that point.  Each pill dosage just wouldn't have been enough to get me from dose to dose without withdrawing.  Something long and protracted like that would have stressed my brain way more than what I went through in the 3-4 days of acute.

Hi BJD

would like to know more of your jump.

1) Where/what did you read that made you jump

2) Since that time are you symptom free?

3) Was your taper hard prior?

I ask because a friend of mine told me a similar story.

Congrats on your success

Joeb

 

I forgot to mention another symptom I had, which was the longest lasting.  Prostate pain and slightly swollen prostate.  Interestingly, I went to a urologist about it and when he asked what I was doing differently lately I said that I somewhat recently got off diazepam.  He responded, "That's interesting, because I prescribe diazepam as a muscle relaxant for prostate pain.  Likely the diazepam was relaxing your prostate this whole time."

 

Anyway, it has since resolved with a mix of learning how to chill the hell out about stuff (which will always be an issue I have no matter how much CBT or mindfulness I do), pumpkin seeds and zinc.

Thanks for the reply JBD, your story is very interesting and I think it’s very bold and brave of you to do it. There’s so much info out there saying the brain needs a long  time to heal and to suddenly stop with only a week of acute amazes me. So many people stop and have long extended bouts of acute wd and end up back on months later or take months to heal.

I know we are all different but Wow I wonder how many people that stopped were stable at the time and if that’s the common denominator that minimized the acute timeframe. If I knew I had a decent shot at it I wud try it.

Again congrats, and have to admit I’m envious and wish that could be me

Joeb

Thanks for the reply JBD, your story is very interesting and I think it’s very bold and brave of you to do it. There’s so much info out there saying the brain needs a long  time to heal and to suddenly stop with only a week of acute amazes me. So many people stop and have long extended bouts of acute wd and end up back on months later or take months to heal.

I know we are all different but Wow I wonder how many people that stopped were stable at the time and if that’s the common denominator that minimized the acute timeframe. If I knew I had a decent shot at it I wud try it.

Again congrats, and have to admit I’m envious and wish that could be me

Joeb

 

The key is making sure the dose is below what would be considered cold turkey, not being at the end of an already tortuous taper, and being in a good mental/emotional place.  Those three combined enabled me to jump from a higher point than most on this forum.  To pull the band aid off, so to speak.  YMMV.

What’s YMMV?

 

 

So your advice, it's just very individual I think. For you it works, for some others maybe too, for other people it will definitely not work.

 

 

Just my ideas 

 

That's all its intended to be.  I see a lot of people struggling then giving up trying to taper down to zero.  That's mainly who my advice is for.  Or for those generally not interested in a taper down to zero for whatever reason. 

 

Maybe I'll update my post for reflect that.

 

 

While tapering you recover. I'm recovering right now with my turtle 0.002 mg Diazepam a day style. That way I don't have to suffer so long after walking off.

 

Just my ideas 

 

Do whatever works for you.  There are those though for whom the taper to zero makes things a lot worse and/or find it basically impossible.  It sounds like you're handling it quite well, like many others on the forum.  For you and all those, definitely keep it up but know that here is a safe alternative.  I am living evidence. 

What’s YMMV?

 

Your Mileage May Vary.  Meaning, what works for one person may not work as well for another. 

 

 

While tapering you recover. I'm recovering right now with my turtle 0.002 mg Diazepam a day style. That way I don't have to suffer so long after walking off.

 

Just my ideas 

 

Do whatever works for you.  There are those though for whom the taper to zero makes things a lot worse and/or find it basically impossible.  It sounds like you're handling it quite well, like many others on the forum.  For you and all those, definitely keep it up but know that here is a safe alternative.  I am living evidence.

 

Yes, it's good to see both sides. I wouldn't even dare to jump right now. I have so much respect for people who go cold turkey at high dosage potent drugs.

 

Although remember, at my dose it was not considered cold turkey.  I don't want anyone to be misled.  I would never suggest going cold turkey, which I define as not first tapering to an appropriately low enough dose.  For some, that "low enough" dose will be higher and some lower.  Again, I just want to offer an alternative to the taper to zero method in case anyone needs it.

That's totally understandable.  That fear is why people fail.  In this game it's all about comfort. 

Again, I just want to offer an alternative to the taper to zero method in case anyone needs it.

 

Is there really a "taper to zero method"? Don't all successful tapers end at zero?

 

I define cold-turkey as withdrawing entirely from the drug without any taper (dictionary says the same); basically one day someone is taking a full, therapeutic dose and the next day none.

 

cold turkey

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

noun Immediate, complete withdrawal from something on which one has become dependent, such as an addictive drug.

 

adverb Immediately and without gradual reduction of use.

 

I think it's absurd to say that some doses are "below what would be considered cold turkey"; by the basic definition if you tapered at all then it's not cold-turkey, otherwise it is. Tapering can be rapid, jump doses can be too high, but neither of these problems relate to or could be classified as a cold-turkey withdrawal.

 

To my understanding, buddies who taper to very low doses before quitting do so because they're trying to best manage their complex needs and opportunities. I don't see jumping to zero from 6mg diazepam as some "safe alternative" to jumping to zero from 0.5mg diazepam; it's just a different jump dose, because everyone is a different taperer.

 

All successful withdrawals are "taper to zero" methods.

It's your success story and I'm happy for you.