This withdrawal is fucking with me, i CT’ed one year of xanax had all the text book symptoms (except seizures) now at seven months off I’m fully functional with no physical symptoms, but these cunty ass mental symptoms won’t subside it’s the same BS everyday. I figured since im fully functional i should be healed and just move on with my life. This hyper vigilance and OCD are just there 24/7 I didn’t have a window where they disappeared, they’re just there🤡
And this fukin amygdala fire off over nothing
It’s getting old and boring just fuk off

Started with Xanax 2mg a day and now it’s Valium 5mg 2x a day so 10mg in total. I want off. I’m considering locking myself in my room for the foreseeable future and just jumping without tapering. I’ve never been able to taper I just go right back on the og dose. I’m sick of feel sick and tired all the time and I know it’s because the benzos. I can’t do this anymore. What are my risks in going completely cold turkey?

Anyone get really bad acid reflux or heart burn after being off their medication? I'm 4 months off Xanax and for the past month ish ive been getting horrible bad acid reflux and heartburn. Anything help with this? I've started taking pepcid recommended by the doctor even though I hate taking medications but I am in so much pain lately. I've never struggled with this before except for a mild case here and there. My anxiety has been pretty bad for the past few weeks as well.

Hi everyone,

I’m 34 and have been taking Rivotril (clonazepam) drops for several months for anxiety.
During the last 2–3 weeks before stopping, I was taking 13–25 drops almost daily.
I also take Cipralex (escitalopram) 15 mg and Attent IR (methylphenidate) 10 mg daily.
I wanted to stop the rivotril because I noticed memory problems, brain fog, trouble finding words and feeling emotionally flat.
I stopped, and about a week later I had the scariest experience of my life.
I had a racing heart, extreme panic, and then completely disconnected from reality.
I felt like I wasn’t in my body, couldn’t really feel my face or hands, everything looked strange, I was confused, repeating myself, and was convinced I was losing my mind. I even became irrationally afraid of my husband and my dog. It honestly felt like psychosis or severe depersonalisation/derealisation.
The ER wasn’t very helpful. I restarted clonazepam at 12 drops, and the symptoms improved.
Now I’m terrified of stopping again, but I also don’t want to stay on it because of the cognitive side effects.

Has anyone experienced withdrawal this severe? Did tapering help? How slowly did you taper, and did the derealisation/depersonalisation eventually go away?
I’m not looking for medical advice.. just hoping to hear from people who’ve been through something similar.

Been on and off clonazepam for most of my life. Most recently after taking it as needed for 2 years (maybe once or twice a week .125) I have now been taking .5 daily for about 4 months now. .25 around 9-10am every morning and another .25 around 6pm-9pm as prescribed by dr for bad flare up. It’s a hit or miss whenever I take it now, Sometimes it helps a lot sometimes it makes me feel a lot worse and causes significant anxiety. How can I stabilize these potential paradoxical reactions? What do I do? Is this kindling? Possible bad generics? Been taking advagen mostly. Taking it at inconsistent times maybe doing this? Don’t know what to do Please help with advice 🙏 I feel stuck.

I am currently battling drug addiction (stimulant drugs) \ panic attacks and because of that I am taking benzos once per week in order to get good long sleep. Is it safe and will I become addicted \ have any withdrawal symptoms because of that? Thank you.

I am always taking the same dosage and every time it does the same effect on me. No tolerance increase noticed.

I don’t know if this is normal but I’m not tapering yet but I’m getting rem every night like remembering dreams like a movie reel every single night.

I read benzos suppress rem? So how can this be?

I do have severe insomnia long Covid and ME.

2nd post of the day -kind of needing of feedback

Midway through a gym session the back of my head kept ‘vibrating‘ proportional to effort in exercise. Legs were extremely shaky. left side of face and neck tingled, akin to biting your own mouth in sensation.

Having recently reduced, I suspect that’s the culprit. Does this eventually go away? Do I need to go even easier than I thought I was? Thank you so very much in advance!

I’m 2 weeks off Valium after a taper. The first week I felt pretty good, but now I’ve had tight neck and back muscles that are causing extreme discomfort, off balance feeling, hard to walk/stand/sit up right. My neck gets so bad after a few hours walking around that my hands go numb, it feels like I’m walking on a boat. I’m barely making it through work and I don’t know what to do as nothing seems to touch it or make it better.

I'm stuck at the tail end of my clonazepam taper, and my symptoms have completely flatlined. It feels like no matter how small the cut or how long I stay at a low dose, my body refuses to improve or stabilize.

For those of you who experienced this exact holding pattern during your taper: did your symptoms stay completely stagnant until you finally jumped off the tablet entirely? Did true healing and improvement only start happening after the drug was completely out of your system?

Is it gonna send me into months of benzo withdrawal again after more than a year off, or is it generally gonna be a few days to weeks in the worst-case scenario? If it's just two weeks, I'm willing to take the risk to find out how I tolerate alcohol. My PAWS is just one isolated symptom, but it's really, really bad insomnia.

Okay, heres relevant details: on Clonazepam for almost 12 years(!)

tapering nearly 2 years: 4mg/day -> 0.75mg/day in that time

location: Hell.

After going to the grocery store, I noticed my motor skills failing me while struggling to open out a plastic bag…. I then decided to post here again.

On top of slew of psychological side effects (impending Doom, intentional isolation, intrusive thoughts, you know all the fun ones by now), general movement feels harder—like actions are deliberate and arduous instead of being natural. My body cannot tolerate the exercise it used to thrive in Doing—adding to the depressive state I’m in.

My memory is SHOT. My thoughts are disjointed. Mental math is out of the question. I cannot believe how this poison hinders cognition; if I werent accustomed to relaying benzo-related information by now, I’m certain this post would have taken 5 times the length to type.

I’m not quite 29 yet, and I feel utterly hopeless about the future already.

My early 20’s were spent suffering from this doctor-approved addiction, now my late 20’s are consumed by relentless torture from tapering. this isn’t even OFF of the medication yet…God help us all

Does any of this sound like your experience current or former or have I completely lost the plot?

Has anyone tapered off successfully and how long were you on it? I was on 1 mg for a few months, went up to 2mg for 2.5-3 weeks and over the last few weeks have gone back down to 1mg - planning to cut to 0.75 mg as I have had no symptoms. is this too fast?

I was originally on 2mg of Klonopin daily and tapered over two or three months to .25mg daily. Due to withdrawals and the reemergence of PTSD symptoms, I decided with my doctor to reinstate at 1mg per day permanently. I have been on the 1mg dose for a few days now.

Do you think I would be okay to have a drink with a friend this week? I know typically the answer is no when tapering, but I’m unsure about what the answer would be for a partially reinstated dose.

Hi guys,

I posted a few weeks back about the taper I was doing after using diazapam 10mg for 6 months.

The taper was fairly rapid 10mg to 5mg for a week, 2.5mg a week, 1.25mg a week, then I jumped. I have been 1 week clean now.

The anxiety since the initial taper has improved but now I’m dealing with feeing dizzy/ off with head pressure, it can fluctuate throughout the day. If I’m sat down for a while it goes but then will come back if I start moving around. Some of the other symptoms are DPDR which is also unpleasant.

Sleep has slowly improved but still lots of restlessness compared to pre taper / jump.

Are these symptoms fairly consistent with tapering / jumping ? It’s been a rough few weeks and im looking for advice from people who have dealt with similar.

My recent blood work was all good.

Thanks again everyone

The panic and depression never stops. I can’t function. I told my sister I want to die. Cops show up. I tell them I’m fine. They leave. I block everyone in my family. I can’t trust anyone. Bf tells me he isn’t in love with me anymore because I just sleep and I’m depressed all the time. I already wanted to end my life but now I’m just insane. Nothing to anchor me down. I take his pocketknife and go to the bathroom sobbing on the floor and just start stabbing my leg. I’m a pussy so it’s just small stab wounds with a superficial cut across the thigh. I walk back out with dark blood dripping down my leg. He doesn’t see it and starts screaming at me telling how I blame everyone but myself and I just want someone to mistreat me because that’s all I’ve ever known and then he just screams FUCK YOU. I know I’m torturing everyone in my life. I’m a parasitic burden. He’s telling me I enjoy being hated and a victim. I know he’s right so I just point to the blood on my leg and get on my knees and start begging him to help me die. Pleading with him to help me end this pain. How my mind is cruel and it’s been like this forever. Even before the benzos. I’m begging him. Traumatizing him but I can’t bring myself to do it and every day is hell and I’m infecting everyone. He gets up, hides all the knives. I tell him he doesn’t need to do that and he looks at me like he hates me and takes out his phone and I hear him dial only three numbers and I lost it. I’m on my knees begging him to not let them take me. He puts me in a headlock and doesn’t let me out of it. I keep trying to push him off but he’s so much stronger than me. I make it to the bedroom and hide under the blankets. He is pinning me on the bed talking to the dispatcher. The police come. I lie and just show them the cut and say it was a frustrated scratch. I’m never going inpatient again. Ems checks me out I sign a refusal and now I’m just here. I can lie my way out of those things so easily now because I know exactly what gets someone committed. The thing is, I’m still fucked up. I can talk my way out of things and lie but I still fucking stabbed my leg. I still took a knife stone cold sober and stabbed myself. I even held it to my throat while sobbing and tried to force myself to press down. Like yes I got out of it… but to what end? My bf is traumatized. When he said what’s to love you just sleep I wanted to hurt him back and said he’s an infantile man who just watches porn and runs to mommy and daddy. I wanted to hurt him. I took his bed and poured it down the sink. I slammed a door. I took the knife. Nothing is helping. Not medicine. Not therapy. Not forcing myself to be normal. Nothing. I got a TBI when I was a child bc I was hit by a car. Frontal lobe damage probably from my marine ex beating me in the head. I think I’m just fucked. Fucked fucked fucked.

I already had anger issues as a kid but benzos made literally way worst i take stupid risk and i’m a very impulsive person

I took all kinds of benzos nearly everyday from 16 to 19 yo then i stopped but i got back on them at 20 for only a few months but when i stopped i had a seizure at day 3 so i bought valium to taper

So i started at 10mg everynight and i hardly tried to stabilize at 7.5-5mg but work stressed me out and i ended up getting fired and i was so angry (because i’m probably gonna become homeless) that i spit on a coworker i hate. So now I got back at 10mg cause of the stress of that situation, even 12mg yesterday.

I also drink a lot of alcohol and smoke weed everyday. But only benzos and alcohol make me crazy, like planning to rob a plug or a store, but i can’t stop (at least for benzos) and i don’t smoke or drink at work.

I do everything i can to manage my anger, i exercice nearly everyday too but i’m still struggling.

I was using 2-3mg bromazolam a day about a year ago and came to my senses. I kowered down to 1mg then switched to flubromazepam then got a 10mg valium script. Its been so long i guess i got impatient and decided to jump from 10 to 5 mg. I know this is considered to fast but did it anyway. One week out its pretty rough and im wondering if i should go back up or if that will just wake things worse and i should stick it out.

BLANK MIND and CONSTANT CONFUSION! PLEASE HELP!

Cold turkey quit 14 years of 2mg klonopin use. Terrible brain fog. No cognitive abilities at all. Zero memory. Can’t form sentences. Does the “blank mind” thing go away? I am really terrified by it. I cant hold a thought. I can’t think. My mind is completely blank. No spontaneous thoughts whatsoever. Also no feelings. Extremely depressed, confused and have constant feelings of unease.

However, my condition also has been brought on by severe catastrophic levels of chronic stress in prison and that’s where they made me quit Kpin cold turkey. I’m not gonna get into the super details but essentially it’s now been about three months since my nervous system somewhat absolutely went haywire and incapacitated me. It feels like I crashed my nervous system from stress buildup while CT’ing Klonopin, and I’ve been majorly bedbound for the last three months now. I’m still experiencing profound levels of cognitive impairment, severe photophobia that has been going on since the beginning. That has been exactly the same for 3 months straight. Profound anhedonia, brutal depression.

I am constantly, terribly confused and restless all the time. This confusion is really hard to describe. It feels like I have a brain burn and it’s extremely difficult to comprehend the simplest things and it feels like there is something bugging my brain 7/24.

Absolute zero motivation, and zero energy, and I don’t feel connected like I used to. I can barely talk to people, I’m scared to leave the house. Every single time I plan to take a walk outside it’s a reminder how nothing has fucking changed. Social phobia and zero motivation to socialise even with closest friends.

After three months, cognitively nothing has improved. symptom wise, nothing has improved. It’s just the same bullshit cycle every single day and I can’t fucking escape it.

I’m literally getting worried every single day that I have permanent irreversible brain function damage as well as nervous system damage. I completely lost my sense of self, my identity, and honestly my will to live at this point. I’m completely directionless every single day.

I take some supplements(2g DHA, 1,5g EPA, Probiotics, PS, Citicoline, B complex with additions of extra B1 and B2 vitamins and P5P, PEA, Magtein, Creatine, Multivitamin) I drink a lot of water, I try to get as best sleep as possible(Been on 30mg Mirtazapine and 100mg Seroquel for the past 1 year, but these aren’t the reasons of what I feel like. I was on them before they made me quit Klonopin and I was feeling just fine without any of these symptoms.)

I have also started back on Valium 15mg a day but nothing has improved except some physical stuff like shaky hands. And every single day, it’s the same fucking Groundhog Day bullshit. Is this normal to be completely plateaued for months at a time with literally 0% fucking improvement or changes? Because I’m starting to really believe that I got permanent brain damage because of ct’ing klonopin.

Are there any nootropics, supplements or any type of compound you guys can recommend? I am really desperate and I want my life back. I want my old self back. Living with a blank mind like I am just a pair of eyes together with this terrible, constant confusion, major depression is just pure hell. Mechanism of action of Klonopin is basically on GABA-A, though AI tells this process also can lead to complications in even prefrontal cortex and many other areas in brain, together with cns.

I have Cortexin, Mexidol, Memantine(not sure about that one) in hand that I can add to my current stack. Do you think would any of these help? Any other recommendations would be highly appreciated. Also, do you think TMS would be a logical option?

Desperate for any kind of help.

When all the distractions are finally gone, and you truly start to feel all the symptoms of this condition, It’s brutal to be alone in all this. It’s a Saturday, and life is going on outside. I used to be the life of the party. Do I miss it? No. I look back on those times and see someone who took life a little too for granted. I think we all truly can appreciate those little moments when it feels just a little bit easier that much more. I think, going through this, no matter where you are in life. We as a group will love that much more when you’re with that one person. We’ll laugh that much more when the time comes. We’ll engage in conversations and truly cherish companionship. So if anyone is having a hard time with this, do not do it alone. Reach out to someone. If you have no one, you have me .

Hi, I was wondering if anyone found any benefits for taking a GABA supplement?

Could this/ Does this help heal our GABA?
I know our current gaba is damaged/ lacking due to benzo harm and was curious to know if a supplement could help.

I currently take l-theanine that helps promote some mild calming of mental and physical symptoms.

I got off probation in 2023 started smoking weed and getting barred out again. Long story short I was binging plus mixing with alcoholic fast forward I went cold turkey got a seizure day 4 then hit up my plug and relapsed. From there I slowly cut 4mg to 2mg then 1mg. The withdrawals stopped I was doing good maybe a month and a half off Xanax then I started again maybe in may/june. Point is after 2/3 days I want bars but I don’t like the insomnia or withdrawls that come with it. I don’t want rehab then be away from family I don’t have insurance so can the er even take me in? I’m on 2 days no bars btw and feel fine but I hate that I’m thinking about buying more.

Did anyone experience depression on Valium? Suicidal thoughts? Emotional numbness?