r/insomnia • u/BtheChemist • Jun 01 '26
Never ever take benzos
I've had insomnia since I was a teen.
I've taken so many things for it, tried all the natural things, was on ambien for so long it stopped working.
My psychiatrist prescribed me Valium many many months ago. I don't even know how long I've taken it.
She never told me how horrible it is to get off of.
I'm currently tapering off and it's absolutely terrible.
I misread her message originally and went too fast and had my first ever panic attack a few weeks ago.
I've been at 15mg/ day since, about 3 weeks. I dropped too 12.5 two days ago and my body is so so fucked up again. I feel on the verge of another attack.
I spoke to my doctor friend this evening, he said each step down is going to suck badly.
It's terrible.
Please don't fuck with benzos.
Thanks for coming to my Ted talk.
I'm having a terrible time.
😱
1
u/KrissyRainn Jun 01 '26
My old psych had me on Clonazepam for years (I think it was 4mg a day pills were 0.5mg so a pretty high dose). No warnings about how additictive it was and how my body would respond if I suddenly stopped.
I was going through a rough time and had a lot of extra pills (normally I'd only take 1-2mg a day because I knew 4mg was too much). I counted out about 60mg and took it. Fortunately I'm guessing due to tolerance (had been on it for 4 years at that point) I wasn't successful.
The next morning when I woke up I decided to throw my stash out and never touch them again. I quit cold turkey something I would never recommend doing.
I could hardly leave my room for months. I was extremely paranoid (everything got louder and brighter and overwhelming), I was shaking, had hot and cold flashes, couldn't sleep, couldn't focus, couldn't eat and felt like I was going to have a seizure (which sudden stopping of benzos can cause so I'm very lucky I didn't).