Knackered Has No Expectation with Benzos

   Hey there, Knackered here.  Yesterday was the anniversary of an event that made our area famous for awhile.  We’re home to the largest and most destructive volcanic eruption in US history.  I grew up camping and hiking around Mt. St. Helens.  Indigenous people of the area had long ago warned settlers that the area was sacred, strange and ‘spooky’.  Nevertheless they came, built and recreated. And they should have listened to the tribal people who named the mountain Loowit, or ‘little smoky’.  In the end, 57 people died and 200 homes were leveled.  Anyone should have known what was coming down. The north side bulged to enormous proportions and the ensuing blast knocked over 1,000 feet from the top of ‘little smoky’.  Yet, those who died while hiking in the area that day must not have expected that.   

   Nature knows no timeline, but its events can still be expected.  It’s as if a supernatural stream of consciousness masterminds the universe, living, dying and rebirthing itself.  People are, of course, part of all that, but sadly believe they are in the driver’s seat.  Not really understanding that we’re only riding ‘shotgun’, the natural world must laugh at our endeavors and efforts to control it all.

   There are lots of things that shouldn’t  be put in our human bodies.  Their effects are often unknown at first, but time and natural response rates bear out the error of our ways.  Trusting our own, we have taken things to the extreme way too often. The unknown effects of benzodiazepines should have been minimalised by extended studies and careful prescribing.  However the effective way they reduced my symptoms of anxiety and obsessive control disorder were enough to convince me of their worth.  The lasting results have left me, like all of us, thinking much differently.

   If there’s one constant in the whole experience of tapering this stuff, it’s the predictability that you never really know what’s going to happen next.  Of course, over time, we recognize many of the same symptoms reappearing over and over.  But the unexpectancy of how and when they will appear can leave us in a state of constant unknowing.

   The last three days of my own experience have been a glorious window of relief.  I walked, ate, slept and lived like I’d never taken a pill (of Benzos) in my life.  That ended the second my feet hit the floor this morning.  Coming into the kitchen and trying to gather up some breakfast for myself and our dog further warned me that I was in for it.  As I write this, I can move my fingers, but the rest of me is in agony.  As soon as I finish I’m headed back to the bedroom.  Luckily there’s nothing planned that I need to be a part of and no ‘going out’ that’s to be had.

    If we were  responsible for only ourselves and our own well being, things would flow freely. But the natural consequences of colliding life expectations can cause eruptions that we hadn’t planned on.

   So what can we say about the unpredictability of our own situation here?  Bob Dylan probably said it best:  “Doesn’t expecting the unexpected make the unexpected expected?” Therein lies an expectation even I can live with.