The Klonopin Klub#2

[[je...]]

When I meet with my doctor next month , after a month on 0.25 mg of klonopin (started at 1mg) , I am going to ask to make the switch to Valium for rest of transition. What would be the dose I start at for Valium and should I cold Turkey too klonopin or do I need a few days or week to take both? Need advice

 

You'll need to slowly crossover to valium. I suggest you start a thread in

Substitution then someone can help you with that.

[[Ul...]]

I am starting a new job in a few weeks and will be getting drug tested, does anyone know if Klonopin is usually part of that drug process screening? I am taking of course as prescribed but am fearful this will result in my drug over being rescinded. Any insight would help thanks .

 

I know it's not a part of employee drug screening here in my state, but I'm not sure how states differ. Here, they're just looking for illegal drugs. You could probably look up the drug screening company and give them a call. I was on k for 27 yrs at high doses (as prescribed), and never any problems. I bet you'll be just fine unless it's a position related to psych (social work, counseling, etc). Good luck!

[[gr...]]

Hope someone here can help me... My Dr. has switched me from lorazepam to clonazepam. At the moment I am taking .0625 clonazepam and .125 lorazepam. Yesterday I took .125mg lorazepam in the morning and .0625mg clonazepam in the evening. I felt okay. Today I took .0625  clonazepam in the morning and was feeling very anxious and uneasy all day. I took .125 lorazepam this evening and still not feeling so good.

Does it take a while for the clonazepam to build up? Or is it just my body trying to adjust to the clonazepam?  And will things get better? Not sure how to proceed from here. Any help would be appreciated.....

[[je...]]

Yes I believe it takes a while for Clonazepam to reach full effect in your system. I remember when I updosed my Clonazepam after my big reductions I did not feel immediate relief but it took a couple of days and I already had Clonazepam in my system.

 

Any specific reason you changed the crosover schedule you decided on previously?

[[he...]]

The fogs that I had been having had gotten down to only two to three hours a day, and I had a couple days where they were nonexistent (most recently two Saturdays ago), but the last two days, the fogs have lasted all day until evening (6:30 or 7). Thankfully today it ended around 2:15pm. I'm hopeful it was because we were just getting over COVID and this goes away. A 9- to 10-hour fog makes it hard to be functional. I really hope it was a fluke of a wave.

 

I don't know if it's a true cog fog, though. It's more like a heavy head or like my head is in a cloud. It's hard to describe. I think I could still do well responding to Jeopardy clues, but I would probably be slow in my reaction time. Maybe it would be more accurately described as feeling drugged or sedated but not necessarily feeling tired. I can still do things and don't seem unable to use my brain, but it's definitely a fog of sorts. Anyone else have something like this?

[[Ul...]]

The fogs that I had been having had gotten down to only two to three hours a day, and I had a couple days where they were nonexistent (most recently two Saturdays ago), but the last two days, the fogs have lasted all day until evening (6:30 or 7). Thankfully today it ended around 2:15pm. I'm hopeful it was because we were just getting over COVID and this goes away. A 9- to 10-hour fog makes it hard to be functional. I really hope it was a fluke of a wave.

 

I don't know if it's a true cog fog, though. It's more like a heavy head or like my head is in a cloud. It's hard to describe. I think I could still do well responding to Jeopardy clues, but I would probably be slow in my reaction time. Maybe it would be more accurately described as feeling drugged or sedated but not necessarily feeling tired. I can still do things and don't seem unable to use my brain, but it's definitely a fog of sorts. Anyone else have something like this?

 

Heck, in this forum I'd think it would be hard to find someone that DOESN'T have fog of some kind. It's just part of the process, and things will clear up over time. You'll see

[[Na...]]

I have been on 1.5mg clonazepam for 5 years and believe I have built what you would call a tolerance to it.  It no longer  helps with anxiety panic or sleep . I woke up one day a year and a half ago and my life was flipped upside down, I have been non functional ever since. I have spent most this time in bed because I just don't know how to do life anymore. Not sure if it's the benzo doing it, the loss of my younger brother that I took care of four 3 years while he fought cancer dying in my arms and then the pandemic or a combo of all these, but I can't comprehend things, have become agoraphobic and all I want to do is sleep, which I don't do at night, so I sleep during the day, no appetite and stomach issues galore, almost feels like I've been going through withdrawals! I took a 10% cut a month ago and I am still having a hard time. I keep reading about being stable before your next cut, what is stable?  My question is should I even start a taper if I have uncontrollable anxiety 24/7 ? I am new to all this being , 60 years old and having to deal with an addiction a doctor caused never telling me the consequences. Please help me on what I should do

[[Ul...]]

I have been on 1.5mg clonazepam for 5 years and believe I have built what you would call a tolerance to it.  It no longer  helps with anxiety panic or sleep . I woke up one day a year and a half ago and my life was flipped upside down, I have been non functional ever since. I have spent most this time in bed because I just don't know how to do life anymore. Not sure if it's the benzo doing it, the loss of my younger brother that I took care of four 3 years while he fought cancer dying in my arms and then the pandemic or a combo of all these, but I can't comprehend things, have become agoraphobic and all I want to do is sleep, which I don't do at night, so I sleep during the day, no appetite and stomach issues galore, almost feels like I've been going through withdrawals! I took a 10% cut a month ago and I am still having a hard time. I keep reading about being stable before your next cut, what is stable?  My question is should I even start a taper if I have uncontrollable anxiety 24/7 ? I am new to all this being , 60 years old and having to deal with an addiction a doctor caused never telling me the consequences. Please help me on what I should do

 

Wow, that's a lot going on! Give yourself some credit for hanging in there throughout all of this. That would be a huge pressure cooker for anyone on the planet. I had some brutal life events too, but what ultimately helped a lot was finally finding a great counselor (which took a while), holding my dose to get as "stable" as anyone could under my messy circumstances, and then I began a really slow microtaper off my klonopin. I had also taken some time to get free of Prozac and many other meds, but k was the biggie that created issues, so I had to do the super slow liquid microtaper. Everybody has their own answers, but that's what worked for me. It took years for me to get off the k, but it was well worth it and I learned how to handle life in the process. I'm not on this forum as much as I used to be, but I hope you find your answers soon. As they say, "if you're in hell, keep going!!".

[[fe...]]

Hello, I'm new here. This is my second attempt at taking myself off klonopin - both times 0.75mg has been easy. 0.5mg has not. I've been on this drug for many years, I hope this time I can do it.

 

What are people using to split? I haven't had great luck with normal pill splitters.

[[Ul...]]

Hello, I'm new here. This is my second attempt at taking myself off klonopin - both times 0.75mg has been easy. 0.5mg has not. I've been on this drug for many years, I hope this time I can do it.

 

What are people using to split? I haven't had great luck with normal pill splitters.

 

If you're cutting .25mg in fifteen days, then wow! That's a huge cut, but I do realize that every single body out there is really different. Anyway, I used liquid. I had to since I could only tolerate super small cuts, especially as I got lower. The best of luck to you!

[[he...]]

Hello, I'm new here. This is my second attempt at taking myself off klonopin - both times 0.75mg has been easy. 0.5mg has not. I've been on this drug for many years, I hope this time I can do it.

 

What are people using to split? I haven't had great luck with normal pill splitters.

 

The Equal Split Pill Splitter is about as accurate as you can get. I also had to go to another method like Ultra, but mine is a dry daily micro taper with a scale. I still use my splitter before filing tablets to expedite the process. I hope you're able to taper down successfully with a direct taper, but if not, you have a lot of people on here that have done it or are doing it with other methods who'd be happy to share some knowledge.

[[Fi...]]

Hello, I'm new here. This is my second attempt at taking myself off klonopin - both times 0.75mg has been easy. 0.5mg has not. I've been on this drug for many years, I hope this time I can do it.

 

What are people using to split? I haven't had great luck with normal pill splitters.

 

I used a scale and metal nail file. I weighed my pills, using the gram function on the scale. 

For example, my 0.5mg pill weighed about 200grms on the scale. I then would shave my pill down to 199gms on the scale. I then micro tapered my way down off the pills using .001 cuts each time. 

 

You can do it.  Take your time and pay attention to your body's signals. 

[[Fi...]]

I have been on 1.5mg clonazepam for 5 years and believe I have built what you would call a tolerance to it.  It no longer  helps with anxiety panic or sleep . I woke up one day a year and a half ago and my life was flipped upside down, I have been non functional ever since. I have spent most this time in bed because I just don't know how to do life anymore. Not sure if it's the benzo doing it, the loss of my younger brother that I took care of four 3 years while he fought cancer dying in my arms and then the pandemic or a combo of all these, but I can't comprehend things, have become agoraphobic and all I want to do is sleep, which I don't do at night, so I sleep during the day, no appetite and stomach issues galore, almost feels like I've been going through withdrawals! I took a 10% cut a month ago and I am still having a hard time. I keep reading about being stable before your next cut, what is stable?  My question is should I even start a taper if I have uncontrollable anxiety 24/7 ? I am new to all this being , 60 years old and having to deal with an addiction a doctor caused never telling me the consequences. Please help me on what I should do

 

I used to be confused by the term stable as well. 

 

Stable for me meant I felt strong enough to taper.  The symptoms were tolerable enough for me to keep going.

I used numeric scale of 1-10 to figure that out.

If I was a 6,7,8 on the day I was scheduled to cut (I did a micro taper), then I cut.  If I was feeling 8,9 or 10 I held till I felt stronger.

 

I had agoraphobia for 5-6 months during my benzo withdrawal. I could not go down the hall to even through out the garbage. That is completely gone and left as I got lower on the medication.

 

I would wait a bit to see if your anxiety reduces.  You have had some hits to your nervous system and maybe need time to settle down.

 

 

You also might want to consider a micro taper because perhaps 10% cuts at one time may be too much for you.  You could do smaller cuts that then add up to 10% for for the month. 

 

There are many people on this site who had been on benzos longer than you and they got off! There is hope for you too. 

[[he...]]

I am still struggling quite a bit with multi-hour fogs and much worse anxiety in the afternoon and now into the evening. I can't remember it ever being this bad, but I know early on just before and right after starting tapering, things felt pretty bad.

 

This all started during our bout with COVID (Omicron), and then my stepdad passed away six days ago after going downhill with incredible speed, leaving my mom alone. Before these things happened, I was getting windows every evening and quite often during the afternoon with maybe just a few twinges of anxiety. Walking would knock it out. Now, it just lasts all day and never really goes away.

 

I'm trying to figure out if I need to hold for a bit on my taper. Since my symptoms started before I started tapering, I have always assumed this is tolerance withdrawal, and I don't know that doing a hold would help much and would just lengthen my already slow taper. I'm just hopeful things start to ease the further I get away from having COVID. Surely I didn't just coincidentally pass a certain dosage that caused everything to get worse. My taper rate has not changed since December 1. I'm still tapering 6.3% / 14 days.

 

Not looking for medical advice...just some thoughts. Has anyone else had major stressors and life events that caused this kind of thing, and did it resolve over time? Did you stop tapering for a bit to help, or did you just keep going? I want to go easy on my CNS and give it a fighting chance.

[[Te...]]

I was on 3 x 0.75mg and cut from my midday dose 0.25gm on 1/15 and an additional 0.125mg on 1/25. I have a hard time (Huge back pain, SI, chills). Should I updose the 0.125 after 7 days of suffering?

[[Li...]]

I was on 3 x 0.75mg and cut from my midday dose 0.25gm on 1/15 and an additional 0.125mg on 1/25. I have a hard time (Huge back pain, SI, chills). Should I updose the 0.125 after 7 days of suffering?

 

Ouch!  I’m not surprised you are experiencing withdrawal symptoms.  You made a 16.67% reduction in dose in just 10 days.  As I hope you know, our general guideline is to keep reductions in the range of 5-10%.

 

How did you feel after the first reduction of 0.25mg on 1/15?  That was an 11% reduction which is more in keeping with the guideline.

[[Te...]]

Maybe I should try 0.5mg at midday?

[[Li...]]

It depends, in part, on your answer to my earlier question.

[[Te...]]

First cut was not so bad. But now...I am non-functional.

[[Li...]]

If I were in your shoes, I would return to the dose where I last felt ok and hold until I stabilized.  During withdrawal, stabilize does not necessarily mean symptom-free/feeling great.  It means symptoms are not changing much and you feel ‘strong enough’ (from a mental and physical standpoint) to make another reduction.

[[Fi...]]

I am still struggling quite a bit with multi-hour fogs and much worse anxiety in the afternoon and now into the evening. I can't remember it ever being this bad, but I know early on just before and right after starting tapering, things felt pretty bad.

 

This all started during our bout with COVID (Omicron), and then my stepdad passed away six days ago after going downhill with incredible speed, leaving my mom alone. Before these things happened, I was getting windows every evening and quite often during the afternoon with maybe just a few twinges of anxiety. Walking would knock it out. Now, it just lasts all day and never really goes away.

 

I'm trying to figure out if I need to hold for a bit on my taper. Since my symptoms started before I started tapering, I have always assumed this is tolerance withdrawal, and I don't know that doing a hold would help much and would just lengthen my already slow taper. I'm just hopeful things start to ease the further I get away from having COVID. Surely I didn't just coincidentally pass a certain dosage that caused everything to get worse. My taper rate has not changed since December 1. I'm still tapering 6.3% / 14 days.

 

Not looking for medical advice...just some thoughts. Has anyone else had major stressors and life events that caused this kind of thing, and did it resolve over time? Did you stop tapering for a bit to help, or did you just keep going? I want to go easy on my CNS and give it a fighting chance.

 

If it were me, I would hold a bit longer.

 

I was tapering another medication and was hit with emotional loss. It really rocked my nervous system at the time. So I would respect your sense to hold.

[[he...]]

I am still struggling quite a bit with multi-hour fogs and much worse anxiety in the afternoon and now into the evening. I can't remember it ever being this bad, but I know early on just before and right after starting tapering, things felt pretty bad.

 

This all started during our bout with COVID (Omicron), and then my stepdad passed away six days ago after going downhill with incredible speed, leaving my mom alone. Before these things happened, I was getting windows every evening and quite often during the afternoon with maybe just a few twinges of anxiety. Walking would knock it out. Now, it just lasts all day and never really goes away.

 

I'm trying to figure out if I need to hold for a bit on my taper. Since my symptoms started before I started tapering, I have always assumed this is tolerance withdrawal, and I don't know that doing a hold would help much and would just lengthen my already slow taper. I'm just hopeful things start to ease the further I get away from having COVID. Surely I didn't just coincidentally pass a certain dosage that caused everything to get worse. My taper rate has not changed since December 1. I'm still tapering 6.3% / 14 days.

 

Not looking for medical advice...just some thoughts. Has anyone else had major stressors and life events that caused this kind of thing, and did it resolve over time? Did you stop tapering for a bit to help, or did you just keep going? I want to go easy on my CNS and give it a fighting chance.

 

If it were me, I would hold a bit longer.

 

I was tapering another medication and was hit with emotional loss. It really rocked my nervous system at the time. So I would respect your sense to hold.

 

Thank you for your thoughts, Final healing. I have not held yet, and things seem to have gotten slightly better, but I'm definitely keeping that on the table. I did, however, have an episode of ventricular tachycardia and then atrial fibrillation yesterday, but I have an ICD device that paced me out of it. That was unexpected. I believe it was COVID-related and my cardiologist agreed it definitely could've been. So now I have a bit more stress in my life, but I'm hopeful it was an isolated event and complication resulting from COVID infection three weeks ago and praying it's not something that will recur.

[[Te...]]

I am on a high dose ( 0.75 + 0.375 + 0.75). My doctor is open to a valium c/o. What do you think?

[[Pa...]]

Are you suffering with interdose, is this why you're considering crossing over, I see you've been on it previously, then were switched to Ativan, then Klonopin.

[[Te...]]

I was on Valium. I thought the lethargy is bad. The doc gave me Ativan (interdose withdrawal, went up to 3 mg). Second doc switched me to 1.5 Klonopin that became 2.25 in 3-4 months. I started tapering but suffering tremendously.  I'm stuck. Does it make sense to go to 37 mg Valium and taper from there? Thanks.