In a terrible state, had to ring emergency Doc , What do I do?

[[ch...]]

In a real mess.

I have been tapering down slowly from 4mgs Valium for ages, see signature, and have struggles all the way down ,I was already ill on Valium so tapered from a very unstable  place, but have got down to 1.6mgs since yesterday, I have been cutting using DLMT using milk at a rate of 0.01mg a day since 2mgs though I admit I did cut a couple of days or so at 0.2mgs, and have cut 0.4mgs in just over a month and a half.

I am in such a state , My terror fear is beyond me and none of the usual methods I try work on this kind of fear, It's not normal, I don't know what to do,

I range the emergency Doctor for advice , but he seemed to think I was drawing out the agony and should be tapering faster, I really don't think anyone understands, I have taken 10mg of propranolol in desperation a couple of hours ago , but am at a loss.

I really what this gone. I started on it  Last March 2018, I have been struggling to get off it almost all of this time. It really has damaged me so much ,

Do you think I have gone too fast and that is what is happening, even though the Doctor says that the dose will be doing nothing for me, and I should go faster

I am in such a terrible state .I don't know what to do.

I truly fear I wont make it. It's too much at 74. My life is in ruins because of this. I think I wont make it. Do I hurry off as the Doctor says, or do I hold and hope for the best, though I am never stable , I can't keep living this way, there has to be something that helps, I am so very desperate to save my life,

 

Jen

[[Be...]]

Chinchuck,

 

First, take a deep breath. Relax. Nothing's going to hurt you. Yes, you're in a terrible state, but to me it seems you need psychological support from a therapist who doesn't only prescribe pills.

 

Also, you have us here You've already accomplished so much, and are down to a really low dosage of diazepam. I read your signature, and I see a lot of instability there. You keep trying new drugs (I know, you're scared, but you're fueling your anxiety). Trust me, it's all in your mind. It will pass. Stay strong. I'm not sure you should take beta-blockers or any other drugs. You're exhausted because you've beet battling this for so long. I have this hypothesis that once we get down to low dosages most of our symptoms are psychologically-induced, they're not physical. We keep worrying and worrying, so we create unnecessary stress and anxiety.

 

You can always call a suicide hotline or a friend, if that will calm you down. There are a myriad of options that exist. But, first, let yourself breathe and believe you're okay. Take a nice shower (even if it seems hard at first), let your pores open, adjust the temperature to whatever level is comfortable for you.

 

Doctors might get exhausted too when they have to deal with so many patients. Forgive him/her. Why don't you look for another doctor, preferably, one that specializes in CBT (Cognitive Behavioural Therapy) or Psychodynamic Therapy. You need to talk to someone who can calm you down. I see your signature, you're okay

 

And, if not... You can reach out again. We're here for you

[[ch...]]

Thank  you for trying.

I feel this terror is chemical, It's beyond any normal fear and has gone on and on. I have been cutting a bit faster these last few weeks to try and move off the diazepam, but  I should have done this months ago, Now I am unable to move let alone  take a shower, I am smashing my teeth because my jaws it clenched. I really don't know what is best. I should never have been given this at all at my age, and I have reacted so badly all this time, now I fear it's too late. I can't do this. I need some relief somehow.

I tried CBT but I cannot take it in or use it. I am completely paralysed by fear.

I know anxiety, this is way beyond and has been going on for so long all day every day, but now it's ramped up a further notch, I can't do it any more.

I keep asking the Doctor, The psychiatrist , my family. etc but I am still left with just my will power, and  I am out of it,

It's such a sill low amount now, but for some reason it's caused such tremendous damage I can't survive.

I am so agoraphobic I cannot even go to the hospital and no one will visit.

Sorry to moan, just very desperate.

It's been quite a time since I tried the listed drugs, they were short term i.e. a week each or there about  I am on only Valium for several months now, I really wish I could be knocked out and it be over .

Thank you for trying.

 

Jen

[[ps...]]

Hi chinchuck, first of all, as BenzoMutant  says, calm down.

I know what you are feeling, I've been there countless times, that's why I tell you, slow down. Whatever you decide doesn't have to be decided right now.

 

I don't think  that you are tapering too fast at all.

How you feel right now depends on various things:

 

Your normal anxiety (that is without drugs)

Your life situation (financially, work, friends family, etc.)

Your sensibily to this drug.

 

At this time maybe the fear of feeling worst is the trigger to the panick.

 

You have to solve thing one by one, with all the help you can get, not today, not tomorrow, at your own rate.

 

When you feel a little calmer find the one thing that helps you cope with panik

For me it's long waks with my favourite music, find your own and use it.

 

I think finding a good therapist will help a lot.

 

Hope you can calm dow and feel better.

My best wishes.

P.

[[ch...]]

I don't think anything helps any more. I have shut down and I can seem to pull out of it.

I am in terror, Yes  I started from an anxiety state, and it was never really addressed , Maybe it can't be,

I have tried CBT but I could not accept it. this is far too chemical a fear as if there is change in me even before the Valium and I can't recover.

I feel desperate and need to calm, but don't know the way as all the usual ways just wont reach this.

I need a break from this fear and terror that is beyond description, It's gone on too long.

You say you have been in this place, Did you have anything else to help?

I am not taking anything else except  I took 1 10mg propranolol a few hours back under the emergency Doctor's instruction, It was a telephone consultation  so I have not been seen.

I worry it's more and that I have been permanently damaged somehow because this surely can't be all withdrawals from such  a small amount, that has been tapered slowly,

 

Sorry  I know I sound desperate and  hysterical , but I am.

[[ps...]]

I'm sorry but I didn't /don't have anything else to help.

I've been on my own for the last 6 years, which is not a good idea.

 

Call a close friend or family if you have, if not call a help center. Please don't stay alone in this state.

This is the best advice I can give you at this moment.

 

Best wishes.

P.

[[Be...]]

chinchuck,

 

Please, calm down. Just like psychmed already said, we can't do miracles. Just relax and try lying in bed. If that doesn't help, pace around the room. I've done it a million times when i had anxiety until I was so tired and the adrenaline had worn off that I had to go to sleep.

 

You've called your doctor, we're giving you sound advice. Just sleep it off. It's okay, everything will be fine if you just stop panicking

 

As a last resort, you can call a suicide hotline or an ambulance.

 

Wish you a calm day/evening!

[[ch...]]

Thank you for your kind replies. I think I may have tapered a bit too fast on this last bit for me, though not fast, it still is quite a percentage, I don't know what is wrong with me.

Thank you for trying to help ,

 

Jen

[[pr...]]

Hey Chin,

 

Take some deep breaths, scream, cry, stomp your feet or do whatever you need to do in order to calm down. Hopefully you will be somewhat stable in a few. When my anxiety was at its worse after going cold turkey, I would walk up and down the hall and tire myself out. Hope you feel better and I am sending hugs and prayers your way.

 

PG

[[ch...]]

Thank you for the advice preacher girl. I find it a comfort to be thought of.

I cannot even imagine how hard a CT was for you.

I see you take or have taken Buspar for anxiety. Did you find it a help?

I am thinking I need something, though up to now I have been loathe to take anything at all.

 

Jen

 

[[Ev...]]

Chinchuck, you've done so well and you've come so far! You should be proud of yourself. I know its hard to see it when you are in such extreme distress but think of how far you have come. The anxiety and depression was so extreme for me too during the taper and for a while after the jump, but I promise you, it does get better. Do you have anyone to call who can come stay with you or at least talk to? I know for me, its hardest to be alone in times of extreme distress. Even when I absolutely did not want to and didn't think I could, I would always calm down when I got in the shower or bath. I would put on calming music. It always helped me even if it I didn't feel like doing it.

 

Please take a deep breath, I know it doesn't feel like it but it will pass. Please do not be alone when you are feeling this way. We are all here for moral support. I understand how you are feeling, I really really do. I went through it many times. The things that got me through the worst were literally just breathing, trying to meditate with a guided app, taking a warn shower or bath, getting outside to walk, or calling my mother to come over and just be with me. Hang in there, you are in my thoughts. 

[Guest [so...]]

Chin please believe me when i say this WILL get better. I had a horror taper from only 6 weeks of use of Valium and just as horrific wd. I have had all of the sxs and feelings of terror that you describe. I had little support and just wanted god to take me. I spent all of my days and nights crying, pacing and desperately trying to distract by listening to church singing and felt true despair.

 

I am 18 months off now and i still hv sxs but all that chemical anxiety and terror has completely gone. It took a long long time but it is all gone. I am in a very stressful situation right now as i have just left my abusive husband but the anxiety and terror has not returned. You have come so far, you are doing amazingly well to keep going off this dreadful poison. Believe in yourself and believe me when i say that one day this nightmare will be over.

SS X

[[ch...]]

Thank you so much Ever hopeful. Your words give me hope that I can get through this and it's not for ever, that it happens to others and it does not mean it's permanent, Sadly I cannot call my Mother because she long ago passed away, but I do often think of her and she sometimes seems so real to me, Not as she was when older, but strangely how she was in her 30's at a guess and I was a young child. Perhaps that is the child still in me even at my great age, wanting that comfort.

I am finding this journey so incredibly hard and one I should not have been put through at my age, but it has happened and it's one I have no choice in making,

Thank you again

[[ch...]]

Southern star , I am so sorry you have been put through so much for a small amount of Valium and short use, It is a terrible drug and for some of us, the word is horrific, I have to hope that I will mend and that the sheer terror subsides,  It is beyond anything I have experienced in my long life and I have experienced a lot.

I do not know why I was given this drug at my age, but I was, and can only hope that I still have enough years left to enjoy and put right the mistake made that brought about such suffering,

I am so grateful to every one for helping me through today.

I face another one tomorrow and the day after until it stops, but I have to believe it will stop, and I can go out once again and I will be able to enjoy life and the simple pleasures, Hope is what I have to hold on to.

 

Thank you so much  for your caring,

I have a way to go yet though it does not look much on paper, I will have to keep tackling it, but I am going to give myself a few days of holding and then I will move forward again and not let  this drug beat me,

 

Jen

[Guest [so...]]

Chin i forgot to mention that i am 65 and was given the poison for muscle spasm prior to spinal surgery for a growth in my spine, so i was having to go through wd after major surgery, i was taken off it CT and then reinstated on a rapid taper due to a clueless Dr that caused me to have a stroke. Thankfully i recovered.

 

I'm not telling you this to scare you but to say if i can get through this you will too. I never believed anyone when they said i would heal, i was stuck in the terror alone most of the time. If you never believe anything else please believe me when i say this will eventually end. It truly will.

Sending you much love and healing.

SS x

[[pr...]]

Thank you for the advice preacher girl. I find it a comfort to be thought of.

I cannot even imagine how hard a CT was for you.

I see you take or have taken Buspar for anxiety. Did you find it a help?

I am thinking I need something, though up to now I have been loathe to take anything at all.

 

Jen

 

Yes  I still take Buspar and it definitely helps my anxiety.

[[Fi...]]

Thank you for the advice preacher girl. I find it a comfort to be thought of.

I cannot even imagine how hard a CT was for you.

I see you take or have taken Buspar for anxiety. Did you find it a help?

I am thinking I need something, though up to now I have been loathe to take anything at all.

 

Jen

 

Yes  I still take Buspar and it definitely helps my anxiety.

 

Hi Chin! So sorry you are feeling so badly. Did the propranolol help with the chemical anxiety/adrenaline rush? That can be so awful and you're right.... no behavioral techniques can override that situation since it's chemically driven. My counselor and I just talked about that yesterday.  I know you can't take Mirtazapine (which has helped me a lot), but I do take Buspar too. It is fairly benign, can make you a little dizzy when you first start, but from reading up on it, it has a short half life and shouldn't be a hard wean. Plus if it works, nobody would make you wean. You can take as little as 2.5mg up to 60mg. Takes a little while for dizziness to wear off and build up dose, but honestly I wasn't nearly as dizzy from that as I've gotten from my wean. I've also heard CBD oil provides a similar effect. I started at 2.5 Buspar twice a day and worked my way up to 7.5 twice a day. Good experience with Buspar, but it's not very strong. I know you also  have lots of nausea too.... has your doc ever let you try Promethazine/Phenegran? It can help with nausea and sleep (I think Ashton even mentions this too). When we feel awful and don't sleep, it makes the anxiety and nausea so much worse.  Hopefully the Propanolol can stop your cortisol and adrenaline surges, Buspar may help calm your thoughts. It's always nice to have more tools in your arsenal to try. At some point, I'll probably have to try out the propranolol as I get lower in taper. Good luck Chin and I'm so glad you've been able to continue on taper. ❤

 

[[ch...]]

Thank you fighterk.

I am feeling so very poorly just now,

I wish this nightmare was over. I am so grateful to everyone who rallies round and I know they are people who really understand,

No Doctor seems to, They only prescibe this , and have no idea the damage done, Cannot get their head around it is more than detoxing your body,

I do hope I survive, at this moment I don't feel able, and even now I still have to remove 1.6mgs which does not sound a lot, but it is for those who are so very sensitive and made ill by it.

I really should hold for a short while to try and let my body catch up, but I have never found holds helpful to me, probably because I have not had a stable place, just illness since the start and tapering from that ill start.

So perhaps the better plan really is too keep going on the slow methodical micro taper, At least then there will be an end,

I can only say that maybe because of my age at starting, perhaps it has been too harsh on my body and taking it each day is putting more and more strain on me. It's such a difficult thing to cope with in year mid 70's and to have been started on at this age is beyond wrong. I think valium has too many metabolites for someone my age to keep dealing with. so my best choice how hard to do is probably to keep going down. T. here is no right or wrong when this ill. I only know that if I were to go into hospital they have told me they will stop it, so better that I keep reducing at home however ill I am and just pray I will get through. thank you  so much everyone,

 

 

 

[[tr...]]

Buspar helps me too.

[[ch...]]

Thank you Trudie.

It's good to know that it helps some people

[[Fr...]]

In a real mess.

I have been tapering down slowly from 4mgs Valium for ages, see signature, and have struggles all the way down ,I was already ill on Valium so tapered from a very unstable  place, but have got down to 1.6mgs since yesterday, I have been cutting using DLMT using milk at a rate of 0.01mg a day since 2mgs though I admit I did cut a couple of days or so at 0.2mgs, and have cut 0.4mgs in just over a month and a half.

I am in such a state , My terror fear is beyond me and none of the usual methods I try work on this kind of fear, It's not normal, I don't know what to do,

I range the emergency Doctor for advice , but he seemed to think I was drawing out the agony and should be tapering faster, I really don't think anyone understands, I have taken 10mg of propranolol in desperation a couple of hours ago , but am at a loss.

I really what this gone. I started on it  Last March 2018, I have been struggling to get off it almost all of this time. It really has damaged me so much ,

Do you think I have gone too fast and that is what is happening, even though the Doctor says that the dose will be doing nothing for me, and I should go faster

I am in such a terrible state .I don't know what to do.

I truly fear I wont make it. It's too much at 74. My life is in ruins because of this. I think I wont make it. Do I hurry off as the Doctor says, or do I hold and hope for the best, though I am never stable , I can't keep living this way, there has to be something that helps, I am so very desperate to save my life,

 

Jen

 

I know that fear. And I also feel horrible dread. I HATE it. I know it's due to coming off my benzo. I read all your replies and you feel agoraphobic. If you can't get outside, you are literally sitting in your negative thoughts. You need to distract yourself. And only you can find that distraction. For me, I ride my bike. But if it's to the point you can't go outside, Try opening your windows, or sit on your porch,

 

I know if I stay in my house for too many days at a time I begin to get agoraphobic as well. And my brain will do it's best to tell me "You're too tired to go out", "Your stomach hurts", "Something bad is going to happen", "Stay inside and watch TV". Guess what, nothing bad happens. EVER!

I think getting outside is the best remedy for anything, but if that seems too much, get fresh air. And many BB on here have said to walk around your house, or do "something", and I agree.

You have to find a hobby to get out of your head preferably something physical.

 

Don't let your worries keep you from conquering this benzo Crap! We all believe in you, and You need to believe in you too. 

You can do this.

 

It's not how much time you have left, It's what you do with your time left.

[[ch...]]

Thank you Fresh start.

I know that what you say makes a lot of sense, but since when does sense come into things once valium confuses the mind.  Sadly the truth is distorted and though the words are read and know it's right , somehow it wont sink in.

I know I have to work at this as best I can or it will beat me.

I need some way to gain a positive mind set again.

 

For tonight I will rest, I will remove this drug, even if it thinks I wont by making me suffer ,It's going, It has done harm to me and never any good, so no point in hanging on to it.

 

 

I think the emergency Doctor was right , this taper has gone on too long, due to many errors, and so much fear, and torment with little help or guidance from the medical profession. Now I am determined that whatever it  throws at me it is going. I have to accept it's hard, because it has always been so since the  beginning, and I should not have listened to the advice given of staying on the valium, and that at the low dose it would be quite safe. I should have been stronger when I said it was not helping, instead of thinking they know , that's their job,  I was the one suffering and I knew I was getting worse on it. I did not have anyone to fight my corner so I carried on, and now I have to undo this bit by bit.

 

 

I am so grateful for all the wonderful support here, It has been such a lifeline to me, and I am sure I will need more help and guidance in future as I am not having an easy  journey off this last bit. However it has to be done and I have to find a way forward.

 

 

Thank you for your kind message and understanding

 

 

Jen