Zop taper - so confused! HELP!!!

[[Pu...]]

Ok - I am SO confused.

 

Trying to work out the next phase of my taper. I began tapering off 7.5mg last July and had to hold my taper for 6 months as the cuts i made were too big and my withdrawal symptoms were too great. I have made it down to  approximately 3mg (have been eyeballing my tablet cutting) and am about to restart my taper, but would like to start doing daily microtapering because my body can't handle the big cuts.

 

Have watched some great videos and I know HOW to do it - the bit I'm confused on though is the math.

 

If I was o  a 5mg tablet say, doing a 10% cut a month - I'd be cutting 0.5mg (so taking 4.5mg). Then if I cut a further 10% (cutting .45mg), I'd be taking 4.05mg. Then if I cut another 10% (.405mg) I'd be taking 3.645mg.

 

But from what i can gather with a microtaper - you're not really adjusting those amounts. The amount of the cut (let's say 0.001mg per day) remains the same the whole way through. Which means the percentage gets larger the more I cut, right?

 

Does any of this make sense? Have i missed something? Can someone explain this to me in another way that my benzo brain will understand?

 

Pug 

[[Li...]]

You are doing just fine understanding one approach to daily microtapering — making fixed amount reductions in dose on a daily basis. You have also correctly identified one of the disadvantages of this approach — the percent reduction increases over time.  Some individuals can tolerate this, whereas others cannot.  It is not uncommon for members who are implementing a fixed-amount daily microtaper to ‘hit a brick wall’ when their taper rate exceeds their unique ‘speed limit.”

 

To mitigate the risk of this happening to you, I encourage you to discover what taper rate works best for you and adjust the amount of your reduction to keep within this ‘speed limit.’ I also suggest you remain open to the option of adjusting your taper interval (e.g. reducing every other day, every third day, every week).  (A common misconception here on the forum is that microtapering must be done on a daily basis.)

 

Lastly, if you are not already doing so, I strongly encourage you to keep a daily taper journal.  Examples of key data to collect include:

 

- The date

- Time(s) and amounts(s) of drug ingested

- Daily rating of your withdrawal symptoms (0 = no symptoms; 10 = intolerable symptoms)

- Daily rating of your functionality (0 = able to perform all essential daily tasks; 10 = unable to perform any essential daily tasks)

 

Review the data on a regular basis and adjust your taper rate and/or interval if needed.

 

 

[[bl...]]

Thanks for your expertise as always Libertas. I feel like I might be hitting that wall right now with my linear taper.