Should I hold or taper? Am I in tolerance?

[[Za...]]

Hello,

I made two cuts from klonopin 0.25.. everything seemed OK. But I had to come off lexapro at the same time. Lexapro made me worse, worse panic, anxiety, agiatation, insomnia..

(I took low dose od lexapro, just one quarter of 10 mg for 3 weeks, tapered 9 days, finished yesterday.)

Now I feel horrible, I don’t know if it is lexapro WD or if I am in tolerance of klonopin because I got stuck on the same dose of klonopin for three weeks while getting off lexapro. I am severely anxious, racing thoughts, fear..

I don’t know if I can lower klonopin in such state.. but I don’t want to stay on the same dose for long.

It could be either lexapro wd, klonopin tolerance or my anxiety, I have anxiety disorder. I panic because of the situation.

What should I do? Wait for more days? Cut a little bit? Thank you!

 

[[je...]]

Hi Zazie

 

I'm sorry you haven't received any replies yet. I doubt you're in tolerance and if I were you I would put the fear of tolerance out of my mind. Withdrawal is hard enough and adding unnecessary fears and anxiety just makes it worse.

 

You made a 20% cut and then just 10 days later you made a 9% cut of Klonopin. Then 6 days after your last Klonopin cut you rapidly tapered the Lexapro you were on short term. All of these add up in your brain. I suggest you hold your current Klonopin dose for at least 6 weeks so your body can recover from all these rapid and large reductions. You should feel better over time.

 

When you stabilize I suggest you make smaller cuts and give at least 2 weeks between cuts so there's enough time to recover between each cut.

 

I know you want to get off these drugs but you can either rush it and suffer or you can do it slowly and be more functional. We really don't like to see you suffer. 

[[Za...]]

Thank you, Jelly Baby,

 

I have another problem. The whole time during my taper I am using trazodone for sleep. My doctor told me I should cut the pill somewhere between 50 and 75 mg. But I realized the dosage varies in this way. The knife isn’t accurate. I’ve been doing it for a month. I am scared that it messes up my nervous system. Today I panic because of that. I need to go lower with klonopin.. but how when there is this mess with Trazodone?

I will use 75 mg today and stay on this.. but what if I really got the klonopin tolerance? I am scared.

[[je...]]

Hi Zazie

 

Can you please update your signature with all the medications you are using? What dosage of Trazodone did the doctor prescribe? It sounds very unprofessional to tell a patient to randomly cut a pill somewhere and not give a precise dose? I've never had a doctor tell me something like that. I do think it's best to have a fixed dose and stay at that so 75mg is probably best like you suggested.

 

I can promise you I don't think it's tolerance. You made a 29% cut in 10 days. Any person on here would react severely. I made a 20% cut in 1 month and I struggled with that. So here's the thing. I suspect I had signs of the onset of tolerance withdrawal at the start of my taper. You know what, it didn't really matter. I was still functional and in comparison to most people here, even those with no signs of tolerance my taper was fairly good. Even with those tolerance withdrawal signs,  I still held my dose for 6 weeks when I tapered too fast. The only problem would've been if I never wanted to taper. Eventually my symptoms would've increased and gotten much worse.

 

In your case I don't think it's tolerance,  you haven't been on the drug that long. Please hear me when I say that benzo withdrawal causes an insane amount of fear. I have seen it gets us to latch onto something and that one thing becomes what I think of as our OCD fear. We obsess about it so much that we catastrophize. I had it too. I knew I was thinking irrationally in my situation but I couldn't help it.

 

I can try and keep trying to tell you that this is not what you have but I don't know if it will make a difference because your brain is fixated on this fear.

[[Za...]]

Thank you, Jelly Baby. Exactly, I am very fixated on the fear. I try not to, but I don’t know how, I try all the techniques, breathing, meditation.. but my brain doesn’t work much, it is overloaded with stress, gives me brain fog. But thank you for your encouragement, it helps.

How did you cope woth fear and catastrophizing?

[[je...]]

Will it help if I say I don't think you have tolerance withdrawal but if you had it, so what? I had it and my taper was better than some people who don't have it.

 

I was functional throughout,  I was able to work, I wasn't in benzo hell,  I was able to look after my family, attend all my kids school functions and sport activities and go on many social outings. I'm not saying withdrawal was easy, but I'm saying I was able to have some quality of life and I wasn't housebound.

 

I know of many people who tapered during tolerance withdrawal and managed to keep their jobs and stay functional. It's not a death sentence.