Is it normal for symptoms to get worse?

[[Gr...]]

I'm currently 29 months into a cold turkey. It seems like if a symptom goes away for a time being, it comes back with a vengeance and is worse or it comes with friends... How normal is this?

[[Ha...]]

It's pretty common, it's very non linear for most. I'm 38 months out and feel like I'm getting somewhere, then get slammed. Very cruel, but "normal" when it comes to this s#!t

[[ea...]]

Very normal. Benzo wd is mean and cruel, no doubt about it. Ive always wondered why it is that most people abruptly stop taking benzos and have NO trouble whatsoever. In the beginning, I didnt know this. Like you, I was a babe in the woods about this stuff. Only a tiny percentage of people end up finding this site or the couple others out there, because most people simply do not feel awful in wd or even have wd symptoms at all. I wish I understood why! My wd was awful just as yours is. And I was a slow healer. Ive always thought that this was because I used benzos heavily for 30 years and went cold turkey. But that might not be the truth. I will never know. But I can tell you that I DID heal. And how wonderful life has become for me! I had no idea that benzos were affecting every single things about my life. When my health declined, I started seeing various physicians. None of them suspected it was my medications causing all those problems. My balance was awful, I was falling frequently and subsequentially I ended up have surgeries to fix broken bones. Other really bad medical things, and the only thing all those doctors did was prescribe MORE drugs!!! At the end. I was on approximately 14 medications daily and the only thing that happened was my health began to decline even more. Unreal!!!! What kept me going was the support I got here, and finally learning about WHY I felt so awful. Knowledge is powerful. I sim[ply refused to give up and Im so glad I did that. Each year brought more healing. Its been 10 years now and I have never once regretted going through all the horrendous stuff I went through back then. My health is great foir a 73 year old lady. I only take 4 meds now: and all of them for hypertension which Ive had all my adult life. I sleep just fine now. Im happy and enjoy my life now. Its like I was set free back in 2012. Set free and allowed to fly!

Keep going, my friend. You will get through this. Rely on BB, because thats what this forum was created to do. The good people who run this forum are true gems, they are dedicated to helping people in this predicament. Over the years I have checked out most of the other benzo forums and I feel none of them is as good as BB. BB has rules, and those rules are there for good reasons. On some of the other forums, people were putting down other members, and in general not being supportive.  BB seems to have the most and best real information about benzos, and that really helps. Understanding WHY you feel so bad is reassuring. As long as you understand that you have NOT gone crazy mad, and that its all because benzos temporarily injured your brain, you will survive this. Keep posting please.

Annie