Interdose withdrawals with Ativan direct microtaper?

[[ho...]]

Hello I'm micro tapering directly off 2mg of Ativan super slowly (0.5mg 4x a day).

I saw this post for the user Anxiety Girl where one replier mentioned Heather Ashton saying tapering Ativan directly will give interdose withdrawals if you don't switch to something long acting like Valium.

Is this true if I'm tapering down the four doses at the same time? For example in a period of 4 weeks, going down 2mg in pill weight (not dose!) for one more pill each week.

I'd like to avoid interdose withdrawals as I was originally prescribed Ativan for akathisia I got from Prozac. I also am hesitant to switch to Valium as it causes notable issues with resistance to histamine intolerance treatment and reflux, both of which I have.

Quote and link below: 👇

"The problem that you are facing with a direct taper from Ativan is the short half life of Ativan in your body of around 8 hours; that means that after 8 hours you only have 1/2 the Ativan concentration in your system which becomes a problem as you begin tapering.  That is the reason that Prof Ashton recommends moving over to Valium because it has a much longer half life in your system."

Link:

https://benzobuddies.org/topic/59430-need-help-with-ativan/?do=findComment&comment=869969

[[ou...]]

Valium would be ideal if you can tolerate it but 4 doses of Ativan are usually enough to avoid inter-dose withdrawal symptoms.

Edited December 11, 2023 by [ou...]