Benzo tolerance or hypesensitive CNS?

[[sh...]]

Hello all,

I am really desperate to figure out my situation. Everything started in April 2023 when my dr basically had me CT my AD Cymbalta. I started getting unbearable headaches, stick neck and neck pain muscles, all types of head pain in particular. 14 days later I reinstated to 30mg, half my original dose. All this time I was still on 1mg Ativan, 225 lyrica.

I got a little better pain wise but I was still having head pain, neck pain so my dr had me go up to 60cymbalta in May 2023. In june 2023 I went back down to 30 and added 12.5 amitriptyline for the headaches, I was not tolerating cymbalta well at all at 60 anymore. I was having nausea, was a walking zombie, fatigue, still having neck pain.

June-september, I had bad headaches everyday, every week was something else, bad anxiety, nausea that would come and go, no motivation at all any of the time. I just felt I had to do something, I slowly started getting off amitriptiliyne, 2% every 2 weeks. Bad nauseaa persisted this entire time, I thought I had benzo tolerance so I tried water tapering ativan in 200 ml water. When I got to 185ml - 1ml pulled everyday - my neck pain came back full force, face tingles and numbness, all kinds of head and neck pain day and night so I stopped. Every small change I make is a disaster, like 1% taper even. I tried taking out 5 beads out of cymbalta - i was out of for 2 months (all of this time still tapering amitriptyling 2% every 2 weeks). I was trying to see if cymbalta was the cause of my bad nausea.

In march I switched to valium, cross over took a month and i actually felt pretty good the entire time. I took into my account my water taper drop because i didn't want to loose all of that suffering I had so I am dosing 2.5mg in the am and 6.7mg at pm. I tried tapering again, this time weighing and I went down to 2.475mg in the am on april 10th and then 2.45mg on april 15th and 2.4mg on may 26th.

In april I realized all of this time it might of been tapering amitriptyline too fast after my reinstatement on cymbalta in 2023 that made me sick and while also trying to taper other, although veryyyy slow. So I updosed amitriptyline on april 26 from 8mg to 10 mg (I got to 8mg from 12.5 from september 2023 to april 2024) and started feeling a little bit better having some better days nausea wise. But I still have days when I feel very ill../nausea, weak, knots in my stomach, now I started having face tingles and numbness I assume from the taper of Valium on may 26.

Could i really be that sensitive? or could it be benzo tolerance? one day i was feeling sick, on june 1st and i admit i tend to dwell and over think and that makes me have anxiety and i took 0.5 ativan which made me feel a little better so i immediately thought that yes, the benzo is the problem.

What do you think? pls help! survingantidepressants site says I should hold everything because I have been all over the place, but I was just trying to figure out what was making me sick plus I want off drugs!

 

Thank you so much!

[[Pa...]]

Hello @[sh...], welcome to BenzoBuddies,

What a terrible ride you've been on, I'm so sorry for your pain.  These medications are so powerful and when we use so many, its difficult to know what is causing what.  I'm sorry, but I agree with SA, its going to be difficult to know what's happening until you stabilize somewhat and approach your situation thoughtfully and methodically.  

Unfortunately, this takes time and in your condition, time is pain.  It looks like you've been keeping good records of your use and reductions, are you also tracking symptom severity along with your reductions?  This is so important, because it can be your guide for future tapering.

I hope you'll let us help you while you go through this, we understand how painful and emotionally challenging this process is.

@[Pa...]

[[sh...]]

Thank you so much for your quick response. so there is really no way to know if I am in tolerance? could it be possible that going CT on cymbalta made me tolerant to the benzo? yes i have been keeping good track and informed myself. I guess i just need to hold....it feels like wasting time but in the end it might be better!

[[sh...]]

as far as tracking severity, I have not been doing that but somehow as wierd as it sounds I feel the smaller cuts "hurt" more. I sometimes feel just as worse when I went to from 1mg to .93mg water taper with daily reduction i was fine the first 14 days then i could not even remove one more ml.

of course, I will accept your help and I am so happy I have someone to talk to as no one understands...

[[Pa...]]

8 hours ago, [[s...] said:

Thank you so much for your quick response. so there is really no way to know if I am in tolerance? could it be possible that going CT on cymbalta made me tolerant to the benzo? yes i have been keeping good track and informed myself. I guess i just need to hold....it feels like wasting time but in the end it might be better!

How long have you been on Ativan, if its longer than a few weeks, its entirely possibly you're tolerant but its so difficult to know this when you're on so many other medications.  

I know it feels like a waste to hold, we want to fix this, but blindly flailing about could cause even more suffering so try to use this time to observe, plan and decide how to approach this.  

I'm not a fan of reducing every day, I've seen members reach a point where the cuts seem to catch up to them.  I understand 1 ml isn't much but if you're not allowing your body to recover from each reduction, those ml's pile up. 

 

[[Rh...]]

Hi.  I tend to agree with survivngantidepressants and their advice.  They, like benzobuddies, specialize in AD withdrawal and tapering.

I think what set you off was the initial cold turkey off Cymbalta in April 2023.  That is what lead to your CNS dysregulation and all your symptoms started.  You then added and took away things which added to your CNS dysregulation. This is by no fault of your own and only because you were suffering and desperate for relief.  So please, in that regard, be gentle to yourself.

Moving forward I would suggest you hold for some time and see if any stabilization happens at all.  Then, from there, you must pick one thing at a time to taper and go very, very slowly.

[[sh...]]

I have been on ativan since july 2021.. so 3 years

now on valium 9.1mg

So basically hold for a few more months and see if anything improves and it should if it was the amitriptilyine tapering and valium tapering at the same times. And yes with valium i would rather cut and hold because symptoms show up soo much later. 

[[Pa...]]

I believe you've arrived at the best solution for now, but its good you're seeking different opinions because trying to find our way through this nightmare alone is scary.  I hope you'll keep us posted on your progress.