A Time of Thanks Giving - Two Years Out

[[So...]]

gutsygal,

 

Thank you from the bottom of my heart for posting your success story.  It is through these real-life stories that we gain our strength to continue this journey...day after day after day after month after month after month....  Blessings to you!  Sophia

[[af...]]

Dear Gutsy,

 

Shelley's success post last week left me wondering who her special buddy was... well now i know .

 

Thank you for this sincere, warm, and hopeful success story. I too just passed the 2-year off mark, and am feeling so much better. Yes, healing does happen.

 

I look forward to reading your updates from here onward.

 

Congratulations.

 

Kev

[[Pa...]]

Hello GG,

 

I'm glad to see you, and I'm especially glad you found someone who was walking the same road you were to help you through it.  I knew from reading your posts, you were in a great deal of pain, but the way you write doesn't let the reader know how much.  You did your best to let us know what you were feeling, how you were coping and what you tried to find your way through, and I thank you for that.

 

You attempted to maintain your life for the time when you would step back into it, and some people might have thought you suffered less than others.  But I knew that you did what you had to do, your way, and the strength it took to do that.

 

I wish you the best GG, thank you for coming back to let us know how you're doing.

 

Pam

[[km...]]

Gutsygal thanks for shaing your story.  I read yours and feel so bad for whining about my ordeal.  I should start being thankful for being able to work thru this torture.  Your story made me realize I need to be thankful for healing instead of self pity.  Yes my head is messed up but hopefully with time it will work itself out.  I'm glad your healing is still taking place and you are feeling better. I pray that all the s/x go away soon.

Hugs

Kristin

[Guest [CM...]]

http://www.bradfitzpatrick.com/weblog/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/090206_i_said_well_done.gif

 

Nice one, well done, Congratulations. I can relate to everything you wrote. Nothing compares to the sheer hell that is psych drug withdrawal. It has swallowed up over two years of my life, but I too am finally getting better. You are so right, we ALL HEAL.

 

Thank you from the bottom of my heart for sharing your story. It means the world to read your story, to feel your pain, to know your battle and to see that you have emerged Victorious.

 

Proof positive that healing does happen for everyone.

 

That some good can be derived from every event is a better proposition than that everything happens for the best, which it assuredly does not.

 

Wishing you all the best of Love, Joy, Peace and Light in your new life.

Lots of Love

Melo x

[[mi...]]

Two years ago today I took that last little bit of clonazepam... and waited for my world to turn around. Instead it turned upside down. Inside out. My mind fragmented into a zillion pieces as the hours went by after that ‘last little dose’. Two Thanksgivings ago I was holding onto the walls in my home just to navigate through the house.

 

I want to be honest with anyone reading this... I don’t want to pretend that it was in any way just up and out after I got off the stuff. It totally was not. I lost all sense of smell, taste, touch. Not so much lost it, I have come to learn... but those senses became so incredibly heightened that all the sensory paths in my brain just could not handle the input. So.... they basically shut down.

 

I couldn’t feel the shower on my body... tell the temperature of the water. Taste food or smell food burning as I attempted to cook. I could not tell wet from cold anywhere on my body. My feet were numb as were my fingers and most of my skin. Also my internal organs. No sense of internal processes. No sense of anything. Nothing MADE any sense. Anymore. At all.

 

And my cognitive function took an even harder hit. It was as though I had had a stroke... the symptoms I experienced were so similar to many of those in Jill Bolte Taylor’s Book, ‘My Stroke of Insight’, that I still equate my experience with having had a ‘chemical stroke’. That is still the comparison I use today when sharing with people about my experience.

 

I lost almost all memory of events, experiences and learning. From my entire life. My sense of linear time evaporated into some sort of suspended animation that went on for months. I sat in a near catatonic state by the hour. I lost all sense of visual depth perception, my eyesight clouded over... I could not sleep, I had no appetite, I was in a constant state of internal agitation and was nearly drowning in negative thought patterns that replayed 24/7, 24/7, 24/7.

 

There was no respite, no relief. As the first weeks went by I was less and less able to communicate verbally. I huddled in my tiny bath with the space heater on full bore to try to combat the deep penetrating bone chill. I could never get warm. I became phonaphobic as I call it... unable to answer or speak on the phone. Nearly unable to do so in real life and my brain could not process conversation or adequately respond.

 

I sat quietly in a dreamy lost sort of way that others interpreted as calm and collected. I withdrew wherever I could and only took part in brief activities that allowed me to talk little or not at all. And I emailed... women who I met on this site. Every dang day. Page after page of outpourings from my heart.

 

One person... Shelleyr (who jumped from the same drug from nearly the same amount at almost the exact same time)... and I spilled it all out and held each other up and shared... and challenged one another and supported each other unreservedly. Day in and day out. Week after week. Month after month. Year... after year. We held nothing back... sharing the misery... the hope... the signs of healing as they began... the setbacks... the anger. We let it all out.

 

Shell was a total LIFE LINE for me... and she still is. As she stated in her story... I can only hope that some of you will find someone like that to share the journey of recovery with. We don’t... CAN’T... get that from our families, our friends, our physicians, our spiritual guides. The ONLY people who can truly share this exhaustive process of recovery are those who have been through it or are going through it.

 

Others from this site also came alongside... on the outside. They were not in the dire straits I was... so they were able to pray for me when I could not do so for myself... they gave me strength and added humor to my dark days. They helped ME see good things where everything seemed so bleak and dark. They never left me... even though it was a long slog of dark days and negative thinking that I subjected them too. They were invaluable to the process of recovery for me. I love each one of them and they will always be sisters of my heart.

 

I stopped posting on BB... because my experience was just SO hard... and SO bad. I had not read any posts that talked about what I was going through. The unendingness of it... the incredible difficulty. The heart ache and break and brokenness of it all. I worried about newbies and people tapering and could not post about how bad it was. I didn’t want them to read it and see themselves in my story. I didn’t want to bump anyone off the path of getting off the benzo.

 

Now... two years later... I want EVERYONE who comes to this site to KNOW that even when the experience is as severe and as crippling as mine... that is NOT the end of the story. Our bodies are marvelously made... wonderfully complex... and possessed of a limitless reserve of intrinsic health. Even with the severe brain bashing from the benzo... my recovery is happening and... life... is good again.

 

I do still have many residual symptoms from the brain toxin I was on. Sensory integration is an area that just does not function correctly for me even yet. I purged my wardrobe of anything that ‘felt’ odd or didn’t ‘lay right’ on my body. I gave away most of my colorful clothing and wear only calm and soft and flowing subdued shades now. Even Wikipedia has an entry about this ‘leftover’ from benzos.

 

I have a compromised immune system still... GI issues that are not yet resolved but ARE slowly slowly improving. After all... the gut has more neuroreceptors than our brains... so the benzos totally mess with digestion, absorption, all of that. My diet is strict and not all that interesting... but it is totally doable and keeps me gut well. I have gained nearly ten pounds in the past two years. A good thing.




I am ultra sensitive still to sounds... some days more so than others. I got fitted for a pair of musicians earplugs to filter and dampen loud environments. I am figuring out how to adapt to my world as it is while I continue to heal. I walk more slowly... I take my time... I do not subject myself to people, places, situations or information sources that do not facilitate my recovery. I am VERY aware of me... and my needs... for the first time in my life. I value... me.

 

At two years out... I sleep up to seven hours at a time. Often. I wake without that horrible agitation. Almost always. I have a clean house. Most of the time. My garden is beautiful. I am involved in activities outside my home... I have new hobbies and interests that have taken the place of things my brain is no longer able to do or interested in. I have learned to pay bills online... I have an iPhone. I have lost friends and gained new ones. Life... is good.

 

And what I haven’t yet figured out... my brain is dealing with. Although I have not regained much of the physical sense of my body... I am still sort of fluid as Jill Bolte Taylor would say... my brain is adapting where it is not healing... and is allowing me to function even with those missing pieces. My brain is a MARVEL of biological engineering and continues to find ways to piece me back together in a new form of wholeness.

 

And huge part of that new wholeness for me has been on a spiritual level. I have undergone a very deep internal journey of transformation and healing that has changed everything about the way I interact with my world. The change has been profound and I am internally... and eternally grateful for this unexpected gift that emerged from that pit of chemical darkness. I am more alive and aware than ever before. I am blessed.

 

The time of Thanksgiving for me will forever be a time of personal celebration. My own version of the new year so-to-speak. My anniversary of anniversaries. The yearly reminder of the one most important step I have ever taken in my life. And the one I hope anyone reading this is taking... or has taken... or will take.

 

s and  always ~~~

 

GG

 

Your story made me cry so hard.. You suffered so badly......... So hard and so long.

I am happy that you are getting better now

Thank you for your story.....

Please take care

Luv

mishi

[[...]]

GG- you are so kind to write so much back to me to help me feel better.  i'ts like jen jaso says the thing she believes in the most is love.  i'm depressed these past few days but i believe in love too - esp when i think o benzo buddies and what a huge web of support and love it is.

 

thanks for letting me off the hook for now on things.  i am so darn hard on myself; always has been an issue for me. 

i am proud of all of us for holding on thru this.  not everyone does or could. 

 

i am so happy u r better.  it was interesting to read chris's old thread and how sweet Pam was to him. 

 

thanks so much for being there and coming back to do service work here  xoo  i crashed my bike into a curb at the park today while looking back to see if my dog was coming and i hurt pitiful self  . smile

[[He...]]

This is a great success story. Thought I would resurrect it to give hope to us today.

 

Healingnow

[[gi...]]

Healing, thanks for pulling this back up. I was just yesterday thinking about her and wondering how she was doing! We lost touch "on the outside" in 2012.  Has anyone been in contact with her since the last time she posted here?

g

[Guest [su...]]

Hello All ~~~

 

THIS is what is important to take away with you from my last post....

 

'I do think it is not helpful to put ourselves on any sort of timeline though.

Healing happens when healing happens. End of story.

Mine... yours... every last one of us on this site.

 

The important thing to take away is... that healing happens.'

 

Don't let fear control your healing journey. Just take it a day and week and month

at a time. Find things to enrich your life AS IT IS NOW... let your healing

unfold on its on timeline. It will all work out....

 

s &    to each one of you on your journey to wellness.

 

GG

[[Fr...]]

This is a great success story!  I wonder whatever happen to her.  I bet she's doing what she worked so hard for - living a happy and healthy, fun-filled life.  Maybe she'll come back one day and post her update.

[[Te...]]

This is an amazing story, and thank you so much for it!

[[ca...]]

This story helped me today.

I have been feeling like i had a stroke or something for a long time….

She describes how i have been feeling.

She healed..I hope i do too.

 

Much love and healing,

Causing

[[Aj...]]

I see the last time Gutsygal was on BBs was 2016

 

 

Do any of the older members know whether her bodily sensations etc ever returned?