50 and over club- withdrawal and recovery issues for the aged :-)

[[ve...]]

It feels like a big mountain that I have to keep climbing (and Im actually a very good hiker).

Intend

 

 

V

[[se...]]

That's quite a bucket list, searchin, in and of itself. Are you agoraphobic? I am...or was(?). I won't know if I still am for quite a while.

Agoraphobia is the only symptom I can't handle. All the other physical symptoms are workable.I have most of them that I read about. I am used to pain because I am severely disabled with Psoriatic Arthritis. Pain is old hat.

 

The agoraphobia is what has ruined my life. Today I could not go outside. I feel better at night as most do. That is when I go out. I don't know why this is for me. I don't hear so many people complain about this on the forum. I can only go in a car with one special person at night. Only for a few blocks. Some days I am afraid to leave the house at all. Luckily I have been able late at night to go to the hospital down the street to visit dad. They made an accommodation for me after hours since he was so sick. I lost my career, family, everything to agoraphobia. I never had it before Xanax. I had anxiety of course, but not agoraphobia. From lots of reading I found that Xanax causes agoraphobia. Tapering exacerbates it. Also the kindling from years of on again off again CT of different AD and benzos large and small probably didn't help. I endure infections because I don't go to a doctor, abscesses, and even have a growing lump which I don't see a doctor about because of AGORAPHOBIA.

Long answer I know. If it weren't for the agoraphobia I would not be here. I would just taper, suffer the withdrawal and be done with it.

[[el...]]

In the summer of 2010, I was seeing a therapist as I was going through w/d. She had me journaling and told me to list the things I wanted to do when I recovered. (I suppose that was my bucket list.) I did it, and I do recall making a list of a few dozen things. I was just looking for that notebook and I remember throwing it away several months ago because I didn’t want to be reminded of the agony that I endured day after day after day. Every day I wrote page after page of misery. I stopped journaling in April of last year because I figured that it was pointless - that I wouldn‘t be recovering anytime soon and that I would never be in a “good place” again to experience anything on my list. What was the point in writing about my misery? It wasn’t really changing - and maybe never would.

 

It was in the Spring of last year (shortly after I gave up the journaling - last entry Friday, April 29, 2011 - I kept the last notebook because it had some unused paper in it.) that I noticed I was beginning to very, very slowly rejoin the living. I just read the last entry - lots of misery, depression, and fear. That was slightly over a year ago now.

 

I am trying to remember what was on my bucket list. Here is what I recall.

 

• Have dinner with many different individuals and couples (each of which I listed separately). There was probably at least a dozen on the list. I have had at least one  meal with all but one couple. I’ve even eaten with others who were not even on the list.
   
  
• Reestablish friendship/relationship with at least a half dozen people in my life to whom I could no longer relate in w/d. All of those have been reestablished. They all waited for me to return - real friends.
   
  
• Rejoin the “small group” that I used to attend over a year ago at church. I had tried to sit there in terror for about the first year of w/d but eventually gave up and stayed home. About three months ago I rejoined the group. I had to leave the group to help my wife teach Sunday school to the children. That is something that was WAY out of my comfort zone long before I got into benzos. Anyway, the leader of the small group is moving away so I will probably become the new facilitator in a couple weeks. This is something that seemed completely undoable a year ago.
   
  
• Be a member of the “Barnabas team” again at the church. (These are guys who help others with moving, building, painting, etc) In the last 2 to 3 months my wife and I  have painted one lady’s house and I have helped two different people move. A year ago I couldn’t even go to the church for a work day - too afraid.
   
  
• Start a latch hook group to make wall hangings for others. (Yeah, this one is weird for a guy.) I haven’t started a group, but I have made many wall hangings for a pregnancy center in the area for mothers and newborns. I started making wall hangings about four months into w/d at the suggestion of a therapist. It helped me pass the endless hours of misery. I remember the horrid brain fog at the beginning and my shaking hands. Now I actually enjoy latch hooking and have designed some of my own.
   
  
• Do some special things for my wife (because I could do literally nothing for her for two years. I did manage to get a card for her for our 30th anniversary but could not muster a smile - pretty lame I know.). A few weeks ago I did get her a quilting table and even assembled it for her (8 hours) for her birthday and Mother‘s Day. The most “special” thing is just being able to smile and laugh with her. She went through her own hell because that is what I was making her life.
   
  
• Several different volunteer activities. I’ve done quite a few and hope to do more.
   
  
• Do some creative writing again. At one time, I wrote lots of poetry and short stories - even started a novel (which eventually took a backseat to booze and benzos and was eventually tossed out the back window). I never thought my brain would recover enough to write anything coherent - anything that made any sense. I have done a little of that in the past six months. I hope to write a book in the not too distant future with the help of others. It is certainly doable now.
   
  
• Resume tutoring high school students. I did tutor high school chemistry for a year awhile back but it also got slammed by the booze and benzos (and then w/d). My brain is thinking very clearly now and is probably more capable than it was back then. A year ago I couldn’t even recall any kind of chemistry or math. Simple addition and subtraction were almost impossible (especially the subtraction - making balancing the checkbook a real treat for over two years).

 

I am sure that there were some other things on that list. I just don’t recall them all. In the last six or seven months, I have done most of the things on that list and many more that I am sure were not on the list. I clearly am in a good mental place - even after 40 years of alcoholism and 13 years of Klonopin use.

 

So, maybe I should think about a new bucket list. That’s a hard one - not because anything seems out of reach or because I have no interests but because I am doing most of what I have hoped to do for years. Life has become very fulfilling since the depression lifted six or seven months ago.

 

There is one thing though - based completely on what I have gone through these 2 ½ years of w/d. I honestly would like to start or be part of some sort of “haven house” for others going through benzo w/d hell. My w/d would have been much less agonizing if I would have had someone else with whom I could talk face to face. This forum is great, but there is something about being in the physical presence of someone who has gone through it or is going through it. It would be a place of compassion and understanding - no talk of being a drug addict but rather a person injured by benzos. Such a place is necessary especially as our society seems to be spawning benzo-sick people. I already have several candidates for such a haven here where I live. “Graduates” would then be able to go out and create more havens - a very cool dream of mine.

 

Yeah, too much soap box. Anyway, that is my former bucket list and my remaining bucket list.

 

It really is good to have a bucket list - even if it seems like it could never be fulfilled. I though my list was “pie in the sky” thinking - but most of it has come true already. It really, really does happen.

 

It’s like when you are hiking and get the first glimpse of the summit. Just makes you want to keep moving those fatigued legs because the end is in view.

 

Sorry this is so long. I get carried away when I realize how much I have healed - how much I have improved in the last year.

 

eli

[[Fl...]]

Thank you, Eli!

 

It wasn't long. Most of us are so hungry for words of hope, we eagerly gobble up every word. This was a beautiful post, full of optimism. Real optimism, that was obviously so hard won.

 

Thank you for taking the time. I wish you continued healing and a life of joy.

Flip

[[ja...]]

I think a haven house would be a blessing to many. I pray someday this will be possible for you to make happen.  A good PST i was glad to read.  Hugs my friend Jackie

[[se...]]

I dont have any social anxiety. I have massive anxiety about how this Klonopin situation will resolve. Thats at the top of my wish list.

 

It has created a living hell for me, and I just want to be free of it. I know that xanax is a powerful drug, but Ive never had any of these types of w/d sx on it, and I did do a taper on it so I can make the comparison.  A lot of these wishes I see here are wonderful, but thats my real and only one right now as all others can not be accomplished if one cannot function properly.

 

I know that these drugs stay in the system for awhile, so I recognize that this could go on for awhile. And when and if this resolves, then Ill make decisions about xanax. It feels like a big mountain that I have to keep climbing (and Im actually a very good hiker).

 

Intend

Valium is much more gentle. I had a difficult time tapering from Klonopin and Xanax. Valium crossover was difficult, but I can just feel that it is the way to go.

Maybe it will work for you?

[[ja...]]

http://www.desicomments.com/graphics/funny/13.jpg  Have a great Saturday! Love the old lady Jackie

[[pa...]]

http://www.desicomments.com/graphics/funny/13.jpg  Have a great Saturday! Love the old lady Jackie

 

Oh Jackie... :laugh: that we needed!  Thanks much!  Hubby off almost 15 months, still really rough.  Thanks for the laugh.  Pattylu

[[pr...]]

I wrote this earlier in response to something someone was saying about "social anxiety."  Then I got interrupted.  So it may not fit here but I'm posting it anyway since I wrote it so there.  :-)

 

Here's what I think about this whole "social anxiety" BS:  During all the oh, say, 500,000 years that humans and our hominid predecessors have been living in our social groups, it's only been in about the past century and a half that people have lived in environments where they were around strangers often, and less than a century that living immersed in an environment full of strangers has become commonplace. 

 

WE ARE NOT DESIGNED TO BE COMFORTABLE AROUND STRANGERS.  And we shouldn't be. 

 

During most of the years we have been humans, we lived in tribes of a few dozen people at the most, who were loosely affiliated with a few other tribes in the area.  A few traders came and went, but they did so regularly and were familiar faces. 

 

Occasionally we met in larger gatherings of tribes--often with tribes that we were competing with for resources, in order to build and maintain alliances--but even then, we were with our own group.  And we were cautious in those situations.

 

We knew, and had known all our lives, most of the people who were friendly.  Strangers were just as likely to be enemies invading our territory as they were to be friends.

 

So our brains aren't really designed to be comfortable being surrounded by--and getting attention from--lots of people we don't know very well, or don't know at all. 

 

Mostly, for most of the hundreds of hundreds of years that human beings have been human beings, being surrounded by strangers was a major threat to survival and meant something very bad was happening.

 

This whole business of judging how "healthy" people are by how well they "function" in a completely unnatural, abnormal human environment--that is, modern civilization--is just ludicrous to me.

[[In...]]

Searchin,

 

Thanks for your suggestion. Trouble is that I'm not tapering anything at the moment. Still letting K get out of my system. Tried to cross over to it to make taper easier, and had paradoxical reaction to it.

 

I can't even really consider anything yet. Klonopin is still affecting me, and I'm not super well because of it. Right now I just have to wait. Too many benzos involved here. Just need to let things alone for awhile.

 

Intend

[Guest [th...]]

prh,

 

I agree with you. I have no argument with your post at all.

 

However, I do believe that social anxiety can also be heightened to extreme measures by our own past and/or present personal life experiences.

 

sincerely,

T

[Guest [th...]]

Have a great Saturday! Love the old lady Jackie

 

hee hee hee hee ...........................

 

Thanks for the belly laugh, Jackie. Love it! 

[[GH...]]

prh, sure, but what do we do about it? I mean that we live in a very structured society, and we have to fit in, and conform. So for the ones like me, that have difficulty, what do we do?

 

Mostly it seems, that we drug them into submission of function. We need to function in society, just as the hominids had to function in their environment.

 

Humans were not designed, we evolved, and apparently, we are not perfect.

 

Either way, I agree with your point of view. Now what is the solution to dysfunction?

 

good healing, fair winds

[[ja...]]

Goodmorning to old you old folks, We might as well have fun with it if we are going to be considered old. I would just like to respond to many post here if thats ok. Pattylu, im so sorry your hubby is still suffering after all this time. Do you have any thoughts to why? I guess we will never understand the whys for sure. Im just truly sorry. Prhiannon, I totally agree and thought this was well written and thought out. I always like hearing your thought on things. Thanks for that post. Intend, i am just so sorry that this has not left yet.And how crasy this evil k has made you feel. But im proud of you, hanging in there fighting the fight. You are a winner. Thrive, No one should ever have to endure what you went through. Everyone doesnt hurt. Remember that. And the ones that do someday will pay a price for it. Ghostship, I dont pretend to have it all together, far from it. But what i do to deal with these situations is fake it, you heard me right, i fake it. No one knows how you feel on the inside, just you. If you float through it you will feel better. I have anxiety this am. My hubby is sitting at the kitchen table with me but has no clue what im feeling. I went garage sailing,walmart and farmers market yesterday. I had very bad cog fog and heart palps and anxiety. But i will not live in fear i made the choice to let the fear come and float through it. Not easy, I really have to be a good actress sometimes. But most people are so caught up in their own stuff they dont notice what your doing anyway. I always say when im feeling this way. No one knows and i do what i need to do. But i agree it down right stinks. I believe the more we face it and dont run from it, the soner we will get better. Thats my oppinion and im sticking to it. Love you all. Have a wonderful day And all you mommys HAPPY MOTHERS DAY! Jackie :smitten: :smitten:

[[ve...]]

Happy Mother's Day to all you wise 50 + moms.

 

 

Vertigo

[[se...]]

Searchin,

 

Thanks for your suggestion. Trouble is that I'm not tapering anything at the moment. Still letting K get out of my system. Tried to cross over to it to make taper easier, and had paradoxical reaction to it.

 

Crossing over to Valium can be rough for some people. I cried for a month. Paradoxical reactions to Diazepam are extremely rare, occur mostly in children, and those on high doses. In fact you most likely would have have had a paradoxical reaction to any benzo if that were the case. Especially XANAX. Xanax is tops for aggressive reactions. What usually happens is that people don't take enough Valium crossing over, sometimes because the equivalency charts differ. The ensuing withdrawal will look or feel like a paradoxical reaction.

 

Ashton's chart and the NHS chart is correct for most people. Sometimes a little low depending on the person. I felt it was 10-20% lower than needed, also because generics play a part in the problem. Most likely you experienced withdrawal from Klonopin which myself and others have experienced during the crossover to Valium.

 

Not picking on you.  I see the phrase paradoxical reaction bandied about on the forum a lot and in most cases unless the person was entirely benzodiazapine naive, they would rarely have a paradoxical reaction. It is usually children that experience this reaction and people who suffer from Borderline Personality Disorder, and usually occurs in higher doses. Don't listen to me though. there are some very good peer reviewed articles on this subject, many can be found online.

 

I thought I would take this opportunity to rant about the much ballyhooed "paradoxical reaction"    EOR. . .     

 

Hang in there!

[Guest [th...]]

<img src="

http://i1149.photobucket.com/albums/o590/tlpenny/mothers-day07.gif" />

<br /><br />Now, let's hope the kids call! Have a super day, mommies!

[[In...]]

Searching,

 

Perhaps the term paradoxical reaction is overused. I've been on Xanax for @12 years now. No paradoxical stuff there. Made voluntary attempt to cross to K to make taper easier due to longer half life.

 

Had seizure on K which has anti seizure properties on Dec 19, 2011. I was only on it for 14 weeks total. It's caused some real problems for me. That's why I'm back on X. X has never caused any of the problems I'm now having. Currently it is K w/ds. I was doing X taper when I tried to cross. I know what X w/d feels like. It does not feel like K w/d for me.

 

K has proved very toxic for me. No crossing to anything else for now. A person can only take so much in this mess. I need a rest.

 

Intend

[[ma...]]

Am behind on reading threads- so want to go back & thank Eli111 for wonderful post!

It was so inspiring & thoughtful.

The bucket list is a great idea, & I sure hope you get to set up a "haven" for benzo wd folks someday.

There is such a need. I can't even imagine going through this without the help of my hubby, family

& friends. -A haven would be of so much benefit - esp for those who don't have much support.

 

Thank you again Eli for taking the time to write such an encouraging & heartening post.

May your recovery & dreams continue to manifest & radiate such warmth & light,

 

margaretisabl

[[Li...]]

Happy Mother's Day to all of you here!! I hope your days are symptom-free...full of love and closeness with those you love!!!!

 

[[ja...]]

http://www.allgraphics123.com/graphics/mothers-day/mothers-day04.jpg  Have a great day all you over 50 mommys, You desere it! Love Jackie

[[an...]]

And a Happy Mothers Day to you also!  I have not felt well for the last two days.  I cheated on my B-day and had things I should not have had and am now paying the price.  I have been on the couch most of the day.  Too bad as it is a sunny day here and hubby is puttering all around the yard.  I have a chance to go to the lake yomorrow where my GF spends most of here weekends and I hope I can make it.  What are you doing this weekend and how are you feeling? 

[[In...]]

I am preparing to go to my daughters house. I took the day off from work and vowed to get a few things done, but I'm tired. It's small things that I've put off and I just must push myself.

 

Who would think that putting "soft claws" on a cat and stopping at Home Depot for a light bulb would seem insurmountable, but it does feel that way.

 

Tired, burning skin on legs, achey joints, and an ugly rash on one leg due to K w/d. I'll be glad if I'm ever just stable on X again. Sorry to hear you are also " under the weather" but Happy Mothers Day no matter what.

 

Intend

[[an...]]

Intend, I am sorry you are having it rough also.  Yes, I know how the simple things can just seem like- you just don't want to put the energy into it.  I have been indoors all day today.  Hot tub is calling my name and the sun is shinning in all its glory-and I should just get out and go for a walk.  It was hard just to feed the animals this morning.  The house is slowly but surly getting more and more dirty.  I hope to pop out of this funk soon and I can get some much needed cleaning done.  Have fun at your daughters house!  Happy Mothers Day to You!  Angelluv

[[ve...]]

Hope all had a lovely Mother's Day.  Now it's on to Memorial Day and summer is calling .

 

Vertigo