How many people HAVE to work while tapering

[[Co...]]

Hey etown...feeling about nuts tonite. I was fine, then I came home and took my meds. I am paradoxical and my brain is rattling so hard it feels like it is going to leak out my ears. *sigh*

[[Mr...]]

Hello Colorado..... Maybe a long hold or a small updose for a few days till ur symptoms level out. Your body's healing rate is slower then the taper.... Even though ur taper looks nice and slow. Valium has that sneaky way of all of a sudden one day kicking us in the butt. Plus the half life of valium usually means ur body is operating on your daily amount times 8. So it could possibly take approx. 12 to 16 day hold to let ur healing rate catch up the tapering you have been doing for the last month or more. Well just my thoughts.....and best wishes Always!!!

Mr scared Ottawa Canada.

[[dr...]]

Hang in there CC. You've had a rough few days on top of withdrawing. 

 

:smitten:

[[et...]]

Isn't it amazing how I know what to do for others but not myself? going to have to make a few small adjustments I guess

etown

[[dr...]]

Etown,

 

This is learn as we go for every one of us. Good luck on adjustments.

 

Drew

[[Co...]]

Mr scared,

 

I am cutting once a month now. I have gotten opinions about slow tapers and I decided to go with that as I am having a hard time. I am due to cut on the 18th. I never expected to have such a hard time at the lower doses but I have learned a lot in the past few months. I am trying to be optimistic but am feeling really shaky.

[[Mr...]]

Hello again Colorado, so sorry to hear about your troubles. A member here named Birdman told me the "lower you go, the Slower you have to go" The daily micro taper can also be applied this way in my opinion.

1. Using a nail file and a good micro scale shave the smallest little little bit off you pill, then weigh

    your pill.

2. A really slow rate would be say .010grams per day or Even to be really safe... Taper

    At .010grams per day for one week... Then just automatically hold for a week or even two to make

    Sure your body's healing rate can play catch up and help you not to feel brain pain.

 

3. You could also try tapering at 0.010grams per day then Automatically Hold for 3 or 5 days. The

    General rule seems to be taper at a rate that gives you the least symptoms. And I would

    would like to take this golden rule One Step further and say, YOU CAN ALWAYS PLAY SUPER SAFE

    by going sooo super slow when a person reaches under 2mg...Since there are no rules...

    Just cut .010grams for one or two days then hold for 3 weeks if u want to. Sure it might take you

      Extra 3 to 6 months but maybe better then many days of pain and suffering.

 

4. At the end when u reach 0 it's only zero if you feel almost ok again when u reach the finish line. I

    don't like the term "jump" at the end of a taper... I think more Evaporate the last little pile of

    Valium dust u can lick off ur finger as Bart says.

 

I know this is all easy for me to say to cause I'm not almost at the end like you are, but I care about you and it makes me sad to hear your pain. It's 7am here in Ottawa and before I go to work I just had to try to give my little input and hope it may help. Just in case it doesn't here is a Big Hug!!! I will be thinking of you.....

 

Mr scared Ottawa.

[[Co...]]

Mr scared,

 

You rock. More info for me to consider. I am going to cut in 4 more days and I was certain I was going to follow a new taper but at week 4 from the last cut I am still sick. I am going to figure this out in the next day or 2. The micro tapering sounds great but there are so many opinions against drawing it out further. However, my own slow taper does not seem to be enough. I may continue with the new taper but I need to think this through. Personal issues have made this much worse. If I was walking on sunshine in that area I feel like I would feel safe. Feel protected from the stress that is taking me apart. I feel like my life is in a holding pattern and I do not like it. On any given day I am able to make clear decisions. I feel incapable of that now .Thanks for the advice. I will let you know how I map this out.

 

Down but not defeated in Colorado

[[...]]

Colorado,

I hope that you figure it out soon.  Feeling bad sucks especially when you have to work.  I am lucky that the tiny cuts on my daily taper are working for me right now and that Etown's scale method really saved my butt back when I was kind of stuck at 2mg.  I know there is are few members who do not do well on daily small cuts and also members who swear by cut and hold but like Mr. Scared says I believe for a lot of us, we have to slow down as we get lower regardless of what method we use.  Cut and hold worked well for me until 2mg and after that I could not handle the large cuts anymore.

 

I am facing the fact that I may get to the point that even the .001 gram cuts (=.013 mg) on the scale may not work all the way down and at that point I am willing to consider going liquid by dissolving my pills in suspension fluid. 

 

The point is to keep it where we don't feel so bad.  I hope you are able to find what will work for you soon though.  Hang in there.

 

Etown are your cuts catching up to you too?  Take a breather my man and maybe hold for a few?

[[Co...]]

Thanks Eliz.  I will take all the advice I can get. I had help from Bart and was certain I was going to do his taper. I still want to. But I am still in lala land and am almost at 4 weeks out from my last cut. I have to keep going. A month is long enough. I am at work now and it is a bit of a better day than yesterday. My personal issues take it harder. I am emotional but not in a good way. I am usually strong but am felled by benzo axe. Thanks for your input.

 

Colorado

[[et...]]

CC - I totally understand your frustration. If you check in with Diaz Pham you will notice how long she held at 1mg. If you get your taper rate too far ahead of your healing rate you will be in this freefall for the rest of your taper. Mine caught up to me and I will hold until stable no matter what. Tapering while you are very symtomatic only results in pain that you will have long after you get off. Better to take the time now than later IMO. I am doing a slow taper and will do whateverit takes to stabilize.

etown

[[Co...]]

Hey etown,

 

Thanks for the input. So you think it is ok to hold for over a month? That was my first inclination but as I said I had some input that suggests that it could make it worse. I still want to go with Bart's taper but I think I will string out my current dose for another 2 weeks and see how I feel. Thank u. The noise in my head seems less right now.

[[...]]

Hi CC

I never felt worse during an extended hold.  In fact I almost always ended up feeling better the longer I held.  I view it as a much needed "break" from tapering when I find myself ahead of my healing rate.  I think if you look at all the veterans on here, they have probably all had to hold at one point or another. 

 

Hope that helps

[[Co...]]

Thanks eliz,

 

I have tried so many different ways to do this that I think I confused my brain. I felt like I was fighting for my life when I was tapering off klonopin. I did it by myself and found BB about 2 weeks after I was done. By then I was really sick and needed help. I got it here. I will say one more time that I do not think I would still be upright  and mobile without the buddies. I have tried to explain abt w/d to others but there is no way that anyone can really get it unless the beast is on your own back. I know I have friends here.

[[et...]]

CC I would hold as long as it takes. I do not agree with the "holds make it worse camp" unless of course your taper rate and healing rate are far apart. You will stabilize with a hold just have to be real patient. I am entering a hold right now and I will not taper until I am stable which includes the courage to taper on. I understand you as I am having similar challenges for unknown reasons right now. Standing pat or slipping up a bit is way more predictable than going down when in a jam. I am using Bart's and my own taper which are very similar. He taught me how to think differently about my taper and that was/is (he's still working on me!) making all the difference.

etown

[[Co...]]

Thanks etown. I am going to hold. The advice helps so much.

[[He...]]

Healing - welcome to this thread and your are welcome to hang out with us whether you are working or not. Let us know how the job turns out. What island do you speak of? I'm glad you are well enough to work or just tough enough!

 

Gaer - nice to hear from you buddy. Sounds like you're on you way. Thanks for stopping by. I must admit I laughed my ass off reading your post. We need your humour so don't be a stranger.

etown

 

etown and eliz, thanks for the welcome and the well-wishes. I should know soon about the job. I live on Maui. Yeah, I know, everyone thinks it's so great living in Paradise. Well it is, my body really likes the warm weather and humidity, I enjoy the fairly friendly people. But the cost of living is high so a price is paid, literally. If I don't get a f/t job soon I will have to move to the Mainland so hope a job will materialize, if not this one. I've been so broke for the better part of 3 years that I can't hardly go anywhere just because of gas prices. Luckily I live in a lovely lush, country-style tropical area which helps a lot.

 

I wanted to weigh in on the taper discussion just a bit. I believe I dropped my dose too quickly at first, holding at 15 mg when I'd been taking sometimes quite a bit more sporadically, then following Ashton and dropping the 1 mg at 2 week intervals. I got pretty sick and it lasted well into my 13 mg hold. Supplements have helped a TON but I believe that the slow taper is best for my sensitivity. Why be totally incapacitated? As I've posted elsewhere, I've detoxed from alcohol, Tramadol, and Effexor but nothing compares to this. I'd love to just be able to quit and man, I was really angry when I discovered the damage this drug does and that it would take a long time to get off. Now I've come to accept that and will do what I have to in order to have as much of an enjoyable day, one day at a time, until this is out of my system.  Hope everyone's week is going well. I'm off to job hunt! Aloha, Healingme

[[...]]

You have the right idea Healing

 

Slow and steady wins the race.  Think of all of us as the tortoise in that childhood fable The Tortoise and the Hare.  The tortoise won the race because he kept a slow and steady pace.  I think we all were guilty of going to fast at first and had to hit a wall before we woke up and realized we cannot force our body to heal faster than it is capable of doing.

 

Sending you good luck so you can stay in paradise!  :thumbsup:

[[et...]]

Healing - all the possibilities of normal life exist in the slow taper plan. I am so glad that you found us. Please stick around because you have some slow taperers around presently to help you. We are all about continuing on with life as normal as possible and taking it easy on the drama. Pretty down to earth and tough people over here but also tender people who have cried themselves to sleep many nights. Eliz is right slow and steady.... You have already come a long way and now you have the guts to go back to work. Good on ya! I have a long way to go so I'll be pestering everyone on this thread for quite some time. I was mad too. Not anymore, got over it, not productive, so I put my energy into things that people do who live a "normal" (whatever that is) life.

Post often

Keep up the fight!

Cool living in Maui 

etown

[[et...]]

Healing another thread many of us spend alot of time on and you should too. Again positive people with their heads screwed on lol

http://www.benzobuddies.org/forum/index.php?topic=50573.0;topicseen

etown

[[La...]]

All of this positive talk around here is contagious!

[[...]]

Etown,

You sound like you are doing better today.  I hope that is the case.  I will hold until at least Monday.  Just got down under 1mg today (tap wood softly) and I want to make sure I am good and steady before I start down again.  Don't want to hit the dreaded 1mg wall and be stuck for any length of time this close to the end.

 

Trying to practice what I preach and be patient with myself.

 

 

[[et...]]

You're just awesome Laser!

hang around more and we'll be singin kum ba ya lol

How's it going?

etown

[[et...]]

Eliz don't want to say much and jinx myself but I'm moving in the right direction after a little piece of fancy footwork.

etown

[[et...]]

Remember that bag of tricks we talked about when we first met?

Zingo!(with a little help from a friend)

etown