  > Having kicked opiates cold turkey in the past, I felt nostalgic for three simple days of traditional nausea, sweatiness, and bone-deep ache.

I am one of few people stupid enough to have, at one point, been addicted to and subsequently withdrawn from, almost everything but alcohol.

There is no way to explain the hell on earth that is benzo/GABA-ergic drug withdrawal, and I would not wish it on my worst enemy. It is an order of magnitude more intense than opiate withdrawals, and the timeline is weeks/months rather than days.

Like the author, I managed to quit via a year-long Ashton protocol taper.

The irony is that benzos were the one class of drugs I wasn't abusing for recreation. I was using mega-doses of Etizolam to cope with PTSD flashbacks, and only discovered I had become physically addicted after flushing it all and winding up in the ER.

▲ rnd0 10 hours ago | parent | next [-]

I did everything under the sun, got sober, did klonopin for a bit to help with anxiety and was lucky -blessedly lucky that it didn't do too much for me.

My best friend was not so lucky and was on ativan and had the worst experience getting off of it, and had years of problems with it because it aggravated the anxiety she was already experiencing.

Benzodiazipenes (sp?) has it's medicinal uses, particularly with injury or surgery; but yeah -if you're not very careful and very lucky it's hell to get off of if you end up dependant on it.

I'm very glad to see the word is getting out and is more wide-spread. I hope that it doesn't result in a complete freakout the way that oxycotin did. It's vital when it's needed, hopefully it will remain available.

What gets me, as someone with chronic anxiety, is that they've only come up with one thing that reliably works -and it's this. It feels like the research stopped in the nineties or so. I often wonder wtf about that.

▲ virtue3 10 hours ago | parent [-]

Lavender extract is about as effective as klonopin according to a study.

I use it to deal with my anxiety.

I don’t trust benzos in the slightest. Especially so after reading the horrors of this thread.

▲ hereonout2 9 hours ago | parent [-]

It sounds a fantastic claim, but I'll read up a bit on it so thanks.

Must admit though I've not had any drug - prescribed or illicit - that had a more immediate and powerful effect on my anxiety than a benzodiazepine (granted I've not tried heroin before!).

Thankfully they are incredibly hard to get prescribed where I live due too all the above associated dangers.

▲ astura 9 hours ago | parent [-]

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC12500767/ - this is the study the GP is talking about.

	▲	throwaway2037 4 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Also: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/19962288/ `> A multi-center, double-blind, randomised study of the Lavender oil preparation Silexan in comparison to Lorazepam for generalized anxiety disorder` FYI: CalmAid a brand name for Silexan, and Ativan is a brand name for Lorazepam.

▲ nrjames 12 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I was on Ativan for acute trauma avoidance (to try to prevent PTSD) for about 6 weeks. I hate taking medicating and stopped it cold turkey. It took me another 3 weeks or so to feel "normal" again and the withdrawal period was so phenomenally physically uncomfortable and panic-inducing that I will never take it again for any reason. I spent most of that time thinking I was going to die. In the long run, I guess it helped with PTSD avoidance (which seems to be one of the things they do now), but even just thinking back to those few weeks makes my skin crawl.

▲ cj 11 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

> weeks/months rather than days.

Weeks to months is actually pretty fast for benzo withdrawl IME.

For me it took nearly an entire year to feel completely normal. I was only taking 10mg diazepam per day (not a big dose).

To anyone on the journey now... hang in there. It feels never ending. But I promise you... you will wake up one day and feel completely normal.

▲

tylergetsay 11 hours ago | parent [-]

how long were you taking them?

▲

cj 11 hours ago | parent [-]

14 months. (Usually) not every day, maybe 3-4 times a week. And 8 months to taper off. How long it takes to taper depends on the level of discomfort you’re willing to tolerate.

Diazepam half life is so long that dependence can develop even when not taking it every day.

Edit: and I totally believe there are people who can take the same amount as me and not become dependent as easily as I did. Everyone is different

	▲	retrac 10 hours ago \| parent [-]
		> Diazepam half life is so long This is a desirable trait when tapering a dose. It reduces hour-to-hour blood level variation which reduces the whole up-down of alternating between euphoria and rebound anxiety. Idea is to target a constant level which is tolerable and slowly lower it. The article implies this (a Valium taper is mentioned) but I don't think it outright states it so I'll say that for anyone who is addicted to a fast-acting one like Xanax or Klonopin - a switch to Valium might help. My taper was nearly one year. Ten years off now.

▲ bhickey 8 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

About a decade ago, my doctor prescribed me Klonopin for sleepwalking. 0.5mg daily.

After two or three months I discontinued it. He suggested to just stop, but I thought better of that, tapering through 0.25mg and 0.125mg. What followed was weeks of unrelenting insomnia and headache.

I wouldn't recommend.

▲ howunfortunate 7 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

It seems like Jordan Petersen really permanently messed himself up trying to shorten the timeline of getting off prescription benzos in a dangerous way.

I always feel awful when I hear people making fun of him for this. It seems like it's one of the most horrible and difficult things out there.

▲ ShadowOfThePit 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Just curious, why not alcohol? With it being so common and easy to get...

▲ a34729t 9 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

I'm convinced a small percent of people get addicted to anything much more easily. Ive enjoyed various things but it's like meh- though Ativan is fucking amazing (but only for fear of flying). I think it is a brain reward structure thing; I get bored very easily and i guess it takes a decent amount of danger or effort to get me very interested.

	▲	calebkaiser 6 hours ago \| parent [-]
		I think that's a common impression. Interestingly, while there are still a lot of questions marks around what makes someone predisposed to addiction, the few things we do know tend to run counter to the idea that people dealing with addiction are overly sensitive to feelings of reward and pleasure. Or that being less sensitive would make someone more resistant. One of the most well studied genetic risk factors for addiction vulnerability is the DRD2 gene, which encodes the dopamine receptor D_2. People who are particularly vulnerable to addiction commonly have a deficiency here, meaning getting bored very easily and feeling under stimulated/rewarded by typical things is in part what makes riskier sources of pleasure (i.e. drugs) so appealing. Disclaimer: Not a medical professional, just like reading about addiction and genetics.