I have been on xanax for about 6 yrs 1mg 3 times a day some times i double the dose though. There really is no substitute for xanax but i found that maybe taking a less potent benzo like klonipin dont have such severe withdrawls.  If your son has anxiety issues the doctors can give him non addictive busbar for it.I also take Norco and I am not a drug addict but sometimes i feel like one thanks to the doctor. Another way to make shure he dont take too many is to take his pills and give him his daily dosage yourself. No matter how much he complains he will always have medicine that way. Believe me he dont want to withdrawl.so you administer his pills and hide them good. And make shure he dont drink on them It will intensify the drug 10 times.

yes you are so right. i know when i stopped taking them i had some memory loss and couldnt comprehend what people were saying it went in one ear and out the other. I can still tell even with me taking a few (and now being without for 3 days) the difference. what i cant figure out is why before when i was taking the loritab that i only needed 1 a day to get by and now i have to take 1/4 of one thru out the day until its about 2 a day now. maybe i just havent let them  get back in my system enough or something?

anything compreble to xanax will also be very addictive.

ive been taking them for 5 yrs myself. i was taking 1 to 1 1/2 at night before bed until i went of the loritabs the first of this month. i went about a 2 weeks without my xanax and i couldnt tell what wd was coming from what. i got some milder ativans and took those until i could get some xanax and now im waiting til saturday to get my script..
when i dont take them now..i have a nervous stomach and cant sleep and im jumpy.
At 6 a day i understand how you feel about your son..my mom also takes that many of 1 mg a day and i can tell her moods change and she's sloppy and it makes her angry and she is to the point when i get my script( 10 days after her) she wants half of mine also and i always run out every month. so i either have to taper for no reason to 1/2 a day for just hope i find some..but i have told her this month..i cant let her have any to hang onto her 30 and 6 days after she got her script she ran out.  i have a better time tapering them than i ever did loritab ..i dont know why but i adjusted fast ..s maybe have him taper down some..say something like...this way they will last longer or something..if he is a minor..talk to the dr and see what he says. he may need some other form of med too. i dont know if this helped..i hope so..

Your son can probably try a different anti-depressant, possibly a tricyclic like elavil. There are a lot of possibilities it just depends on what works for him. He can't just stop taking the xanax, he will have to taper off of it. Stopping a benzodiazepine suddenly is extremely dangerous, this can cause convulsions, seizures, acute delirium, stroke, and it can be fatal. Stopping a benzo c/t often does quite a bit of damage to the central nervous system. I wouldn't be too hard on the doctor, benzos are safer than a lot of drugs out there, even in larger doses. It's risky stopping anything suddenly before talking with the doctor. Just about anything he can take will have addictive potential. Especially anti depressants, these meds are increasing certain neurotransmitters like serotonin and dopamine and stopping suddenly leaves the brain "hanging" so to speak with very low levels of these critical chemicals and the body is no longer producing them on it's own like it should, the point of tapering off of anyhting is to give the body a chance to safely start producing its normal amount of these neurotransmitters. The problem with him being off of them alltogether is that if he is depressed there is a good chance it is due to his body not producing enough of a certain neurotransmitter(s) and depression is nothing to fool around with especially in a young person. I would just have a very thorough conversation w/ the doc about all of his different options and how the xanax has been working and how much is has helped or not. This will give you a much better idea of what might be wrong and the neurotransmitters involved.

xoxo- D.

The same thing happened to me recently.  I have been suffering with severe postpartum deppression, anxiety and panic attacks.  My doctor had been prescribing me .25 mg xanax to take once a day for several years now.  When I went in for my physical she changed to script to .5 mg xanax twice a day.  Well the next month I went to get my scrip filled and she filled the .25 dosage without even calling me.  I tried to get her to change the dosage and she had a nurse call me and say that she only wanted that dosage to be for one month as a "bandaide" for the time being.  
Well I ran out of my script in only ten days and have been suffering from withdrawl, anxiety, sweating, panic.  It is very addictive and I didn't really know this.  Don't you think it was rude of my doc to just cut me off and not even talk to me on the phone?  I guess some docs doing want to be liable for any problems with addiction..  
As far as a substitute I've heard that Adivan is weaker.  I've just been drinking a lot to help me relax.  I'm not sure which is worst for me, xanax or binge drinking.  I'm so mad at my MP.  

amino acids have been proven to be 400% more effective than pharmacutical drugs for depression and anxiety.

find a book called,

the mood cure,

by, julia ross

all my depression and anxiety symptoms dissappeard completely when i started taking aminos 6 months ago.

all of them completely.

this is always possible and what you are describing is common. It could also just be that you are building a tolerance which is completely normal.

xoxo-D.

Hi... i'm sorry to hear about your son.

When you say his MD gave him his meds, did you mean psychiatrist MD or regular MD?  I must tell you, generally speaking, for mild or temporary depression, your regular doctor can sometimes help.

If your son has severe depression and anxiety and has suffered this for a long time, he really needs a proper diagnosis from a good psychiatrist.  They will know best (it's what they do) what to put him on, and what to try next if that doesn't work.  Sometimes it's trial and error.

As well, hopefully they would encourage your son (and you) to first stabilize him, but then get him into some sort of talk therapy (whether with this psychiatrist or someone he/she recommends.)  Alot of the time, this sort of thing has a psychological/emotional root, and if you can get to that (long tough work, but it works) you get to the root of the problem, and not just put a bandaid on a wound that will never heal.

But he does need obviously to be diagnosed/stabilized properly first.

Forgive me if you know all of this already...

wishing you well...
mj

The amino acids can be more effective for some, but not the majority. There are no clinical trials or valid research that concretely prove amino acids to be more effective than pharmaceuticals.The studies that there are, are not all invalid, they are just not applicable to the majority of those with chemical imbalances. The amino acids work for some because certain amino acids, your body turns into the same neurotransmitters that antidepressants are increasing. L-tyrosine the body turns into dopamine, tryptophan the body turns into serotonin. The difference is that just b/c your body is getting it doesn't mean your body will use more of it at the same time. You can take all the tryptophan you want and the serotonin receptors will use part and reuptake the rest leaving most with depression or anxiety with too little serotonin(as an example, b/c there are almost always more than just one neurotransmitter involved). The other thing is that many antidepressants and other meds are targeted at specific serotonin, dopamine, norepi etc. receptors. Certain types of depression only involve serotonin type 1 and 2 receptors or GABA type a receptors and the medication can be targeted to those specific receptor sites, when you flood all the receptor sites things can go pretty haywire in someone who is depressed, anxious, etc. The SSRI's, like prozac, for example not only increase the amount of serotonin and stops the reuptake of the extra serotonin left in the synaptic gap. but over time also makes the neurons more sensitive to serotonin so they will absorb even more of the serotonin that is left in the synaptic gap. I have a few patients that use amino acids with great success, and anyone who can do it this way I most definitely think should. Even coca cola has a large amount of L-phenylalanine which the body turns into l-tyrosine, then to dopamine so eating certain foods is usually a good idea along with amino acids too just as long as you are careful about the amount your body is getting daily.

xoxo- D.

xoxo- D.

thats hard.  It sounds like he will probably go through some benzo withdrawal.  I'm not sure what you asking but it sounds like you want him to be on something that is less addicting or want him off it completely.  Maybe he should just go to rehab and then asses the situation after he is detoxed and see how he feels or see if he still needs maybe a lighter benzo like lorazapam.