Discontinuing Xanax

To help keep my blood pressure normal, I was given few medicines including Xanax. It works. But when I slowly withdrawing from 0.5 mg to 0.25 in one week time, I felt terribly bad and my blood pressure going up again. Is one week 50% dosage cut is not sufficient ? Should I go 2 weeks instead ?

[Roger Gould, M.D.]

The recommendation is that you reduce it 25% each week...go as slowly as you need, and if having trouble, ask your doctor to replace the xanax with an equivalent dose of klonopin, and then reduce that the same way.