Panic attac + Ambien abuse (snorting)

[hopeme]

Hey Gang,

Hoping for a bit of help from the community. I'm a 32 year old guy, and for the past 4-5 years, I've been on a combination of ambien + marijuana + alcohol at night. Thing is I normally crush up the ambien and snort them. I usually don't do the whole tablet but sometimes do. I've hid this habit from nearly everyone in my life, and have actually (somehow) been able to have a pretty successful career. My job is stressful, and I've always been a bit of an anxious person.

To deal with anxiety, I take xanax - really only when I fly (maybe 3-4 times per month). Lately, I've had some family stress plus my normal stress which resulted in a major panic attack last week (exactly 8 days ago). I've never experienced anything like this in my life. I ended up in the ER, because I truly thought I was having a heart attack and going to die. The results came back negative for the heart attack, and they also did a test for blood clots along with a chest x-ray. To be fair, I was also coming off a vacation where we ate / drank a very unhealthy amount.

Here's the thing: I don't feel the same at all. This panic attack rocked my world to the point I've seen my doctor (but not mentioned the snorting), and have an appt. this week with a cardiologist. My main "trigger" for the anxiety is wondering if the years of abuse from snorting will cause long term effects or potentially hurt me. I feel like I am short of breath at times when idle, but when I take a xanax (because I'm extremely anxious) that goes away so I'm 99% sure it's just the anxiety. It's been 7 nights since I've snorted anything - and never will do that again. I also haven't smoked since that time either.  I don't have any bleeding, sores, scabs, pain, but I still don't feel like I can breath out of my nose always.  I know this could be the anxiety, but I'm wondering if something else could be going on.  I have an appointment with an ENT next week as well.  Reflecting, I really can't believe I was that stupid. I guess after you're sure you're going to die you realize how much you want to live. Heavy **** for me.

I'm just curious if anyone has done anything similar for this period of time (snorting)? If so, how did it go when you quit? If I haven't done long term damage it has to be because I'm a runner (20-25 miles a week) and I'm sure this helps clear out the lungs and nasal cavity.

Thanks for any help. I am truly grateful to be able to be alive and type this right now

[gnarly_1]

Hi and welcome to the forum....well you got quit a cocktail of drugs in your system.....as the disease progresses you will find that things like anxiety come up more and more often ...it is like mothers little helper seam to turn on us.....this is very common ......I guess the only question I have for you is are you ready to quit????  if so we can help you  some of the meds need to be tapered off  xanex is a real mofo to detox off of   how many milagrams are you taking a day????  when I detoxed I was up to 4mg a day  it took a good 8 weeks of hell to get past it and that was with a doctors help tapering  if not done correctly you can go into seizures....the abian is a Z med and is also difficult to get off of  most people dont sleep for weeks coming off it....this may seam hard to do but trust me the longer you wait the worst it will be....your still realtivly young and still have a full life in front of you...being in a drug induced fog is no way to live and we cheat our loved ones of who we really are....I speak from experience  I lived in active addiction for 35yr's  it is no way to waist your life and is one of the reason I reach out to others here on the forum that want help  keep posting for support and we can also answer any questions you may have  we all look forward to helping you...............
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