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Benzo Withdrawals
I suffer from Utricular Vertigo. Because of this, my Neurologist and also my Otoneuroligist, both prescribed Valium and Klonopin for my disorder. Thanks from going from a top of line Blue Cross PPO to Medi-Cal (CA's name for Medicaid) I got completely cut off from my Benzo's after 12 years.
Because my Medi-Cal PCP wouldn't do a damn thing for me, I ended up at the ER 3 times in a 2 week period. The last time with a blood pressure rate of 206 over 130. Which is nice, because it gets you to the head of the line... LOL. :(
Anyways, after being on 40mg of Valium per day and 1.5mg of of Klonopin per day for 12 years... which using the Benzo Calculator is equal to 70mg of Valium per day.
It took about 3 weeks before my withdrawals truly hit, and when they hit, the super anxiety was brutal. To the point that if I didn't have something, like a movie, distracting me, I couldn't even function. I suffered from almost every single Benzo withdrawal symptom, to the the point that I actually bit my tongue to the the point it was bleeding while suffering from a full body spasms while I was asleep.
But it has been about 5 weeks now, and the anxiety has gone away thanks to taking Ibuprofen. Which I just happened to take due knee pain one night. After reading about Ibuprofen, the number 1 withdrawal symptom is Anxiety. (So I probably will have to detox off of it too.)
And oh my god. If you have never experienced Extreme Anxiety before, thank whoever you believe in!!!!. While I still feel, after drinking a liter of alcohol as I write this, so bad that it is amazing that I don't have suicidal thoughts.
I'm 5 weeks into Benzo, basically Valium withdrawals, and was hoping somebody could offer some advice.
Obviously from the long half-life of both Valium and Klonopin, both around 200 hours, it took quite a while before the full effects finally hit me.
Thank god the Anxiety portion has gone away... maybe thanks to my taking about 2,000mg of Ibuprofen per day. But I still feel like absolute ****... to the point that if I don't drink about about a liter of alcohol, I couldn't even come close to being able to type this.
So, thanks to getting zero help, except from ER doctors, I was hoping that someone out there can tell me what to take in order to get past this...just get drunk off my *** deal, so I can deal and get some sleep... to be able to get on with my life.
What truly scares me, is that everything I have read says to to taper off slowly. Which isn't an option for me, unless you know a Riverside PCP willing to do this. Even the $2,500 per day, not covered my insurance, places still don't cover Valium detox.
And like I said, I've already got past the worst of it. The extreme anxiety, aka, fear of ******* anything imaginable, even just being able to swallow... it truly was that bad.
But I am still just hating life. I feel a million times better than I did a week ago, but I am still sweating so bad that I don't know if I am hot or cold, and the sweat is so sticky that it is unbearable.
Any ideas of what I should do? I know I can go to ER again, but I don't want anymore Benzos.
So the real question is what can I do about feeling so freaking bad, even while drinking a liter of alcohol per day?
Because my Medi-Cal PCP wouldn't do a damn thing for me, I ended up at the ER 3 times in a 2 week period. The last time with a blood pressure rate of 206 over 130. Which is nice, because it gets you to the head of the line... LOL. :(
Anyways, after being on 40mg of Valium per day and 1.5mg of of Klonopin per day for 12 years... which using the Benzo Calculator is equal to 70mg of Valium per day.
It took about 3 weeks before my withdrawals truly hit, and when they hit, the super anxiety was brutal. To the point that if I didn't have something, like a movie, distracting me, I couldn't even function. I suffered from almost every single Benzo withdrawal symptom, to the the point that I actually bit my tongue to the the point it was bleeding while suffering from a full body spasms while I was asleep.
But it has been about 5 weeks now, and the anxiety has gone away thanks to taking Ibuprofen. Which I just happened to take due knee pain one night. After reading about Ibuprofen, the number 1 withdrawal symptom is Anxiety. (So I probably will have to detox off of it too.)
And oh my god. If you have never experienced Extreme Anxiety before, thank whoever you believe in!!!!. While I still feel, after drinking a liter of alcohol as I write this, so bad that it is amazing that I don't have suicidal thoughts.
I'm 5 weeks into Benzo, basically Valium withdrawals, and was hoping somebody could offer some advice.
Obviously from the long half-life of both Valium and Klonopin, both around 200 hours, it took quite a while before the full effects finally hit me.
Thank god the Anxiety portion has gone away... maybe thanks to my taking about 2,000mg of Ibuprofen per day. But I still feel like absolute ****... to the point that if I don't drink about about a liter of alcohol, I couldn't even come close to being able to type this.
So, thanks to getting zero help, except from ER doctors, I was hoping that someone out there can tell me what to take in order to get past this...just get drunk off my *** deal, so I can deal and get some sleep... to be able to get on with my life.
What truly scares me, is that everything I have read says to to taper off slowly. Which isn't an option for me, unless you know a Riverside PCP willing to do this. Even the $2,500 per day, not covered my insurance, places still don't cover Valium detox.
And like I said, I've already got past the worst of it. The extreme anxiety, aka, fear of ******* anything imaginable, even just being able to swallow... it truly was that bad.
But I am still just hating life. I feel a million times better than I did a week ago, but I am still sweating so bad that I don't know if I am hot or cold, and the sweat is so sticky that it is unbearable.
Any ideas of what I should do? I know I can go to ER again, but I don't want anymore Benzos.
So the real question is what can I do about feeling so freaking bad, even while drinking a liter of alcohol per day?
Best Answer
Hi PBFred Welcome to the forum. First you need to stop putting the Alcohol in your body This is contributing to you feeling so bad.. I know at the moment it does not feel like it but it is. Replace the booze with healthy food a lot of water Vitamins and outside walking This will help you to get some feel good endorphins working in your brain Exercise is important even if you have to force yourself up and out. Sleep is a issue for all of us coming off anything it seems This is all going to take time to get back but if you are kind to your body and brain it will heal and you will feel good Without the drugs, Congratulations by the way for getting off the benzos although it was not by choice you will find that the drugs have stolen a lot of color and joy from your life. As the days go by you will find yourself getting better I'm really glad the Extreme Anxiety has passed That in itself is a Blessing. Taking that much Ibuprofen a day is really rough on your kidneys Drink water to flush them and discontinue as soon as you can.. Take care and I wish you well.. lesa
Thank you both for your replies.
Sorry for the slow response, but to top off my withdrawal symptoms, I also came down with a serious sinus infection, which I caught from my mom... which she most likely caught from one of my ER visits. Granted, the one good thing from it is that it has helped me sleep.
My main question is how long should I expect these Valium withdrawals to last?
Some sites say 90 days, while others say up to 2 years without using the Ashton Schedule of slowly decreasing my dosage.
Lesa, my vertigo is so bad that, without meds, I can't workout. It basically keeps me bedridden. Just imagine spinning in circles, like I think most of us did as kids, until the point you fall down. It causes a serious brain fog, to the point that I can't even type this unless I was on my meds, or alcohol. Which, even the doctors that finally diagnosed my vertigo admitted that alcohol is a treatment for my rare form of vertigo.
And I have been pounding water and Gatorade thanks to the 45 day supply of Clonidine that 2 of the ER docs gave me to keep my blood pressure down. Wow, that stuff really dries me out and keeps me going to the bathroom.
MM, actually, the alcohol did almost nothing for the high anxiety I was experiencing. It truly is the Ibuprofen that is helping that. But it definitely doesn't keep working as well all day. A 600mg dose when I wake up works great now, but 4-5 hours later, 600mg doesn't work as well, and 12 hour after my first dose, even 800mg barely does anything.
And thanks to my vertigo, I've been unable to work for about 7 years now and have been living with my parents. And again, thanks to our great healthcare system, almost all my records have disappeared, to the point that I got turned down for Disibility, plus only got put on Medi-Cal (CA's name for Medicaid) this year. That was when I got shut out from being able to see my former doc that has been prescribing these meds for me for over 12 years... and my Medi-Cal PCP wouldn't prescribe them for me... or do anything about the withdrawals I knew I was going to go through.
My parents are my only source of income, and they both are retired on a fixed income. Yet, they were willing to shell out some serious cash to get me into rehab/detox... yet, we could find no place in SoCal that treats Benzo Withdrawals. Their sites will say that they do, but then you call them up and it turns out that they won't treat me. So, secondary insurance won't help me at all, plus, by having my parents pay for it will cause me to lose my Medi-Cal. Yes, ObamaCare is that bad. Go sit in an ER waiting room these days to see how bad ObamaCare is, it truly is amazing. An ER is almost the only way to get treatment for anything. Plus, if you didn't know, your PCP is only allowed to see you for 10 minutes and only treat one thing per visit, or else their billing rate gets cut drastically, so they won't do it. It is pretty scary.
So I am still drinking a lot of alcohol every day, and taking a lot of Ibuprofen. But I wait until I truly can't handle it any longer. So I have cut back, but not by much. And when I say I can't handle it any longer, that is to the point that can barely get a drink to my mouth because my hands are trembling that bad... and can barely speak. And I bet you are thinking that is alcohol withdrawals. Trust me, it is not. If it were, I wouldn't be writing this post because I got as much alcohol available to me as I want.
Thanks again,
Fred
Sorry for the slow response, but to top off my withdrawal symptoms, I also came down with a serious sinus infection, which I caught from my mom... which she most likely caught from one of my ER visits. Granted, the one good thing from it is that it has helped me sleep.
My main question is how long should I expect these Valium withdrawals to last?
Some sites say 90 days, while others say up to 2 years without using the Ashton Schedule of slowly decreasing my dosage.
Lesa, my vertigo is so bad that, without meds, I can't workout. It basically keeps me bedridden. Just imagine spinning in circles, like I think most of us did as kids, until the point you fall down. It causes a serious brain fog, to the point that I can't even type this unless I was on my meds, or alcohol. Which, even the doctors that finally diagnosed my vertigo admitted that alcohol is a treatment for my rare form of vertigo.
And I have been pounding water and Gatorade thanks to the 45 day supply of Clonidine that 2 of the ER docs gave me to keep my blood pressure down. Wow, that stuff really dries me out and keeps me going to the bathroom.
MM, actually, the alcohol did almost nothing for the high anxiety I was experiencing. It truly is the Ibuprofen that is helping that. But it definitely doesn't keep working as well all day. A 600mg dose when I wake up works great now, but 4-5 hours later, 600mg doesn't work as well, and 12 hour after my first dose, even 800mg barely does anything.
And thanks to my vertigo, I've been unable to work for about 7 years now and have been living with my parents. And again, thanks to our great healthcare system, almost all my records have disappeared, to the point that I got turned down for Disibility, plus only got put on Medi-Cal (CA's name for Medicaid) this year. That was when I got shut out from being able to see my former doc that has been prescribing these meds for me for over 12 years... and my Medi-Cal PCP wouldn't prescribe them for me... or do anything about the withdrawals I knew I was going to go through.
My parents are my only source of income, and they both are retired on a fixed income. Yet, they were willing to shell out some serious cash to get me into rehab/detox... yet, we could find no place in SoCal that treats Benzo Withdrawals. Their sites will say that they do, but then you call them up and it turns out that they won't treat me. So, secondary insurance won't help me at all, plus, by having my parents pay for it will cause me to lose my Medi-Cal. Yes, ObamaCare is that bad. Go sit in an ER waiting room these days to see how bad ObamaCare is, it truly is amazing. An ER is almost the only way to get treatment for anything. Plus, if you didn't know, your PCP is only allowed to see you for 10 minutes and only treat one thing per visit, or else their billing rate gets cut drastically, so they won't do it. It is pretty scary.
So I am still drinking a lot of alcohol every day, and taking a lot of Ibuprofen. But I wait until I truly can't handle it any longer. So I have cut back, but not by much. And when I say I can't handle it any longer, that is to the point that can barely get a drink to my mouth because my hands are trembling that bad... and can barely speak. And I bet you are thinking that is alcohol withdrawals. Trust me, it is not. If it were, I wouldn't be writing this post because I got as much alcohol available to me as I want.
Thanks again,
Fred
Fred,
I have heard a lot of negativity about your current medical experience. I don't doubt that there is much room for improvement in the medical world. A few things strike me, though.
First, a Doctor generally doesn't want to see their patient taken off this high of a dose without a taper, even if they are switching PCP's and don't have a lot of medical history to support your diagnosis. If there was at least a history of you being prescribed these doses, odds are they would want to do a taper. I am not challenging your experience, but rather am very confused by it.
You need a good PCP on your side for everything you are experiencing. As is life, it will fall on you to make that happen and I can offer no suggestions. I do really think your energy should be focused on somehow, some way, making sure you get a doctor willing to at least treat your primary diagnosis in some way and counsel you on your withdrawal.
Best wishes, and again...keep checking in!
MM
I have heard a lot of negativity about your current medical experience. I don't doubt that there is much room for improvement in the medical world. A few things strike me, though.
First, a Doctor generally doesn't want to see their patient taken off this high of a dose without a taper, even if they are switching PCP's and don't have a lot of medical history to support your diagnosis. If there was at least a history of you being prescribed these doses, odds are they would want to do a taper. I am not challenging your experience, but rather am very confused by it.
You need a good PCP on your side for everything you are experiencing. As is life, it will fall on you to make that happen and I can offer no suggestions. I do really think your energy should be focused on somehow, some way, making sure you get a doctor willing to at least treat your primary diagnosis in some way and counsel you on your withdrawal.
Best wishes, and again...keep checking in!
MM
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Alcohol produces intoxication in much the same way benzo's produce their anxiolytic effect, so in reality, you are replacing one dependency with another potential dependency. Not only is this cocktail of alcohol and ibuprofen not helpful to your withdrawal, but it's pretty hard on your body.
You were on high doses and I imagine the withdrawal can last quite some time, although again, I'm not a doctor. I did happen to work for Medicaid in my state, though. It is common that state funded Medicaid does not pay for benzo's or barbiturates, but Medicare supplements often do and generally those who qualify for Medicaid qualify for that secondary insurance. Have you looked into this?
It's all different state to state, so who knows how similar it would be in your state, but it is worth checking out. I suggest looking into this only because I'm unclear on a few things. Did you stop taking your medication because you can't afford them or because the Doctor stopped prescribing them? If it is because you can't afford them, then I would suggest talking more with your doctor about your current symptoms and seeing what they suggest in your specific situation.
Keep checking in so we know how you are doing...
MM