I am a 70 year old male and I've been taking Temazepam & Lorazepam for almost 10 years to help me sleep. At first, small dosages, as needed, and then increasingly larger dosages. I started with 0.5mg of Lorazepam about 5 years ago. It worked so well that I was getting 6 to 7 hours of restful sleep every time I took the medication. No hangover other ill effects, ever. I worked up my dosage to 3 mg nightly and suddenly in early September 2010, it stopped working. Taking a higher dosage made things actually worse. I just couldn't fall sleep anymore. I would lay in bed with my eyes closed but wide awake.
Little did I know about Lorazepam withdrawal!
I was given Lunesta, which did not work, 25mg Seroquel which worked a little bit for a few days if taken along with 15mg Tamazepam. Then it ' too, stopped working. One night, I accidentally, took 2mg of Lorazepam and it worked great until Dec 1, 2010. I was put back on 100mg of Seroquel and it did not work at all. I took it for four days and quit. Next was Ambien CR, the 12.5mg dose allowed me to sleep for about 2 hours, a second dose would allow me to sleep for another hour. I even tried a third dosage without any success.
A new doctor prescribed 100 to 200mg Trazodone and 15mg Mirtazapine. The first night, I took both medications with horrendous results and no sleep. The second night, I took 100mg Trazodone with equally bad results.
I was at a loss and stopped taken all medications. At around 2 PM, 12/25/2010, I hit rock bottom. I was wondering what would happen to my two big dogs, if I were to call 911. It would be a death sentence for them! I just couldn't allow that to happen. I Googled Lorazepam again and came across a webpage 'Lorazepam Withdrawal', where I learned that you could not stop "cold turkey". So, now I'm taking 1mg Lorazepam every 8 hours now, I'm sleeping and feel good, almost great. The next step is to introduce 5mg Diazepam and actually get hooked on it.
My question is: "Do I have to get hooked on Diazepam to withdraw from Lorazepam?" "Could I increase the time interval between the Lorazepam dosages, let's say go from 8 hrs. to 9 hrs. and so on and do that way?"