A new blueprint for dealing with benzo dependency

A NEW  BLUEPRINT FOR COPING WITH BENZO DEPENDENCY

1. Stop taking your benzo on an ‘as needs’ basis

Do not take benzos on an ‘as needs’ basis. ‘As needs’ usage may appear to be a way of controlling or avoiding dependency but varying your dose from day to day or week to week  can actually have quite the opposite effect - playing havoc with your body’s neurological responses and leading more quickly to extreme withdrawal symptoms.

2. Stabilise your daily dose

You may already be on a stable daily dosage regimen recommended by your prescriber. If not, if you are used to taking your benzo on an ‘as needs’ basis, or if you are already experiencing withdrawal symptoms in between doses then -  even if this means increasing your dose slightly - first stabilise your daily dose at a level you are comfortable with and where these symptoms become manageable.

3. Switch from a ‘short-acting’ to a ‘long-acting’ benzo

If you are not taking diazepam (‘Valium’) then use this equivalence table to check the diazepam equivalent of the benzo you are taking and gradually switch from your current benzo to taking equivalent doses of diazepem.

4. DO NOT LET YOURSELF BE PRESSURISED into tapering (gradual dose reduction) until you are willing and ready, and do not accept over-rapid tapering schedules that produce extreme withdrawal symptoms.

5. DO NOT LET  YOURSELF BE PRESSURISED INTO SIGNING UP FOR RAPID DETOX PROGRAMMES. These can do much more harm than good.

6. DO NOT ACCEPT COUNSELLING FROM ANYONE WITHOUT PERSONAL EXPERIENCE OF BENZO DEPENDENCY.

7. DO NOT ACCEPT ADVICE from ‘addiction counsellors’ used only to dealing with alcoholics or users of non-prescription street drugs.

8.  DO use social media and/or ads in your local press to seek contact with other people with a benzo dependency problem. These can offer a great source of mutual understanding and support.

9. The 'Golden Rule' for dealing with withdrawal symptoms: if you experience 'withdrawal symptoms' then do exactly what they are urging you to do - which is precisely to avoid all activities and 'withdraw' from all situations which induce them or make them worse. Withdrawal symptoms are a result of benzo dependency creating a heightened sensitivity to stress, or to any form of stimulation of the central nervous system - even many forms of positive stimulation. Benzo dependency intensifies sensitivity to many forms of stimulation - which are experienced at overstimulation and lead also to fatigue. Therefore the avoidance of this sense of overstimulation in the course of each and every day, week and month is the number one or 'Golden Rule for dealing with withdrawal symptoms.

The Golden Rule can be aided in two ways:

1. by allowing yourself a 'breathing space' for doing nothing at all but rest between each and every daily activity. During such breathing spaces do nothing but be aware of your symptoms but as pure bodily sensations. Allow yourself to also be aware of of any thoughts or feelings your thoughts and feelings these sensations give rise - but do not identify with those thoughts and feelings. Instead concentrate on just feeling your body as a whole - and also the larger and empty space around it. Let your bodily awareness expand into that space, which is also a larger space of awareness - on that is distinct and free of sensations, thoughts and feelings.

2. by establishing a more or less fixed and comfortable routine for your days that allows for periods of activity - but does not lead to overactivity or overstimulation.

10. TO TAPER OR NOT TO TAPER?

This is one question never  asked in the benzo community. In fact it has become a taboo question. That is because tapering has now become the standard ‘one size fits all’ approach to benzo dependency. It can work effectively for many - including you. But for people who have been on benzos for years, and particularly on high doses,  it can also mean the sacrifice of many more years of their life to complete incapacitation and horrific withdrawal symptom - which may not even stop after they have competed a tapering regime and completely come off their drug. The other, more insidious danger of tapering is also that it allows Big Pharma and the psychiatric profession to pretend that benzo dependency has a 'simple' cure - and so isn’t the horrific problem it so often is. Finally,there is the grave danger that, even in the community of benzodiazepine victims, unwillingness or failure to taper becomes a stigma, making the individual feel flawed, weak or guilty.

FACTORS TO BE CONSIDERED IN THE DECISION TO TAPER

1. The intensity and severity of the withdrawal symptoms the individual experiences while still taking their benzo at their usual dose, for example inter-dose withdrawal symptoms resulting from so-called ‘tolerance’, i.e. reduced effectiveness of the drug at a given dose.

2.  The specific benzodiazepine taken by the individual and how high their daily dosage is.

3. The number of days, weeks, months or years the individual has been taking it.

4. The relative degree of loss to the individual’s quality of life resulting from

            (a) staying on the drug or

            (b) possibly suffering extreme and incapacitating withdrawal symptoms from tapering, which can last for years even after ‘successfully’ coming off the drug.        

5. The availability - or not - of face-to-face or 24-hour telephone counselling support, particularly during periods when the patient is experiencing extreme withdrawal symptoms due to tolerance.

6. The individual’s ability to use variety of methods from ‘mindfulness’ meditation or to alternative medications such as pure GABA or pregabalin) to deal with withdrawal symptoms and to successfully delay dose increases due to tolerance.  

7. The ability of the individual, despite periodic dose increases, to eventually arrive at and maintain a stable maximum or ‘ceiling’ dose with minimum impairment to physical health or cognitive ability.  

The trust that one can and will eventually reach a maximum ceiling dose in which symptoms of benzo dependency can be successsfully managed on  a daily basis is important. You will know it when that point is reached. It is no different in principle from the type of trust people are urged to have when going through extreme suffering during a tapering regime.   

NOTE: If you have become dependent on benzos through ‘recreational use’ follow the same advice given in this blueprint.