Issues For Your Consideration
Why You Are So Sick
Benzodiazepines increase the effect of your normal GABA amounts. A normal nervous system operates with a constantly changing balance of excitatory and inhibitory neurotransmitter functions. Excitatory neurotransmitters act to cause alertness as well as anxiety. GABA, the main inhibitory transmitter, modulates or provides the brakes for what would be an otherwise out-of-control nervous system. When you take a benzodiazepine, your body responds by maintaining less GABA. After all, it doesn't need as much while a benzo is making the existing GABA more effective.
When a benzo supply is interrupted, as in just stopping your benzo, your GABA levels are reduced quickly. This leaves a benzo patient with too little GABA to do the work of managing neurotransmitters. So while we can reduce the drug to zero quickly, we can't repair the GABA damage right away. GABA isn't synthesized nearly as fast as the benzo levels drop. This leaves your nervous system unable to work properly. The resulting symptoms are varied. They can be bizarre, painful, and dangerous. They may be both physical and psychological. They are also commonly mistaken as symptoms of other conditions. They array of consequences of a too-small supply of GABA at its receptor is amazing.
So why does the idea that "getting the drug out of the body is the problem" flourish? Why do physicians insist that the benzo doses be suddenly made inadequate and not close enough to properly augment existing GABA? Physicians who are aksed to treat benzo victims do not commonly understand the consequences of a too-rapid decline in benzo levels. Some physicians also fail to understand that Xanax and Klonopin are very potent. We hear of people being told that 1.0mg of either is a "very small dose". It isn't.
It is clear that we must reduce a benzo dose to keep in step with the production of GABA. The real issue is finding how you can reduce your benzo dose in keeping with your own body's ability to repair. We do repair this situation; our bodies do make more GABA. The problem is that this takes time. That ability can be supported. It cannot be accelerated. The process is a DIY thing. No doctor can tell you when your limit is reached. You must make detailed notes to keep track of your condition. You must monitor your blood pressure and heart rate. You then respond to your body's messages. This is your job. No one else can know what you know.
Your body rules. You have to determine what your body really requires. If you can lose X mg of Valium in a day, that's what you do. You can't say that you'll just lose so many mgs in order to be finished by Christmas. It doesn't work that way. A lot of people still believe that it does. They can suffer for years while not knowing what went wrong. This is what went wrong: their cuts exceeded their own body's ability to make repairs. This is not a difficult concept. Using that concept forges your own path to benzo-freedom.
More issues for your consideration can be found here.
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Why We Feel So Sick
- Summary: Changes in GABA take time to repair.