Anxiety Disorders Support Group

.50 3X daily or as needed

Ok and you have been on this how long? Benzos like klonopin, valium, and tranxene give much better anxiety and panic control IMO without the interdose stuff that comes with the shorter acting stuff.

all i can say from my own personal experience is this...i use to have 4-7 panic attacks a day, taking xanax and doing my breathing exercises...my attacks would last anywhere from 45 minutes to 2 hours. I am relieved that I am not taking so much xanax anymore because i really think it stopped working after awhile-but the klonopin makes me feel normal and i nolonger have that anxious feeling all day long...i wish i would of been prescribed this med 4 months ago when i thought that there was no hope for me.

only since i went into the hospital last friday

MichMom77 siad>>> all i can say from my own personal experience is this...i use to have 4-7 panic attacks a day, taking xanax and doing my breathing exercises...my attacks would last anywhere from 45 minutes to 2 hours. I am relieved that I am not taking so much xanax anymore because i really think it stopped working after awhile-but the klonopin makes me feel normal and i nolonger have that anxious feeling all day long...i wish i would of been prescribed this med 4 months ago when i thought that there was no hope for me.Yep, this is the experience for the majority on the shorter acting benzos. They eventually have to be switched precisely because of the reasons you mentioned. Try if you can to keep the stress in your life to a min. and the med should continue to work great for you. Often once you get to feeling better which may take awhile, many people start back exercising and eating healthier too. Your confidence increases and your life slowly becomes what you wish it to be. I think out of all the things in life that brings us joy, most people just wanna be happy and healthy.

i agree, thank you. i am going to begin to take back my life. i just needed a little help right now. after spending sometime in the hospital for these issues i realized i was in bad shape mentally. will get back to me one way or another.

I got into major trouble on these class of drugs. Now I know I should have taken a 2 week drug holiday every few weeks to see if I was becoming addicted. My withdrawal was long and a thousand times worse than my worst anxiety

razzle,

many people do become addicted. in 2001 i was on 5-6 mg of xanax a day for my panic attacks. as soon as those attacks were gone and the zoloft/buspar kicked in I no longer had to take a xanax. was actually relieved when i didnt have to carry them around in my purse. i never took another xanax until feb of this year. iguess we are all different and our body chemistry is different as well. i am sorry that you had such a hard time getting off of these drugs.

I've read that the reason Klonopin is popular with GAD though not with panic attacks is because it kicks in gradually (45 minutes on average) and doesn't provide the rush that a faster-acting benzodiazepene like Xanax might, so it's theoretically less addictive.

That said, I don't have panic attacks but I do have constant anxiety and problems with agoraphobia so I've been on an ever-increasing dose of Klonopin since 2004. I'm now at 8mg/day, which I didn't even know was legal. And I'm physically dependent on it so I have no idea 1) what to do when I build up more of a tolerance and 2) what would happen if/when I gradually withdraw from the medication because it no longer works. My current doc told me people sometimes take 18mg a day. And Klonopin and Ativan are dose equivalent so imagine taking 18mg Ativan a day. I'm in therapy and have tried relaxation techniques but I can't concentrate and applying logic to my fears helps me understand but not beat them so I'm not sure.

Best wishes here to everybody here though going through anxiety, especially panic; I've had panic attacks and can't fathom the idea of having them regularly.

NG,

I guess all you can do is ask your doc lots of questions. i was pretty much a prisoner in my bed before the seroquel and the klonopin. I am not being sarcastic. i am meeting with two different psychiatrist this month to see what the next course of action is. my goal would be to just be on an antidepressant and an antianxiety med-without the benzos. But since living like a zombie since february, and now feeling like a can function-i guess i am going to just roll with the punches...i just know that i am a better person now who can function and actually get up in the morning and do things. I am also in therapy, and will continue to learn more and more about this disorder so that i feel secure.