Question about clonazapam

I'm wondering if the anxiety I feel when clonazapam wears off is a rebound reaction? Is it normal for the anxiety to come back as soon as it's out of your system?

I started out taking it only when needed and only half of a 5 mg tablet per day. Then started taking the 2.5 every night before bed because I was going through some bad times and lots of physical pain.

Now, for maybe the last week, I'm taking the whole 5 mg every day in the early evening. I can tell when this wears off in the afternoon and hold off until evening to take it. My pain comes back when it wears off.

Does this mean I'm addicted? I'm wondering if I should stop it altogether.

Has anyone taken this long term at a low dose and been ok? I mean not addicted? But then how does one know?

Green Grove is right! Talk to your doc about going off the med. It must be done safely. Your body may be experiencing withdrawal symptoms. Let us know what happens!

cookies18 said...
Clonzepam has helped me through so much and it's sad to say but I think it is an addicting drug. I've finally stopped taking it everyday after like a year, and now I just take it when I need it. When you aren't abusing it (which it doesn't seem like you are) it can be SO helpful

It has helped me also. I can tell when it is starting to wear off but I really try to stick to my schedule. It has help me while I wean off my Lexapro too. Hang in there.

I will just relate what my Psychiatrist told me about the drug. He said it takes 3 days to completely clear your system, so to whatever extent is still working for that 3 days regardless of the timetable they put on the drug. So he was quite cavalier about scheduling my appointments where they would be falling a day, or 2 past when the medication would run out if I took them exactly as prescribed.

I have to say that I was not fond of this Doctor, but I was stuck with him until I could get back to work and pay for a Doctor. But his assessment of the 3 day thing was actualy preaty accurate on me. I could feel the stress level opening up on me right about the 10 to 12 hours after the last dose. That stress level would slowly build up and by day 2 without it I was in moderate anxiety and by day 3 I was fighting to focus my mind to not have panic attacks.

But that is of course all relative to the individual and what their Panic attack threshold would be to begin with.

If its a issue of helping with muscle tension or spasm pain, you could ask your Doctor about the muscle relaxer Baclofen. They actualy don't even know why this muscle relaxer works, but they believe it is working on the GABA receptors. It can be weaned off fairly fast if it loses its effectivenes after a few months of use, and then can be gone back onto it after a couple of weeks and will have regained its effectiveness.

And I asked my Psychiatrist about it as I was concerned about taking Klonopin and Baclofen at the same time, since they both are working on GABA receptors and he said its not a problem. Its said its two totaly different drugs working in two totaly different ways. He actualy got quite nasty about a comment I made about the Klonopin relieving muscle spasm pain. He said, that is not what Klonopin is for!!! Klonopin is for your anxiety disorder, the Baclofen is for your muscles!

Like I said. Never really cared much for him. He wasn't nearly as bad though as the one I had that was so insistent on getting me off Klonopin that he stuck me on Depakote and I sunk into the deepest depression of my life and could barely tell the difference between my dreams and being awake. I cared about nothing on this drug. I told him for months it was a horrible drug for me and he kept pushing it. Finally, one day this Doctor completely disapears from his job never to be seen again and they assign me another Doctor. The very first words out of my new Doctors mouth on reading my chart was, "DEPAKOTE"!!! This is the worst drug in the world for us to be putting you on. And then he rewrote my scripts for Klonopin.

I guess those kinds of things happen when medicine gets split up into so many pieces Doctors don't have the time to look at the whole person.