A collection of studies on Robert Whitaker's website that show how benzodiazepines create worse havoc in the bodies of those given them: Benzodiazepines/Anxiety In the early 1980s, governmental medical authorities in the United States and the United Kingdom concluded that benzodiazepines were addictive and should not be used on a long-term basis. Studies showed that... Continue Reading →
The Accidental Addict (NZ news magazine) Assignment programme from 1995 dealing with the issue of iatrogenic benzodiazepine dependence. This is a 15 year old documentary. Why in hell are doctors still handing this crap out like candy? This phenomena of severe benzodiazepine withdrawal and post-withdrawal syndrome has been known about for two decades at least! The... Continue Reading →
The below was written by one of the members on the benzo board I frequent. I found it useful and thought I would share it here too as these are symptoms not often talked about. The fact is this thread got lots of attention. These are relatively common withdrawal problems but you won't find mention... Continue Reading →
Clearly, I'm reading and posting all these articles on benzodiazepines because I'm coping with the following issues with a post withdrawal syndrome. It's a syndrome that can go on for many months and in some cases years. It's much easier at this point in the journey to print the words of others who have gone... Continue Reading →
This is a piece by Robert Whitaker that was written for the benzo community and published by a friend of mine in this newsletter on a benzo withdrawal support website. I received permission to reprint it here. One of the topics Whitaker's new book Anatomy of an Epidemic: Magic Bullets, Psychiatric Drugs, and the Astonishing Rise... Continue Reading →
This is taken from a post on a benzo board I go to for information and these days for hope that I will make it through this phase of acute post-withdrawal. I got permission to repost this here. Hello everyone, Over 14 months ago I took my last bit of Klonopin, after what essentially amounted... Continue Reading →
Update 2026: As I do updates going back in time and read these old posts I learn a lot about things I've forgotten. In the instance of this post, I actually still get this symptom. I now think it's associated with the mold/fungal infections I have that are associated with the chronic Lyme disease. These are issues I'm still dealing with because of how the tardive dyskinesia holds and processes the biofilm associated with the multiple Systemic Infections. I do intend to write more about how these infections interact with trauma and all the other aspects of environment in the world that made me profoundly understand the idea EVERYTHING MATTERS. This illness, if nothing else, continues to offer insight into the nature of being human!
I thought I would put a page together on benzo information and benzo withdrawal in particular since I have more collected info about this class of drug than the other 5 classes of psychotropic meds I've withdrawn from. Basically benzos and now antidepressant drugs are the two classes of drugs for which there is really quite a lot of info on the web regarding withdrawal. It's still mostly anecdotal and not studied, but it's been recognized much longer that there are severe problems with withdrawing from these two class of drugs so it's easier to collect information regarding such.
So here is what has become a rather extensive collection of articles and stories that deal with just benzos.
About 2 decades too late and a good decade after the alarm bell was sounded in the UK but it's better late than never. From the Washington Post: Benzodiazepines, often prescribed to manage anxiety, panic and sleep disorders, include Xanax, Ativan, Valium and Klonopin. Originally pushed as an alternative to barbiturates, their use has grown... Continue Reading →
(I've been visiting early posts from this site. A lot are diary-like and there is more involvement from readers since this predates social media getting really big.) Something that comes up quite often in discussions with my friends and readers who have been on meds and have come off of them is how many of the "psychiatric" symptoms they were being "treated" for disappear upon discontinuation of the medications. This is widely known and experienced among those of us who have decided to stop medicating ourselves. For me there are two most astonishing details. The first was when I discoveredI was being given more and more Risperdal to medicate away the akathisia that the Risperdal was causing! Once off the Risperdal the akathisia was gone and so was most of what we'd called anxiety which led me to take massive doses of benzos. This is tragic and disgusting.
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