About 8 months ago, I made a attempt to stop drinking with the help of self-prescribed high dose baclofen. At 250-300 mg/day--I didn't have the memory to keep an accurate account of my dosage--I made it three days AF (after a slow, careful tapering off), and then I started having panic attacks at seemingly random times. My GP was absolutely no help; she gave me 20 1/8 mg tablets of xanax (with no refills), and told me to take 1/2 pill if I felt like I was going to have a panic attack, and then take the other half if that didn't help after 30 minutes. 62.5 MICROgrams of alprazolam to abort a panic attack? Really? You can keep your placebos, doc. Anyway, moving on...
I started taking baclofen again after a HORRIBLE w/d. For three days straight, I had trouble remembering what day it was, what MONTH it was. I never slept more than a couple hours at a time, and always woke up in a state of panic, and it took me about five minutes to realize where and when I was. I did this at home, by the way--no inpatient rehabs for me, thank you. It's prison by another name, IMHO. They make you do your time, pay your fine, and then send you back out into the world to recidivate.
I started to go to AA meetings, I bought The Big Book, The Twelve Steps, and some other book whose name I can't remember. I could really identify with their description of alcohol dependence, I just had no faith in the steps to recovery. That, and my temporary sponsor ended up being a schizophrenic megalomaniac (not a good combination).
So that brings me to my current endeavor. I've started taking bac again, I'm consulting Dr. L, and I even emailed OA. I'm up to 210 mg/day as of today, and I have to say, I'm not feeling most of the side effects I was feeling the last time I took it. The numbness/tingling in fingers, the superhero-enhanced sense of smell, the auditory hallucinations, the agitation, etc. (I could go on forever.) They're all much milder, transient, or not there at all. The only thing I can think of is that he (Dr. L) has got me increasing my daily dose by 20 mg/week. I'm not AF, but I'm definitely not bingeing the way I used to on the weekends. I hope very soon to be completely AF.
Wow, this post turned out to be much longer than I planned. And as acerbic as it may have sounded in places, I'm actually doing pretty good most of the time. I hope I didn't step on too many toes the last time I was here. I look forward to hearing from my fellow MWOers.
I started taking baclofen again after a HORRIBLE w/d. For three days straight, I had trouble remembering what day it was, what MONTH it was. I never slept more than a couple hours at a time, and always woke up in a state of panic, and it took me about five minutes to realize where and when I was. I did this at home, by the way--no inpatient rehabs for me, thank you. It's prison by another name, IMHO. They make you do your time, pay your fine, and then send you back out into the world to recidivate.
I started to go to AA meetings, I bought The Big Book, The Twelve Steps, and some other book whose name I can't remember. I could really identify with their description of alcohol dependence, I just had no faith in the steps to recovery. That, and my temporary sponsor ended up being a schizophrenic megalomaniac (not a good combination).
So that brings me to my current endeavor. I've started taking bac again, I'm consulting Dr. L, and I even emailed OA. I'm up to 210 mg/day as of today, and I have to say, I'm not feeling most of the side effects I was feeling the last time I took it. The numbness/tingling in fingers, the superhero-enhanced sense of smell, the auditory hallucinations, the agitation, etc. (I could go on forever.) They're all much milder, transient, or not there at all. The only thing I can think of is that he (Dr. L) has got me increasing my daily dose by 20 mg/week. I'm not AF, but I'm definitely not bingeing the way I used to on the weekends. I hope very soon to be completely AF.
Wow, this post turned out to be much longer than I planned. And as acerbic as it may have sounded in places, I'm actually doing pretty good most of the time. I hope I didn't step on too many toes the last time I was here. I look forward to hearing from my fellow MWOers.
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