That is how I read it jaw44 but there seems to be others factors in play as if I do use any Diazepam it wears off during the night and I don't get that drugged up feeling the next day as I did with Zopiclone.
Dave FOURTY ONE DAYS ZOPICLONE FREE!
^ Well done Dave. So do I understand right that you're now taking Diazepam instead? If so are you planning to come off that too?
I take 1mg of the Diazepam if I have had a bad day Steve so can't see a problem with that, it's much like unwinding with a beer I suppose. Apart from that having been a Zopiclone junkie for 25 years I would be very cautious and guarded about jumping out of the frying pan into the fire. To this end my doctor has done something right at long last and agreed not to issue any more Zopiclone and only minimal Diazepam. It seems to be working fine and I am sleeping like I haven't slept in years.
Dave - 1mg Diazapam! that's great! Do they come in 1mg tablets or do you break a 2.5mg tablet in half? What dose of diazepam did you start at when you first started switching over? This demonstrates the way tolerance can be reduced by lowering the dose and going through a short period of adjustment to the new lower dose--so that you can get more sensitive to the medication. I experienced this a year ago, i was getting more and more tolerance, so i was increasing my zolpidem. i would wake up not long after my bedtime dose and i would take more to get back to sleep, and then that didn't work and i took more, like a second time--and that didn't work either, and i could see i was on my way to having it not work at all like happened to me with diazepam 20 years ago, so i cut back the amount i was taking, accepted that i might not sleep much for two or three days, and the more i cut back, the better it worked. But i didn't keep tapering and i've gone back up some with the zolpidem--but no more zopiclone, thank God. It's really great news to hear that you are sleeping better than ever now, and, not feeling drugged during the day. I'm sure your grandson is enjoying the changes too! Congratulations on your well-earned success. It's great that your doctor is working with you. Not everyone has that kind of relationship. You were able to get through to him.
Hi Margaret, I have had difficulty sleeping for years and taking another form of sleeping tablets, like you I was given zopiclone and was actually told at the time that they were not addictive and yet I became addicted. I have been depressed and suffer from anxiety and panic attacks which even happens whilst watching tv with my children, my blood pressure goes through the roof. I have tried to come off them, however I get no sleep whats so ever if I dont take them. And after three or four nights of no sleep end up back on them. Also I dont know about you, but I find they now only give me a few hours sleep unlike the full night sleep they gave me in the beginning. I used to be such a confident person now I struggle interacting with a shopkeeper
The next day is an awful drag, unable to muster the energy to get through the day. Hope things pick up for you, I will continue to strive to get myself off them. Wish there was more help with sleep problems. When I consult the dr she asked me do I want to go on anti depressants, I know Im not depressed naturally, its the chemicals in zopiclone that are causing it. Take care
nobby
i had a doctor once that wanted to put me on an antidepressant, the brand name is Lexapro. This was because my much loved home got contaminated with pesticides and i had to relocate. I went to my doctor to ask her to write me a thing that could qualify me for sick leave from work, so i could move to my new place and get adjusted. She was willing to do that and she wrote a prescription for the antidepressant and told me to take it. I told her i wasn't depressed, i was just dealing with a difficult transition of losing my home, and relocating to a place that was much farther from work, and related things like that.
She said i should take the antidepressant, she said i needed it. She said research has shown that people who are depressed who don't take medication get cancer. Can you believe that? She was threatening me with getting cancer if i didn't take the antidepressant. She was saying the antidepressant could keep me from getting cancer.
I already knew that antidepressants can be difficult to get off of, very hard really for many people, and i didn't need that. i didn't argue with her, i just took took what i came there for. But i was shaking my head as i was driving away from there, thinking about how readily some doctors try to get people onto drugs, they really have faith him them. And they disregard all the problems the drugs cause. She used to prescribe my sleeping meds with a year's worth of refills, but my insurance company would only let me get it for 6 months, so she gave it for 6 months.
I imagine that antidepressants really help many people, but if you aren't depressed, and i certainly wasn't, then it's asking for trouble to condition the body to taking some medication. i was already on the sleeping medication.
You might have success getting off the Zopiclone using a taper method. To minimize side effects, there are people who do very slow tapers, reducing their dose by a tiny amount and then waiting for a week to three weeks, and then reducing by another tiny amount. This can take a long time to get completely off the medication, but it's a good option for many people. I have read that people say this prevents them from having withdrawal symptoms, including rebound insomnia. When this is done, people get their prescription in a liquid form from a compounding pharmacy and they use a dropper to reduce their medication by precise tiny amounts. I am just learning about this recently.
Hi Jaw444,
Thankyou for your response. i did manage to do the taper effect and was making a weekly script last months, but sleeping never returned to normal. I now suffer high blood pressure and low moral. I totally blame zopiclone its an evil drug
DEar Dave 88
I have tried metatonin and it helped quite a lot but not solved the problem. I am thinking of trying your suggesion of diazepan but I only have 30 mg altogether - is that enough? Also, I think 10 mg initially may be too much - the most Zopiclone I have ever taken is 7.5 mg,but more usually 3.75 mg.
Hi Hazel it is important to say that I am only saying what worked for me after being seriously let down by the medical profession and having to fight my own way back up the tunnel. You will have to decide how you want to stop taking Zopiclone for yourself. I doubt that any doctor is going to help you either.
I'd say that 30mg of Diazepam might not be enough to see you through the worst part so if possible get a 'script before you start or it is a very common drug to source elsewhere. You don't want to get past the worst bit then start dropping the Zopiclone because you don't have the Diazepam to see it through do you?
As I have said several times the withdrawals - which were similar to a head cold for me - should only last three days maximum and on the first night or two you might want to knock yourself out using the Diazepam. 10mg should be a perfectly safe dose and high enough to see you through the first night without Zopiclone. The Diazepam has a fairly long half life so you will only need 5mg for the second night and either 5 or 2mg for the third night by which time the withdrawals should have stopped. You might then want to stay on the Diazepam at a very low doseage - say 1 or 2 mg - for a week or so while your body adjusts to being Zopiclone free but I wouldn't use the Diazepam for any longer as that itself carries addiction risks.
Some people say that they have tapered replacing Xmg of Zopiclone with Xmg of Diazepam but to me that seems to defeat the object which is to stop the Zopiclone not reduce it. I would advise go for the total stop.
After 3 days you can give yourself a huge pat on the back because by that time you will KNOW you can live - and sleep - without Zopiclone.
Let us all know how you get on.
Dave - FOURTY SEVEN DAYS ZOPICLONE FREE
One thing I forgot to mention is that I dropped the Diazepam about an hour before I went to bed. This seemed to be about the ideal time for it to kick in.
I am from Canada. I took my first Zopiclone 10 months ago when I just suddenly stopped sleeping and after 5 days of no sleep ended up in Emergency where the doctor prescribed 7.5mg of Zopiclone. It worked for about 6 days and then I stopped sleeping again. Switched to Trazadone(Did not work), Amrtiiptline(did not work a part from making me extremely drowsy). Clonazapem which did give me a few hrs of sleep but major hangover during days. So the doctor prescribed Zopiclone again tellng me that it is non addictive & I can take 2 7.5mg if needed. Zopiclone did work decently as it always made me fall asleep but the sleep time ws anywhere between 30 minutes to 4 hrs. So stared taking Ampriptline with Zops, not muh help, Switched over to Phospotidyl Serine ( A Herb) alng with ops and managed to get reasonable amount of broken sleep.
I Do have sleep apnea and use a Cpap machine.
Fast forward to last month when i got terrible side effects of shaking , Twitching , Jaw and Gums and balance issues. Did feel terrible in the afternoon but felt a bit better in the evening. Talked to my Doctor about possible interdose withdrawals but she laughed at me. Started reading this forum and then began my weaning process. it was not very hard to wean down to 5mg but going under that just brought the Insomnia back. Went down to 2.5mg and stopped sleeping so jumped back to 5mg only to get the side effects back. 3 nights ago i totally went cold turkey took GABA Supplement to help and so far I am very close to 72 hrs without Zopiclone. Have been encountering terrible Stomach Issues and not to mention the lack of sleep. Last night was the worst where on at least 5 occasions I almost reached out to the side table to grab Zopiclone but somehow survived and eventually got some broken sleep after 4am. Today was overall a better day and am motivated to continue this route.........
Wish me luck!!
I will keep you guys updated.
Good Luck khalid ! I'm from Canada also but our experiences are all similar no matter where we live. I was on zopiclone for 10 yrs and now have been free for 46 days ! I have been doing a happy dance ever since !
Do yourself a favour and flush the zops down the toilet ! Others on this site might offer other solutions to help you out . I took melatonin for a little while but not taking it anymore. These days all I take are 2 capsules of Restful Night Essentials.
Take care and keep us updated.
Hello Khallid.
I can relate to your Gum/Jaw/Balance problems. My doctor does not seem to think they are connected,even though I have been taking Zopiclone for longer than I can.
remember.If I cut down to 3.75 I wake in the middle of the night and take the other half,if I cut them out totally I experience nasty withdrawal symptoms----- hallucinations send nightmares,so the pills are no longer working properly for me.I only seem to function later in the day and do not go to many social events in London because of the balance/vertigo problems
I usually have to leave, not much point in going any more which is VERY frustrating as my world is shrinking because of these pills.
i am reluctant to start anything else as I am too scared to get addicted to something else with possible side effects.
As I live alone it scares me incase I get bad reactions to other drugs.
Doctors don't seem to realize how addictive and damaging this drug is,but tapering off them seems to work for some people.
Good Luck.
.
Thanks Wendi & Collette,
Last night was my 3rd without Zopiclone. I took Gaba & A supplement called Sleep 8 together and did get a bit of broken sleep, which was not that much worse then Zopiclone induced sleep as even with Zopiclone I was getting fairly broken sleep too.
I am feeling fairly dizzy today maybe because Sleep 8 had a bit of Melatonin which for whatever reason makes me very drowsy the next day.
My last visit to my Doctor was 2 months ago where when I complained about Zopiclone she just shrugged & told me that they are out of options but did write a Prescription of Temazapem (I only took it for 1 night , could not really sleep and stopped it). I still have a lot of Zopiclone with me & I am still too chicken to throw them and still keeping them just in case more or less for Physcological reason.
I am also encountering a lot of stomach issues and am not too sure if they are because of Zopiclone withdrawal or are in relation with GABA I am taking or just my IBS flaring up.
So have gone 85 + hrs since the last Zopiclone dose & counting.
Khalid - wondering how you're doing. Are you still off the medication? Do you think that the GABA supplement has any distinct effect? Is it supposed to help stabilize the body's GABA during the withdrawal?
I'm planning to go off of Ambien soon, i saw an addiction medicine doctor this week who would manage the withdrawal by having me switch straight over to Valium, no tapering the Ambien, just switch, and then when the valium stabilizes, which can take up to a week, taper off of it. He said it usually takes a couple of weeks to taper off it.
I am researching this. But i guess utlimately there is no way off the medication without going off it. Frankly, i would like to just have broken sleep but witih no medication. if i could sleep broken with no medication, i would appreciate that. But not sleeping at all sounds really rough. I hope you are doing OK.
I plan to keep a big supply of Ambien (and i have a supply of zopiclone from when i was still taking it) because i can imagine there could be times when i really need to sleep and it's the only way. But i will never again use it regularly.
The way i first started using Ambien 20 years ago was about 3 or 4 times a month, i would go with short broken sleep for three days or so, and if on the fourth day, i was still having touble going to sleep or staying asleep, i would take an Ambien and then i could catch up for one night, and then go back to doing the best i could without any meds.
At the time, i had a full time demanding day job and was a single parent of a 9 year old, and that's why i ended up conveniently using the medication. For the past year, i have been retired and when i get off the medication, i believe i'll be able to use it only occasionally. I actually have not found it to be very physically addictive for me. But it's been very psychologically addictive. I don't have any withdrawal symptoms day to day even though the half life is only about 3 hours. Many people do have symptoms in between doses. i don't crave it. I just want to fall asleep so i reluctantly take it. And i have had a mental block against going off it, but i know i'm going to go off it soon. i am hoping within the next couple of months. it's really hard.
i went off zopiclone, tapering in January and February, but that wasn't hard because i had plenty of Ambien to take for sleep. But even still, i was so scared to start that process, i put it off for months when i could've done it, but i was afraid. i felt really protective of whatever sleep i was getting. It's kind of ridiculous because on the medication, my sleep is so poor. I sleep for at most two hours after bedtime dose, which is 17mg, and then i wait until it's been 5 hours since my bedtime dose and i take another 10mg, and i get anohter hour or hour and a half of sleep.
Yes, Tonite is going to be my 12th night without Zopiclone.
I did take .5mg of Lorazapem(That was the first sleeping pill prescribed to me last yr. They only wrote me 7 pills & I had them all saved as my wife pushed the Doctor to write the prescription but I was just not into sleeping pills , 11 Months later I am a considered a sleeping pill Junkie).
on the 7th night as I was dying to get some sleep & guess what I slept for 6 hours continiously, First time in 1 year that I got that much sleep without waking up. The Best I had with Zopiclone was about 4 hrs.
Last few nights have been reasonable, It takes me a while to fall asleep & I do wake up 3 to 4 times & it takes a while to get back to sleep but have gotten better then a few minutes sleep. I did see another doctor the other day & she told me that it is ok to take Lorazapem or Tamazepam or even Zopiclone after 4 to 5 days as long as I am trying different one so I won't be taking the same pill till the 15th day again. I wil see how the next few nights are going to go as don't want these drugs anymore but then again the temptation of a good night sleep is also an attraction.
I am still taking Gaba on nightly basis 500 mg @ bedtime not too sure how much it is helping me but right now I need it to keep my sanity eventually I will try to get rid of it as I am getting some serious Nightmares which I think are by products of the Gaba Supplement.
i'm glad to hear you are making it through--to the promised land. cheers!! Is that GABA supplement over the counter or is it prescription?
lorazapam can be a potent benzo. i have a tiny bit in a pill bottle, at most one small dose, it's kind of in the form of crumbs. Once i had a sort of anxiety attack and there was some laying around my mom's house and i took it, very small amount, less than a milligram, i was short of breath from the panic attack. i knew it was stress related, although i'd never had anything like that before. i took the lorazapam dose and pretty soon, i felt this relief come over me. i was also kind of sleepy, even though it was day time. i have saved the little bit i have in the pill bottle, in case i ever get another anxiety attack. that was 2007.
I just learned something in the past week that i didn't realize before. When the doctor told me he would recommend switching the zolpidem for the Valium, he said one problem with doing it is that it takes kind of a long time for Valium to "reach steady state." i didn't know that. He explained that this means i wouldn't feel the full effect of the Valium for several days. That might be something to consider if you take a medication and it has no effect on you--if it has a long time to reach steady state, you might have to take it for a few days to find out how it's going to effect you. I would call a pharmacist if i needed to find this out.
Hi all, ......WELL I AM SHOCKJED TO READ THESE POSTINGS ...... I have been on Zimovane for 18 months ... I started at 3.75, and was then requiring more to be effective. The support team allowed me to go to 15mg , but they started to not work, so I tried to contact her, but she was unwell. Ok, I then asked to see her again, but didnt get a response, so I tried another support member, who stated I was one of three waiting to see her, and acknowledged my request. A few weeks went past and I heard nothing. I then got a letter from the Psychotherapist (another member of the team ) To come and see her, but the date given clashed with a holiday break. I telephone twice to advise of this but heard nothing ...so of I go on holiday with my bag of various pills . Things were OK for the first 5 days , but then all of a sudden my appetite went overnight and I changed. This was due to not sleeping well , so I upped the zimovane to 18.75 ...after a week it became inneffective , so I upped it again to 22.75 ....again after a while it became inneffective ...I decided to bring the dose down in stages ie 22.5 18,75 etc back down to 3,75 . When I got home I noted that the Zimovane started to work against me ... So last week I stopped ... I went to work ( and you never feel great first thing anyway) but felt low, but put it down to holiday blues ... On Tuesday of last week I ate a sandwich, and my life ... It started to shake me around , and I had this real funny taste in my mouth of margerine ... Now I dont eat Margarene as a rule and I avoid it anyway ... so I put this down to my body reacting to the marg, or the colourents etc ... By the evening I became a shivering wreck, LITTLE SLEEP and worse next day. Got through the next day , but again no sleep. Thursday night , did not sleep AT ALL .. yet not tired, but starting to get edging , anxious paranoid, unwell shaking headache, muscle pains etc ... In the last three months I have LOST THREE STONE IN WEIGHT... Eventually, went to see a doctor in the hospital, and he has done a load of blood tests, which I get back on Wednesday , but as I am treated for Cholesteral levels only by this doctor as Bi-polar is not his specialist field, and he put this down to an extreme high combined with depression. He did ring my GP and advise me to get help, to get me over the holiday weekend . I went to se him PM and he stated not to take Zimovane and gave me a 7DAY only supply of Zolpidem 10mg until I see the support team early next week as an emergency appointment.... WHAT A CHANGE . in 10 hours of taking this tablet I am back to some normailty ....HOWEVER , after reading these postings I thinkTthe Zolpidem has taken the place of Zimovane I think is why the dramatic change ... so in reality I AM ADDICTED to Zimovane and what I was experiencing was WITHDRAWAL symptoms as everything seems to fit !!!!
Being diagnosed with Bi-polar I take Lamotrogine 200mg , Cipralex 10mg, Ezitembe 10mg and pravastatin 10mg , Rampril 5 mg for blood pressure.
Hopefully when I get the blood test results next week I will now get a review .. BUT when the Zolpidem runs out in 6 days .... ??What will it be replaced with if at all?
If it isnt replaced ...from the postings I have read , I am going to get HELL ...
Tonight I feel quite calm and relaxed and have been working in the house with no problems and no doubt the next six days are going to be the same ... after this who knows ...any suggestions welcome . I am male 61 .
hi quovadis - so sorry about your ordeal. if you have been off zimovane for an extended time, probably better to not go back on. If i understand you right, when you run out of zolpidem, you don't have a doctor immediately available who would prescribe more. I don't know what the effects of your several bipolar meds are.
The symptoms you described that started the second day after you stopped zimovane sounded much like the symptoms i got when i went off Valium for sleep in 1993--almost no sleep but wired, not tired, but then increasingly edgy, paranoid--i couldn't find my medication, not that planned to take anymore, but i was certain my apartment manager must've come in when i wasn't home and stolen my left over Valium, i reported it to the management office and asked for a new lock. But then i also wondered if my friend/neighbor might have used his key to come in and take it because he was always trying to persuade me to stop taking it. A few days later, i found it in a drawer in my apartment where i had forgotten that i put it, Valium causes memory problems--but i was so surprised to realize how paranoid i had been about it, amazing.
But in my case, the worst of the withdrawals only lasted less than a week, my body settled down and i wasn't anxious or agitated or having nerves twitching anymore. My sleep improved a little but i can't say i had normal sleep, it was still inconsistent, but it was better than it had been on the Valium at the end because i had a tolerance for it and it wasn't doing anything, and like you, i just quit, cold turkey. But unlike you, the worst of this did not continue indefinitely although i hear that it does for some people.
I was taking zolpidem for many years, and then i added in zimovane/zopiclone, 7.5mg, for a year and a half, and then finally i tapered off it 1/4 tablet at a time over a couple months' time, finishing in late February, but the symptoms from doing that were pretty unnoticeable which i'm sure is because i'm still taking a pretty high dose of zolpidem, 27mg a night, in two doses (17mg at bedtime, 10mg five hours later)(if i took it more often than that, it would quickly lose effect, experience has shown).
Zolpidem is the same as zimovane in that it will progressively lose effectiveness. In my case it was gradual over many many years, and i have only really increased a lot in the past year or two, but i would never recommend it as a solution to zimovane tolerance. However, if your particular health needs involve needing more sleep and easing withdrawal symptoms, it might be a temporary solution.
Zolpidem has the shortest half life of any of the sleeping medications so it is the shortest acting. There is a longer acting zolpidem, an extended release tablet that somehow lasts a llittle longer, but for me, they don't last long at all now, about an hour usually. I will sleep for an hour, then wake and wait until it's 5 hours after the first dose and then take the second dose and sleep for anothe hour or hour and a half.
This problem just developin the past couple of months, coinciding with when i took the last of the zimovane, so it may be related to that. At any rate, because it's not working anymore, i want to stop taking it but i am hesitant to go cold turkey.
I have a doctor i have consulted with who uses Valium to help people get off of the shorter acting sleep medications, and then tapers the person off of the Valium, so i think i'm going to do that, or try it. Actually, i already got the Valium prescription filled and will start this tomorrow night. He instructed me to simply stop the 27mg of zolpidem and start taking 10mg of Valium, and then call him and tell him how it's going and if adjustments need to be made, he will make changes.
am scared, to stop the zolpidem abruptly like that, but Valium is supposed to meet the same need that zolpidem met along with a few others, and there is actually a lot of experience with this treatment for zolpidem and zimovane addictioin. If you are interested, if you want to look into it and then discuss it with your team, use google to search for Heather Ashton MD, she is the MD who developed this treatment for this purpose, has used it quite a bit in her practice and has published stuff about it. There are some you tube videos where she talks about it, but she treats benzodiazapine addiction so most of her work is about that, zimovane and zolpidem are not benzodiazapines, though they are similar, they are milder than benzos but they are designed more for insomnia and not for anxiety as benzos are.
But Dr Ashton found that for a lot of people, gradually tapering off of the "Z" drugs as they are called, is harder than tapering off of longer acting drugs, and that's what led her to switch people over to Valium (long half life, 100 hours) and then taper them off of that. Unlike the doctor i'm working with, she uses a more gradual process of switching people over from Z drugs to Valium, but it's only about two weeks i think. I am going to try this and hope for the best. I don't expect sleep, but i'm not sleeping anyway so i'd rather be not sleeping and NOT on sleeping meds than being on sleeping meds and not sleeping. In time, i know my body will adapt, even if it will be a really long time. Over time, my sleep will gradually improve.
If you are going to google this, use the search terms: heather ashton zopiclone
Anyway, clearly one of your biggest problems is not being able to get in touch with your team or your prescribing doctor and not being able to work closely with them. The doctor i found (in the US) is not covered by my insurance so i have to pay out of pocket and that is difficult, but i simply need to get off the medications, they are so bad for my health and my life, and so, if it means going into debt somewhat, i am going to do that. i have the credit to do it. So i consider myself lucky to have the option.
I don't know how things are in other countries. You might want to search for or request a doctor who specializes in 'addiction medicine.' that's the specialty my new doctor has. Other doctors simply don't know about this kind of treatment, it is a specialty. But one of our members on this forum who is part of these conversations, Dave, has a GP doctor in the UK who has been working with him to let him switch from zopiclone to Valium and then taper off of that, and the last i heard, he had good success, being off the zopiclone without much withdrawal symptoms (lasting a couple of days at most) and then tapering the Valium down to a very low dose. i think he said usually he sleeps ok with the occasional poor sleep night.
If you are only on 10mg of zolpidem, that is a relatively low dose. The approximate equivalent diazapam/Valium dose is 5mg, which is a low dose. So if you have trouble getting off the zolpidem and were to switch to diazapam, 10mg zolpidem would switch to 5mg Valium. But you may be able to go off the zolpidem directly.
There are other medications that can help some people with sleep, some people on this forum have used them. One is mirtazapine. Another is trazadone. Personally, i'm afraid of them (potential adverse effects) and i don't have confidence that they would help me sleep when i'm used to regular sleeping meds. But they do work for some people.
my heart goes out to you and i hope you can get the medical support you need, i think withdrawals and addiction are nothing to mess around with casually. The body gets used to the medications and going off them can throw things into chaos. There are several people who's stories i've read on this forum who managed to stop taking the medication on their own and have been successful. I'm not sure what dose they were up to.
Stay in touch
Hi,Thanks for the feedback, I have only been off a week, I think this is the issue , and why I went through this on Thursday/Friday .I will have to see how things go next week.
Kin d regards