Doctor at IOP and klonopin

He said “you’re lucky I’m not your doctor otherwise there’s no way you’d get klonopin”. He said “it’s like taking a shot of vodka to take a klonopin dose”. This upset me, I need klonopin it’s the only thing that works for my panic attacks. I don’t get high I just feel relief. I only take .5 twice a day. I felt he was ignorant. I told him I don’t abuse it…first of all it only makes me tired if I abuse it and second of all if I take too many today… I won’t have any for tomorrow. He didn’t believe me but honestly I never take more than 1.25, and that’s only on a day of stressful situations. Usually I take 1.0. I was offended.

I haven’t met anyone on benzos that took them exactly as prescribed. I’m surprised that doctors prescribe them so much.

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I was on 3 mg Klonopin a day until I told the pdoc I gave a couple to this girl who was jonesing for heroin. That was stupid. He took me right off it.

While there is considerable evidence for that position, this sounds far too slam dunk / all-good- vs. all-bad thinking on the doc’s part. That is a typical problem in public mental health clinics, btw. The docs in the better private facilities are typically more sophisticated and less black-and-white thinking. (Sigh.)

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That is a lot of clonazepam. Most docs nowadays would see red flags at one.

It’s hard for me to think of any, either. Seems like most pts either abuse them or take too little of the stuff to get anything meaningful to happen. And almost ALL of them refuse to confront their cognitive demons with any actually useful psychotherapy. Most pts (including myself) who do, however, get quite a bit of relief with the following, all of which are very easy to access online without even going to a therapist:

REBT – Rational emotive behavior therapy - Wikipedia
Schematherapy – Schema therapy - Wikipedia
Learned Optimism – Learned optimism - Wikipedia
Standard CBT – http://www.beckinstitute.org/what-is-cognitive-behavioral-therapy/About-CBT/252/

At one point I was prescribed 12mg a day. Obviously I can’t remember the couple of months I was on that.

Holy ■■■■! (Could you even get out of bed?)

I was on Ativan and Xanax. Ativan screwed with my memory. I’m glad I don’t need them anymore. They can also worsen depression and decrease motivation.

Don’t think the gp who prescribed it had much experience with this med. to be honest I’m glad to be off it.