Thanks linearb,
I'm wondering what would have happened if you continued with the LDN (neuroinflammation), alongside Klonopin and Gabapentin (to correct GABA/Glutamate imbalance, resulting from cortical and/or cochlear inflammation)?
No idea; I'd rather be on less drugs than more, and so adding another one into the mix when life is basically fine doesn't seem wise to me.
Is that a daily dose you're on linearb?
Yes, generally combined with some amount of cannabis (legal here).
I know you're very knowledgeable regarding benzos from your posts.
Can you explain how you reached your current strategy?
I was basically railroaded onto them as an 18 year old with an anxiety disorder who probably would have been better served by being forced to live in a Zen monastery for a year, but, that's water under the bridge. I am, however, somewhat suspicious that being on Klonopin from the ages of ~18-24 primed my brain to want it, in a way that would not have happened without that exposure during years important for cortical formation. On the other hand, I already had some tinnitus by 18 when all this started, so, can't really blame it on the drugs.
I withdrew from Klonopin when I was 25, blasted my ears with noise when I was about 30 and got much worse tinnitus which suddenly became a serious functional problem. I went briefly back on benzos, which seemed to work, but I wasn't comfortable committing to them so I then withdrew again and spent a mostly miserable 6 years trying everything under the sun, in as scientific a way as possible.
By the time 2017 rolled around, I had a small child to be concerned with, I had experimented with as-needed valium enough to have some suspicion that benzos were still somewhat effective on me, and so at some point I just stopped fighting the idea. It was actually kind of rocky until I got back up to my full original dose of 2mg/day.
The gabapentin was added on the basis of so research by a Dr. Shulman in NYC who thinks it's an effective combination for tinnitus; I do feel like there is some added benefit, in that when I have attempted to cease the gabapentin, the tinnitus becomes much more difficult to ignore. As for the Klonopin, I think it's doing as much to make it possible to ignore the noise, as it is to actually suppress it.
These are dangerous drugs which can be incredibly difficult (even fatal) to withdraw from, and which do not necessarily work at all for most people with tinnitus, and if so, there is no guarantee they work long term. I considered this cocktail a weapon of last resort for a long time, but, finally just got sick of waiting and having long stretches of life that were just absolutely miserable.
It's certainly possible there will be a price to be paid for this, sooner or later. There's not much point in worrying about that in 2020, everything is uncertainty right now.
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I really appreciate it!
