I'm used to taking benzos. I'm currently on Valium. I've taken Ativan, Serax, Klonopin, and Xanax before in the past.

Here's the story - I didn't take my valium at all last night. I noticed I had a xanax left over. So I took that to try and get some sleep because I was restless. I don't really know what made me decide to take it over my valium... but anyway... I take it... go to sleep pretty soon after that. I wake up, normal time and everything... and boom... it feels like I was drunk last night! I've never had this happen before... it was weird. I mean - I take valium... if anything that would give me a hangover feeling right? Has this happened to anyone else? Or maybe someone can give a reason a little 1mg of Xanax could do this?

I get the hangover from Xanax (at .5mg) also, Klonopin (up to 2.0mg) does not give me that feeling either.

No surprise here about hangover effect. I find it stronger when I don't take xanax for a while and then first take it again. If I take it several days in a row it decreases or becomes less noticeable.

Why? A couple possible reasons. First you are hitting two pathways simultaneously. The Valium probably hadn't fully cleared your system, and then you add the xanax. Two benzos working at the same time. Secondly, it may be that the liver enzymes aren't up to speed in clearing the xanax at first and thus the blood levels stay higher, longer than normal when taking it every day (upregulation/downregulation is probably the buzzwords).

cheers, a.m.

So could this be why I'm so tired every morning and can't wake up? I take 2 mg of Xanax (sometimes up to 4 mg) to sleep at night and when I get up the next day, cannot function until about 3 in the afternoon.

If so, this makes total sense!

But my pdoc was like "oh no, Xanax doesn't do that."