Hi there,

I am new on this board. I have been dealing with anxiety and panick attacks for the past 4 years. I was first put on paxil and Klonopin but I had to stop taking them abruptly due to finding out I was pregnant. The withdrawals were fierce but I made it through. That was 2 years ago. Since then I started having midl to moderate anxiety and I was prescribed Ativan, which only worked for a while and then I started taking Alprazolam (generic for Xanax). First it was the .5 miligrams but I had a few panick attacks and they upped me to 1 miligram once a day. What I do is split the pill in half, so I take half in the am and half in the pm or before I go to bed. My question is, I have been taking this med for about 6 months now. I want to stop taking it all together. What would be a good schedule to follow and what if any would the withdrawal effects be? I'm really concerned about this, any help would be greatly appreciated.

thanks

Grrr, I lost my first reply.

Well you already figured out how to split pills. Xanax has a mean half life of about 11 hours, so any dosage change will reach a steady state after 55 hours or about 2.5 days. No different than any med change, the slower the schedule and the smaller the dosage change, the less chance for bad reactions.

Why not try quartering the tabs and reducing by one quarter (0.25mg) per step and go 2 weeks between reductions? Thats pretty gentle, especially considering the low dosage you are on (heavy users might be as much as 5mg a day or more).

Benzos are wonderful meds but are like bandaids for anxiety. Hopefully you are getting some therapy to teach you how to handle the panic attacks and long term anxiety. Your doc may consider another antidepressant for more effective anxiety relief.

Welcome, a.m.