AZ09 Kurser,
I'm not trying to be rude, or insensitive about your situation at all. Honestly, at this late date, I'm not even sure you're still alive. Anyway, I wouldn't be taking ANY benzodiazepines with stage 5 kidney disease. You're on borrowed time as it is. Once you hit stage five, unless you get a kidney from someone, you only have weeks, maybe a month to live. Most only have days. Benzos are super demanding of the liver AND kidneys. With you suffering end stage renal failure, you're playing with fire. This is going to sound ridiculous but hydroxyzine works almost as well as alprazolam. I was on 1mg 4 x per day. My doctor moved to another city, and needless to say, I was out of xanax and no way to get any. So, I tapered myself down to 1/4mg 1x per day, then quit! About a week before, my dr. Had me start taking 50mg 1x per day of the hydroxyzine.
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Once I was off the xanax completely, I took 100mg 4x per day
Man does it work. I thought great, this stuff is going to be crap and I'm going to go into severe benzo withdrawal. Not so, IT WORKED , and still works to this day! I was on xanax for 24 years. I've now been off of it for 3 years and hydroxyzine still works like a champ. Read about it. It's one of the safest drugs, out of all drug categories that exists. I'm so thankful for that E.R. doctor who prescribed it the first time. Let me tell you though, when he gave me my 1st script, I wanted to punch him in the face for not giving me my xanax back. I just knew this crap wasn't any good and this Dr. Was a complete dumbass! Turns out, I'm the DA, lol. I'm the one who didn't know anything. Don't knock it before you try it.
One final note. I have PTSD, G.A.D. Severe Panic Disorder and clinical depression to name a few. My panic attacks had gotten so bad that they would wake me from a dead sleep, pouring sweat, heart pounding like 200 bpm, and I was TERRIFIED!!! I had panic attacks like this several times a day
No triggers, no rhyme or reason, they would just come on out of left field and hit me like a speeding freight train. My panic attacks were so bad that they actually caused me physical problems with my health. At 24, a lean, fit, amateur body builder, and I had a type of heart attack. I passed out in the booth at an Arby's. I woke up in the E.R. with people cutting my clothes off jamming iv's in both arms. I was in A-Fib and they couldn't get my heart to convert to a normal sinus rhythm. It finally did, 3 days later in cardiac intensive care. Other times, I'm so sure that I'm dying that nothing can change my mind. Once the terror is at its pinnacle, I lose consciousness. To put it gently, I have ungodly, horrific panic attacks. They're now almost completely controlled with hydroxyzine. Best of luck to all of you.