About 20 years ago I was seriously depressed and being treated with antidepressants---Nardil I think, and Xanax. Well, at first I liked the Xanax. It seemed to always have a brightening and calming effect on me. But then I quit taking it, no taper. Forget why. (You know how those depressive episodes in your life have a way of vanishing from memory like a bad dream?)
Well, a few days later, I had a horrible attack of fear, that turned into terror. I felt an impending sense of doom, and a belief that I was going mad. I recall stumbling about in the parking structure of a shopping center, praying to Christ and Mother Mary and anyone else who might be listening to save me from what truly seemed like a Faustian descent into hell.

You know how in the Bible they said of a madman, "He has a demon!" Now I know they were more right than wrong. I could see people passing about me, but in a detached way, as if I were a ghost, in another dimension. And that sense of DOOM DOOM DOOM. I'm going MAD! It was like a scence right out of Edgar Allen Poe.

After maybe an hour of this I walked home somehow and, just on a hunch, (I had not yet made the connection.) I reached for the Xanax and swallowed the 6 or so I had left. Within about 20 minutes, the nightmare subsided. I called my shrink in a nearly hysterical state. He told me at the time that I had experienced a "pre-psychotic episode" but further research on my part convinced me that this is really a type of panic attack. Surely one of the worst experiences of my life.

But looking back, how much of it was self-induced, and how much of it drug -(withdrawal) induced? I agree with an earlier poster that Ashton Manual and book are well worth a visit to anyone stuggling with these issues. Her strategies for derailing these snowballing panic attacks are esp. valuable. But again, even she says that as many as half of people who quit benzos after long-term and/or heavy use do so with little or no real trouble. So go figure.

I still think that these drugs can be true Godsends for people imprisoned and crippled by their morbid fears. Just be careful when weening off of them.
Guess I've blathered enough for one day.
Phil