Last Updated on August 8, 2022 by
Alternative to Meds Editorial Team
Medically Reviewed by Dr Samuel Lee MD
Table of Contents:
- Tapering Guidelines for Safe Clozaril Tapering
- Diet and Nutrition During Clozaril Tapering
- Contracting For Safety
- Restrict Stimulants and Recreational Use of Marijuana
- Reasons to Consider Safe Clozaril Tapering
- Concern over Side Effects of Antipsychotics such as Clozaril
- Do Antipsychotic Medications Stop Working Over Time?
- Alternative to Meds Center Provides Tools to Improve Natural Mental Health
Virtually all antipsychotic drugs share challenging withdrawal phenomena, which can be even more pronounced in Clozaril tapering, weaning, and titration. These difficulties are most apparent where it is not done correctly.
Clozaril tapering treatment must be done using attentive medical oversight, and adequate support — in other words, the kind of treatment provided at Alternative to Meds Center.
Do Your Symptoms
Require Clozaril?
Alternative to Meds has been helping people with antipsychotic tapering for over 15 years. We invite you to review our published evidence of our successful programs. Addressing underlying root causes does not and should not have to involve toxic treatments. In fact, we have found that frequently there were either missed medical conditions or other overlooked factors that contributed to the crisis. Moreover, these could have since greatly shifted. So, a person may have been following treatment protocols that were unable to fix what was wrong because symptoms had been possibly misdiagnosed or misidentified in the first place.
Begin your taper when you are stable. This would mean sleeping well, eating well, and not experiencing episodes of anger, rage, or compulsive or unmanageable behaviors.
During antipsychotic withdrawal, it is not uncommon for feelings of exuberance, newfound freedom, and resistance to following instructions to emerge, particularly if the taper has progressed too quickly. A super-surge of dopamine could make taking disciplined, controlled steps forward extremely difficult. Abruptly stopping the medication, even if it seems like the most logical thing you should do, could have dire consequences.8 Putting a contract for your own safety (sometimes called a Ulysses contract) in writing, signing it, and giving it to your trusted caregiver or family member before the tapering begins is a simple but effective strategy to help keep things on track. The agreement might stipulate that if you suddenly become unwilling to follow the doctor’s advice, or become bent on booking a midnight flight to Tibet, etc., you would have agreed to hospitalization or other measures to compensate and keep you safe until you can stabilize and resume the taper. Consider this an option that will help ensure your success in the long run.15,21
Drug-induced conditions like TD (tardive dyskinesia) and tardive dystonia, are linked directly to antipsychotic medications. And, the risk increases, according to published research,3 according to how long they were taken and at what dosage. TD (repetitive spasmodic involuntary muscle motion or painful twisting and contortions of the muscles) is almost always incurable once it develops. Tardive means slow or late-onset, pointing to the risk for development that increases with the length of time taking antipsychotic drugs such as Clozaril, Zyprexa, Abilify, and many many others.
What can also happen over time is that drug side effects can begin to intensify. Antipsychotics such as Clozaril cause a pretty long list of side effects. Some of these may be more intense than others, just as some persons may be more sensitive than others to certain sensations, aches, pains, etc. Side effects can include restlessness, tremor, stiffness, and other physical sensations. Emotional side effects also occur such as emotional blunting. This is where the person feels no joy or satisfaction or reward in life. Others can include a racing heartbeat, dizziness, akathisia, dry mouth, nausea, lack of appetite, drowsiness, low blood pressure, incontinence, and a host of other undesirable reactions. There are some rare but quite severe side effects that Clozaril can cause such as seizures, life-threatening allergic reactions, sudden cardiac death, strokes, and NMS. Neuroleptic malignant syndrome carries the risk of death and like TD is a drug-induced (neuroleptic means drug-induced) life-threatening condition. The symptoms of NMS to watch for are sudden fever, sweating, confusion, muscle rigidity, and rapid breathing. If not treated immediately this condition can lead to death. Originally it was thought that only 1st generation antipsychotics produced symptoms of NMS but further research has shown that 2nd generation antipsychotics can also put a person at risk of NMS and similar conditions.22,23
A well-planned. individually tailored holistic-based path of treatment may be a more effective choice over neuroleptic-based treatment, especially over the long term. Holistic treatments can include many therapies to help a person regain their abilities to reduce stress, comfortably socialize, interact with others in a safe and welcoming setting, increase coping skills, learn skills to manage their life well, as well as physical and 
Alternative to Meds Center has been providing inpatient natural mental health services for over 15 years now with tremendous success. A wide variety of 
