Theme: Agency

  Yes Peterson’s in a clinic to get off Klonopin (Clonazepam). Yes he had a reason to get on it (terminal cancer diagnosis of his wife). Yes his wife has rather miraculously survived. Yes he will be fine. The reason to go to clinics if you can afford it, is to reduce the burden of care on your family, and to insulate them from your behavior as you go thru withdrawal. Jordan may have low agreeableness, but he is still a very sensitive person, and his career, like that of actors, trains one to be even more sensitive. And so it’s not wonder he sought help (and could afford it.) Testimony Of Shared Experience: I am very similar to Jordan in age, ability, personality, sentiment, and conviction. And because of undiagnosed cancer, doctors thought I was depressed, and was on Clonazepam for years. I quit cold turkey when I realized what it was doing to me. And, while I have many times the willpower and pain tolerance of normal people, it was a brutal physical and emotional experience – including visual auras, panic attacks, hypersensitive nerves, overactive startle response. I can’t imagine what it’s like for normal people. My wife was amazing. I prepared her expectations for it beforehand. I don’t think it took more than about six weeks but I could be wrong. I vaguely remember the effects sticking with me by popping up now and then for months whenever I was under stress. I can still have an overactive startle response when I’m concentrating for long periods. And so, I would not ask a woman recovering from Mrs Peterson’s near death experience to carry the burden of my withdrawal at a time when she needed caretaking herself. I don’t think i’ve been quite right again since getting off it. And I still take an OCD prescription – for more than twenty years – and I don’t know if it’s because of my low level autism, or the consequences of that experience with Clonazepam. (Or the trauma of multiple bouts of cancer, divorce, and related life changes.) I have no idea. I actually don’t mind my OCD. But other people do. ‘Cause my tolerance for illogical speech drops to zero – and my ability to switch contexts does as well. I don’t like being a robot and that’s what happens. Anyway. My sympathies.