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and how are we supposed to know? >> i'll go ahead and show you where these are kept. >> mohammed works in a family-owned drugstore in the suburbs of chicago. >> we always hand them these leaflets. >> each prescription comes with a manufacture's leaflet instructs patients on what they're about to gulp down. avoid drinking alcohol, driving, tasks and actions that call for you to be alert. like most people i've casually glanced through this kind of sheet. tell your doctor if you have itchy, shortness of breath, weight gain. these side effects sound so benign. by this point i probably would have tossed the insert. but if you keep reading, there is scary stuff further down. low mood, depression, thoughts of killing yourself, emotional ups and downs, thinking that is not normal, anxiety, or lack of interest in life. >> a lot of the patients that are taking these medications for such simple things like sleep, anxiety, but little do they know once they start taking it, they could ultimately become suicidal. once a patient becomes physically dependent on these medications, as soon as they stop that consistent dosing that they are taking, they can experience severe withdrawal symptoms such as tremors and even seizure which can be fatal. >> do you get the sense that people read them? >> that's completely on the patient. i can only emphasize the importance of reading them and understanding what could happen with these medications. >> so, the drug companies do provide warnings. and if you do online to the fda website, there's even more data from dosage size to potential side effects, an almost dizzying amount of information. when jonathan got the material that the pharmacists give, most people don't read through that. do you think if he had or if someone had -- >> no, i think that paperwork is written very softly. you know, it says that it can create suicidal thoughts. it's kind of washed over as far as i'm concerned. they just said oh you might get some bad thoughts, basically. people, when they get their drugs, they're suffering. no matter what you go in for, so they just want to get that drug inside the body. >> tom raises a good point. how many of us take the time to really weigh the risks when we're feeling at our worst? isn't that where doctors are supposed to come in? >> i don't believe his doctor knew. how can you give out a drug that changes your brain and especially give it out for sleep but never ever tell you what this is doing? i would love to tell his doctor this is what you took from me. because of your ignorance. >> the wagners are adamant that jonathan's nightmare started with that first prescription for klonopin. but by the time he took his own life, he had been in and out of medical care for months and prescribed a cocktail of drugs ranging from benzos and antidepressants to antipsychotics. >> this is medical records, prescriptions. this is a prescription that we ended up. >> so, he -- so, over the course of seven or eight months, he was on all this stuff. >> yes. all of this. plus more. >> diazepam which is valium. klonopin. >> at one time, i think he was taking seven, eight different pills a day. >> with so many prescriptions that could have contributed to jonathan's state of mind, as much as you might want to, can you really hold one drug or any one doctor accountable? did you talk to lawyers about taking on this case? >> yes. yeah, we called a lot of lawyers, a lot of them. here's one list of lawyers that we had contacted. >> the wagners scoured the yellow pages in search of legal help. i want to speak to one of the lawyers who consulted on jonathan's case. >> hello? >> hi. allen barrenholets is a lawyer specializing in personal injury law. >> i think jonathan's case was -- i thought there was something seriously wrong. but the reality was that if the decedent was not survived by a spouse or by children, the damages on the wrongful death were capped at $300,000. and to finance a medical malpractice case, the cost could be tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of dollars to hire experts to have the files reviewed. it really wasn't a question of can we prove our case. sadly, it was a question of the analytics involved. >> so, it's kind of -- >> your hands are tied. >> your hands are tied and your heart sinks to know they think there was wrong but there's nothing we will ever be able to do. >> my producers and i reached out to jonathan's doctor and the hospital system he works for. they expressed condolences to the wagner family but declined to comment. while i i can't talk with them, there is an expert on the forefront of this phenomenon. doctor say stanford psychologist and has been prescribing medications like these for 25 years. what is the proper way to administer or prescribe benzos? >> benzodiazepines are a great tool short term for anxiety and insomnia. when i say short term, i mean a couple of weeks. they shouldn't be used daily for more than two weeks. when we take a benzodiazepine, it increases the calming neurotransmitter in our brain and allows us to relax. the reason we don't want to use them more than that period of time is because the brain and the body adapts. and then the body becomes physiologically dependent on them. >> jonathan wagner's doctor continued to prescribe klonopin for seven months. major medical institutes like kaiser permanente and johns hopkins warn against taking benzodiazepines for more than six weeks. what happens when you stay on them longer? could they be exacerbating the problem? >> yes, yes. absolutely. they absolutely will make anxiety worse over time. what we're seeing is more and more emergency room visits and more and more people dying. there's been a seven fold increase in deaths in the past 15 years. that's horrific. so, i think we have a very serious silent benzodiazepine epidemic on our hands. >> jonathan isn't the only one who's been harmed by benzos. there's an entire community that's been affected by these drugs. >> i felt like my mind had snapped, that i had just gone crazy. >> this is a rare meet up in the suburbs of chicago. they come from all walks of life. but one thing unites them. they or their friends and family were all prescribed a benzo and for a multitude of reasons. >> the reason i was put on xanax was for excessive sweating. >> my doctors put me on klonopin for hot flashes. >> i had mild anxiety and occasionally trouble sleeping. >> few studies are made on how many people are harmed by benzos. but the manufacturers of klonopin state that one out of 500 patients may have suicidal thought os thoughts or actions. >> what kinds of things were you going through when the symptoms were the worst? >> there's not a day that goes by that i don't have a suicidal thought. but i tried to fight it. >> i would just think i have to walk out in traffic and just -- i just need to kill myself. >> as they continue to share, something else emerges. trying to get off the drug can be another kind of nightmare. >> i felt so alone, and isolated. >> this feeling of absolute terror. >> you lose all your friends. >> i want to kill myself. >> drugged. >> damaged. >> suicide. >> suicide. >> it was like a water fall of symptoms. >> i was vibrating on the inside. i couldn't walk because it felt like the floor was moving. i felt like i needed to run away from my own body. >> what do you do if the ed many cation you're taking makes you feel bad but trying to get off makes you feel even worse? >> it was like pure torture. and nothing i did could stop it. ♪ [ typing ] ♪ ♪ behr presents: tough as walls. that's some great paint. ♪ that's some great paint. behr, ranked #1 in customer satisfaction with interior paints. right now get incredible savings on behr marquee interior. exclusively at the home depot. you don't need to go anywhere dad, this is your home. the best home to be in is your own. home instead offers personalized in-home services for your loved ones. home instead senior care. to us, it's personal. home instead senior care. they're america's bpursuing life-changing cures. in a country that fosters innovation here, they find breakthroughs... like a way to fight cancer by arming a patient's own t-cells... because it's not just about the next breakthrough... it's all the ones after that. - [woman] with my shark, i deep clean messes like this, this, and even this. but i don't have to clean this, because the self-cleaning brush roll removes hair while i clean. - [announcer] shark, the vacuum that deep cleans now cleans itself. somand with the xfinityreen is stream app,reen. which is free with your service, you can take a spin through on demand shows or stream live tv. download your dvr'd shows and movies on the fly. even record from right where you are. keep what you watch with you. download the xfinity stream app today... ...because xfinity stream tv week is here. watch shows like south park and the walking dead now through october 13th. >> benzodiazepines can be taken to treat insomnia, seizures, and stress. but their most popular use is for relieving anxiety. anxiety disorders affect some 40 million adults in the u.s. it's what caused chrissy, a young mother of two, to seek help several years ago. >> have you always had issues with anxiety? >> no. i had normal human worries. i really didn't ever experience true anxiety until after my daughter was born. she would continually stop breathing just at random times, so we spent the first few months of her life in and out of hospitals. and she eventually got better. but i didn't. >> for two years, chrissy experienced chronic anxiety. it eventually became too much and she made an appointment with her psychiatrist. >> he told me about klonopin. i can remember asking are there any weird side effects and he said no, it was a perfectly safe drug to take. >> how did it feel the first time you took it? >> i noticed right away it took away my anxiety. >> finally relieved, chrissy was able to focus on raising her two children. but after two years on klonopin, she started to notice a change. >> the anxiety started to come back. and it was stronger than what i had experienced before going on it. i remembered going to the appointment and saying, you know, what's going on? and i was told, well that sounds like your body's intolerance. you're probably going to need to take a higher dose. >> but chrissy didn't want to take more. she wanted to get off the drugs. she was advised to cut her dose by quarters over a four-week span which lines up with what i've seen from manufacturer's pamphlets. but a few weeks after her last pill, chrissy's life came crashes down. >> one minute i was me and the next i felt like i was in a living nightmare. my ears were ringing. the inside of my body started to vibrate. it was like a motor was running on the inside of me. thoughts started to come into my head. completely separate from me. it was thoughts of wanting to die. and i didn't want to die. it was telling me to go in the kitchen and get a knife, that it would take away my suffering. and it's a very compelling thought. it's almost like oh, that makes sense. okay, that'll take away my suffering. but at the same time, i knew no! don't do that! your kids need you. it was crazy. >> the battle. >> it was. and i can see how someone could lose that battle. >> frightened, she went online looking for answers. >> i started to look up my symptoms and everything i was experiencing was due to the klonopin, coming off the klonopin. every single symptom i was feeling. >> it was an alarm bell moment. and it reminds me of jonathan wagner. like chrissy, jonathan's downward spiral didn't begin until after he stopped taking klonopin. in his case, cold turkey, something even the manufacturers advise against. >> what happens to your brain when you suddenly stop a benzo that you've been taking for an exend theed peri extended period of time. >> if we stop all of a sudden, it's like an excited neurotransmitter thunderstorm going on in our brain. it's a very uncomfortable feeling, wrestlessness, motor ticks, and people even seize. some people even get suicidal. >> chrissy didn't stop taking klonopin suddenly. but she did experience these kinds of withdrawal symptoms. maybe four weeks was too fast. in desperation, she turned to another doctor. he told her going back on a benzo would return her to normal. in lieu of klonopin, he prescribed her valium. >> i took the first dose of it. and within an hour everything was gone. i was back to me. the shaking had stopped, my vision was back, the ears stopped ringing. it was like i had just woken up from a two-week-long nightmare. >> chrissy was now faced with a choice, stay on the medication indefinitely or try to find her own way out. on the internet, she ekt cannco with others like her, people who wanted off benzos and were desperate enough to try anything. >> i have a scale. i have syringes, and i dose four times a day. >> is there any room for error in this at all? 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>> no, there are no doctors on here. they were all experiencing the same things that i had just experienced. they started sending me all this information on how to do this liquid micro-taper where you just take 1/100 of a milligram out a day. it's a way of easing your body off of the drug. i remember a guy from australia that i had met online called me from australia. and he's like, okay, here's what you've got to do. and i listened to this guy because he had been there. >> it's crazy, crazy. someone you've never met before. >> yeah, i'm on the phone with a guy from australia like okay. >> putting your health in the hands of a stranger seemed risky to me, but the doctors hasn't worked. chrissy felt she had nowhere else to turn. how often do you do this? >> i've done this every night. i've gotten good at it now. but in the beginning getting it figured out was overwhelming. it dealt with doing a lot of math i couldn't grasp at the time. i have four jars set up because i dose four times a day. and i have a scale. i have si ryme yringes so i cane accurately. >> this looks like high school chemistry, portioning out the correct amount of medication over four daily doses while cutting back .001 of a milligram each day. >> this seems like such a daunting process. >> this way of tapering has helped me lose my symptoms. >> how do you track your taper? >> i keep a record in this notebook i started here july 30th of 2017. >> i see you've written hold a number of times on some of these pages. what does that mean? >> my symptoms were escalating. and to feel, i just would not make a cut in my dose that day. >> is there any room for error in this at all? >> none, no. really to me, it's a life or death mistake. i just don't want to go back to that place again. >> it's been 13 months since chrissy began her tapering journey. along with her new online family, those closest to home have been a strong form of support. >> these are pretty powerful images. i love my mom. you'll get better soon, i know it. i love you. >> i've just kind of made it a little shrine, especially in the beginning when i was feeling so hopeless. >> if it all goes well, chrissy has about six months to go before her body is free from this drug. while her doctor is supportive and prescribes the value yum iu needs to slowly quit, this way of micro-tapering is not an industry standard. >> what's incomprehensible to me is you're following a regimen that is not doctor sanctioned. >> no. >> that's just -- it's just unbelievable. >> it saved my life by doing it this way. the people who have helped me, they have saved me. last month there were four people who took their own lives. i could have easily ended up one of those names that i see in my groups every month. i can't wait to be free of this, to have my life back. i feel like i'm chained to this medicine. any anxiety -- >> it's okay. >> i'm sorry. it's my dose, to take my dose. >> okay. >> to hear people in person talk about going through withdrawals, so many of their symptoms are so similar. and as i was listening to all these people, i just couldn't help but think about my own father. he went through a period going without sleep for days. his body was jerking profusely all the time. he was crying all the time. and he was prescribed klonopin. and i just have to wonder if it had anything to do with benzodiazepines. s someone ♪ ♪ walking behind you ♪ turn around ♪ look at me ♪ there is someone ♪ look at me (paul) wireless network claims america's most reliable network. the nation's largest and most reliable network. the best network is even better? 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>> i'm going to draw a picture of you. >> okay. you want me to smile? >> my dad doug ling is 82 years old. he's a pretty great grandpa, if a bit rough around the edges. >> now the beard. >> and the scrawny beard. >> he forgets things from time to time, but considering his age, he's in pretty decent age. >> here it is. >> whoa! that must be grandpa. >> but back in late 2016, his health took a sudden turn for the worse. so, during this period, we collected a number of videos of my dad. when he was awake, he was just crying all the time. he refused to go outside. and he would just be hallucinating. when he would try to sleep, his body just couldn't stop jerking. and so he wouldn't be able to sleep. and this just would go on for days and days. and so when i hear all these people talk about what they were experiencing when they were going through withdrawals, it just -- it sounds so similar to what my dad went through. to satisfy my own curiosity, i decided to see if i could find any reference to benzos in my dad's medical record. i see on august 23rd, he was admitted to the er. after a couple of days they prescribed to him klonopin for 30 days. but after five days, his doctor reduced it to half of one tablet, so .5 milligrams of it. and then in february, it says the reason he's there is for delirium. i wonder if this delirium could i wonder if this could have had something to do with a senior citizen being on klonopin. the doctor from the kaiser permanent hospital system was the one who helped my father get back on his feet. what did you think was going on with him? do you think that what he was experiencing was a result of the benzodiazapenes? >> the first visit when you brought him in was really a mystery. he had been on benzodiazapenes. wasn't clear how many he had been taking but if you think of a person's equilibrium as a pond and you take a medication and drop it into that pond there is a ripple effect. those ripples can be happening long after a medicine has been introduced or removed. it may not always be obvious to the patient or physician so it is a risk. >> studies have shown an increased risk of adverse reactions when prescribing benzos for the elderly. do you think he is sensitive to that class of medication? >> yeah. there are definitely patients who have even a paradoxical response. even though the medicines are supposed to be calming some people get very agitated on them. the fact that your dad was older, was on different medications, any small thing can have an impact on the overall whole. so is it possible? sure it's possible there was some impact on him but i don't think honestly we'll ever know the answer to the question. i think it is a very important question to bring up because as with the opioid crisis, benzodiazapenes may be the next thing we deal with. >> you can come to school with jet and me. >> this is my father now. he's clearly in a much better place, and thankfully, doesn't recall much of what happened. so, daddy, do you remember when the paramedics came? i think they came like three or four times? >> i remember riding in the ambulance and i thought it was a -- they were taking me to the morgue. that is about all i remember. >> honestly, dad, we really thought you -- we planned funerals for you a couple times. >> yes. >> because your body was so out of control and no one could explain what was going on with you. >> maybe it's good that i don't remember any of that. >> i know. >> that time. >> yeah. you look good, dad. >> i always look good, my dear. >> so i guess we'll never know whether benzos were behind what my dad experienced but even his doctor said we can't completely rule out they may have played a role in it. i'm just grateful he is doing well now because so many people are not so lucky. nce verizon innovative learning, students have hardware, connectivity, and quality curriculum. the jobs of tomorrow will involve technology. now students are truly hopeful for what they may achieve. even after you clean, odors are still trapped in your fabrics. febreze fabric eliminates those odors. and try febreze unstopables with twice the fresh-scent power. tackle tough odors with irresistible freshness. land a lot! because denny's brought back the super slam™. with eggs, hash browns, bacon, sausage and buttermilk or pumpkin pancakes. all for just $5.99. the $5.99 super slam™ is back! see you at denny's! ♪ think you need to pay prestige prices for better skin results? 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