Benzodiazepine Addiction Treatment in Minnesota
Two facts shape benzodiazepine addiction treatment in Minnesota at NorthStar Regional: stopping suddenly is dangerous, and the anxiety underneath remains. We treat dependence on Xanax, Ativan, Klonopin, and Valium, which often starts with a valid prescription. Withdrawal means a slow, supervised taper with 24-hour nursing in Eden Prairie, since seizures are a real risk. Alongside the taper, the original anxiety gets real treatment in the same plan. We accept Medical Assistance (Medicaid) and most major insurers, and your caution about stopping is correct, so nobody asks you to stop alone.
Licensed Treatment Programs
Founded 2015
Addiction and mental health care in one system
Multiple Campuses
Across the Twin Cities metro
MN Department of Health: Licensed
MN Department of Human Services: Licensed
Understanding benzodiazepine addiction
How Benzodiazepine Addiction Often Starts with a Prescription
Benzodiazepines are prescribed for anxiety, panic, and sleep, and they work, at first. But the body adapts within weeks. Tolerance builds, the original dose stops working, and in time the medicine’s main job is to prevent its own withdrawal. Many people become dependent without ever misusing a pill, simply by taking a prescription for longer than the brain can handle.
The key safety fact: benzodiazepine withdrawal can be medically dangerous, and it can cause seizures, so stopping all at once is never safe. Recovery starts with a taper, where a doctor lowers the dose step by step. It lasts when the anxiety the pills were prescribed for gets treated too, with CBT, DBT-informed skills, and trauma skills when trauma is driving it. Removing the pills without treating the anxiety just brings back the first problem.
What It Looks Like
Signs of Benzodiazepine Dependence
Dependence often looks like simply following a prescription. These are the signs.
The Dose Stopped Working
What used to bring calm now barely maintains normal. Tolerance is the first sign the body has reorganized around the medication.
Panic Between Doses
Rebound anxiety that arrives on schedule as the last dose fades. When the medication causes the feeling it treats, dependence has set in.
Running Out Early
Doses doubled on hard days, refills that run out early, a second prescriber. The prescription no longer matches the need.
Foggy Days
Memory gaps, slow thinking, afternoons lost to sedation. Long-term benzodiazepine use clouds the mind. Families tend to see it first.
Mixing to Make It Work
Benzodiazepines plus alcohol or opioids, to get the old effect back. This mix is the dangerous one. It deserves a call today.
Terrified to Stop
You’ve felt the withdrawal begin, and it scared you. That fear makes sense. That is exactly why stopping should happen with medical supervision, not alone.
You don’t need to check every box, and you don’t need to diagnose yourself. If several of these sound familiar, a comprehensive assessment gives you a clear answer in about an hour. Reading this for someone you love? Start with our guide for parents or our guide for spouses and partners.
Treating Benzodiazepine Dependence and Anxiety Together
Benzodiazepine recovery has two parts. Taper the medication safely, and treat the anxiety it was prescribed for. Skip the first and it is dangerous, but skip the second and it doesn’t last.
For Addiction
Every substance we treat is explained on its own page, from the first assessment through sober living.
For Mental Health
At designated NorthStar Regional programs, these conditions are treated together with addiction as co-occurring care, in one plan. Standalone mental health treatment, no substance use diagnosis needed, is available through our outpatient clinic in Shakopee.
How We Treat It
Benzodiazepine Addiction Treatment Programs at NorthStar Regional
It starts with a comprehensive assessment. Then comes a medical review of what you are taking, how much, and for how long. Benzodiazepine withdrawal is one of the two medically dangerous withdrawals, alongside alcohol. So we never manage it without medical oversight. Our medical partner oversees a slow, supervised taper. When the assessment calls for it, you get nursing support 24 hours a day in withdrawal management.
Alongside the taper, the anxiety gets real treatment. CBT works on worst-case thinking, and DBT-informed skills help with panic that hits at full strength. Trauma skills come in when trauma is the cause, while sleep and nervous system work runs through our whole-person programming. Where benzodiazepines are part of a wider substance picture, every level of care stands behind the plan. That means high-intensity residential treatment, outpatient care, relapse prevention, and sober living, all inside one system.
Am I ready?
Signs You're Ready for Benzodiazepine Addiction Treatment
With benzodiazepines, being cautious about stopping is a good thing. Here is how to stay safe and still get help.
Your Fear Is Valid
If you have felt withdrawal start, your caution is medically correct. The answer isn’t to keep taking them for good. It is a slow taper, planned by a care team that handles benzodiazepine withdrawal each day.
The Prescription Outlived Its Plan
If nobody has reviewed why you’re still taking it, that review is overdue. An assessment is exactly that: a look at what the medication is doing now.
You Want Your Mind Back
The fog, the gaps, the flattened days. Wanting your cognition back is reason enough, and the taper is how it returns.
Here is how admissions works, and the assessment that turns “maybe” into a plan.
Where you can get help
Treated Across NorthStar Regional Locations
You don’t have to find the one building that treats this. Co-occurring addiction and mental health care is available at designated programs, and standalone mental health care is available at our outpatient clinic in Shakopee. Your comprehensive assessment matches you to the right campus and level of care.
Medical detox + men’s care
Detox Center & Withdrawal Management - Eden Prairie
Where most people start: our only campus with medical detox, with nurses on site 24 hours a day.
Men’s IOP with lodging
Men's Treatment Center | Chaska
Intensive outpatient therapy with a place to stay, so you can start recovery before you have housing lined up.
Women’s campus
Women's Treatment Center | Chaska
A fully separate women’s campus in downtown Chaska. The Klein Mansion lets women move from residential into IOP with lodging.
Men’s residential
Men's Treatment Center | Otsego
32 wooded acres on the river, with outdoor groups and a gym, serving the northwest metro.
Men’s residential
Men's Treatment Center | Shakopee
A home on a residential street, not a hospital wing, minutes from our outpatient center.
Outpatient clinic
Outpatient Mental Health Clinic | Shakopee
Counseling, assessments, and standalone mental health care, in person or by telehealth. No established diagnosis needed to contact us.
Where treatment happens
Benzodiazepine Addiction Treatment Programs
Medical safety first, then the anxiety work, then the long plan.
Stage one
Drug Detox
A slow, supervised taper with medical oversight at our withdrawal management center in Eden Prairie. Nurses are on site 24 hours a day.
The core
Inpatient Rehabilitation
Live-in structure while the taper completes and the anxiety work takes hold.
Standalone MH
Outpatient Mental Health
Anxiety care that keeps going, at our outpatient clinic in Shakopee. No established diagnosis is needed to contact us.
Who's behind the work
About NorthStar Regional
NorthStar Regional is Minnesota’s treatment system built around access: alcohol and drug treatment centers and mental health care across multiple Twin Cities metro locations. Founded in 2015, we provide one connected continuum: detox (withdrawal management), residential, outpatient, mental health, and a sober housing pathway. Separate men’s and women’s campuses, co-occurring care at designated programs, and no faith requirement set us apart. We accept Medical Assistance (Medicaid) and most major insurers, and if you are uninsured, our admissions team helps you through enrollment. A person can walk in with nothing and leave with everything they need to build a life.
Paying for Care
Insurance and Payment Options
Our team helps review your benefits and handles the paperwork with you. If you have no insurance, we help walk you through enrolling for benefits. County case managers, probation officers, hospitals, and crisis teams send clients to us because, in their words, we just get it done.
Insurance and State Funding
Commercial plans, Medical Assistance (Medicaid), county placements, and private pay. We verify benefits and handle the paperwork with you.
We Are Here to Help
We help review your benefits, find your right starting point, and schedule you for the same day or the next whenever possible. Then we pick you up anywhere in the Twin Cities metro.
How Admission Works
What Happens From Your First Call to Your First Night
You did the hard part when you picked up the phone. Here is exactly what happens next, so nothing about day one is a mystery.
You Call and a Real Person Answers
A real person answers, usually within seconds, and asks one short question: substance use, or mental health? There is no phone tree, and you don’t have to tell your life story. We ask only what we need and handle the rest.
We Help with the Details
Our team helps review your benefits, and a short screening covers withdrawal risk, medical needs, and mental health, so you land at the right level of care. Then we schedule you, same day or next day whenever possible.
We Pick You Up
You get reminder calls and texts. Before pickup, your admissions coordinator and your driver call you together, so you know the name, the car, and the timing before it’s in your driveway. In the car: water, Gatorade, snacks, and a bagged lunch. Your driver, most often someone in long-term recovery, helps with your bags.
A Real Person Meets You When You Arrive
Your driver walks you inside and hands you off by name to the team member waiting for you. Your intake team completes your application with you. If you’re hungry, there’s a meal waiting. Treatment starts, and you never carried the logistics.
“The client has done the hard work by picking up the phone. We will carry them the rest of the way.”
Sarah Roy, Executive Vice President
Reviews from Google
Why Clients Choose NorthStar Regional
Don’t just take our word for it. Here is what alumni say about their time in treatment.
Keep reading
Related Articles and Resources
Resources
Before You Call
How admissions works, guides for families, and the forms you can complete early. More resources are linked throughout the site, or contact admissions and we’ll send anything by email.
Questions we hear every day
Common Questions About Benzodiazepine Treatment
Is it dangerous to stop benzodiazepines cold turkey?
Yes, it is. Sudden benzodiazepine withdrawal can cause seizures and severe rebound symptoms, so never stop all at once on your own. The safe path is a slow taper watched by a doctor, which is just what we offer.
I take my prescription exactly as written. Can I still be dependent?
Yes, and it is common. Dependence means your body has adjusted to the medication. It does not mean you did anything wrong. If the dose has stopped working, if anxiety spikes between doses, or if stopping frightens you, a medication review through our assessment is the next step.
How long does a benzodiazepine taper take?
It depends on the drug, the dose, and how long you’ve taken it. It takes weeks to months, adjusted to how your body responds. Slower is safer and easier on you. The pace is set by your medical team, not by a calendar.
What happens to my anxiety without the pills?
It gets treated the right way, with CBT, DBT-informed skills, EMDR when trauma is driving it, and whole-person work on sleep and stress. Many clients find their anxiety is lower after the taper than in their last years on the drug. The reason is that rebound anxiety goes away with the pills.
What if I've been mixing them with alcohol or opioids?
Tell us on the first call, because the mix changes the medical plan and makes it more urgent. Nothing you say will surprise us. Being dependent on both is common and treatable, and our detox handles it safely.
Does insurance cover benzodiazepine treatment?
Coverage depends on your plan, the service, eligibility, and authorization requirements. Our team helps review your benefits and available payment options. Benefits verification is not a guarantee of payment.
Admissions
Make the First Call and We'll Take It from There
Confidential, no obligation, and answered by someone who knows what you’re facing and cares to listen.