Opioids From one extreme to another

[MrBaconHawk]

TLDR: I am giving an idea of my drug situation and 1) asking for any tips/advice and 2) sharing my little victory here, if you can call it that haha...

I have terrible sciatic pain from a herniated disc, I regularly take very high doses of multiple meds, including Suboxone, Lyrica, Cyclobenzaprine, I've taken Hydrocodone, then Oxycodone, Morphine, Ketamine, and they finally moved me to Suboxone which initially helped, when combined with Lyrica.

Well, on December 1st, I had emergency surgery to remove my gallbladder, they were very concerned cause we knew I had to get it out but because of the Suboxone, I wouldn't get ANY pain relief no matter what they did. They had hourly IV Fentanyl and Ondansetron for nausea, I went home and it's now been nearly 4 weeks... I have had nausea and vomiting nearly every day, spent my Birthday (Christmas day) puking while my wife's family hung out opening presents... I gotta tell ya, not being able to eat ANYTHING and just trying to very slowly sip water hoping I keep it down has not been pleasant by any means...

Then again, this is probably because of having no pain meds for a few days and already experiencing terrible withdrawls from stopping ALL those meds cold-turkey. Most people stop one med at a time and taper down from what I understand... Even with that the withdrawals can be rough, so it's safe to say my Pain Clinic was highly surprised I was able to stop cold-turkey and tough it out at home instead of getting admitted to a Recovery Clinic cause withdrawals from these meds can apparently be potentially life threatening, especially at the levels I was taking.

For those who want to know, here's what I was prescribed vs what I actually took.

Prescribed:
8mg Buprenorphine 3 times a day (FDA max recommended dose)
150mg Lyrica 3 times a day (50% over the FDA max recommended dose)
Taken for the last 1-2 years now

Actually taken:
450mg-900mg of Lyrica, well beyond where anyone should be taking
16mg-32mg buprenorphine once or twice a day, sometimes up to 96mg of Bupe which is ludicrously high, most people could OD with only 8mg, they typically start you at 0.075mg (75 micrograms), so I was taking up to 1000 times the starting dose in a few occasions, with very little effect... It didn't help my pain anymore so I just had to quit it. It sucks to be in pain but why take such ridiculous levels of drugs when they weren't helping me anymore?

I mainly want any tips/advice regarding the best way for me to get control of my health. I have been having extreme nausea, occasional diarrhea, constant and almost unbearable hot flashes, headaches, back pain, sciatic pain, extreme irritability (I had to set my daughter aside today to apologize for being so quick to anger the last few weeks and obviously feel terrible for it...) I've had 2 or 3 days where I didn't puke and for a decent number of hours I felt almost fine but only if I vaped a decent amount of THC, but I don't have access to any more at the moment and I'm pretty broke since I haven't been able to work for many months...

I feel like I'm doing all I can, and I'm really hoping I'm at the tail end of this. About 5 days in I felt good enough I thought I could try taking the Suboxone and Lyrica again but realized it just kept resetting the time of withdrawals, so I had no choice but to stop cold turkey and I don't want to start again if I'm gonna feel like this. I sip on water or try to nibble on bland stuff, once in a while I can eat half a banana or half a cup of juice/fruit smoothie to combat the hot flashes. Are there other things I can do? I'm stuck in 85 degree "winter" weather in Hawaii and the only time I get complete calmness from hot flashes is in a cold shower. The moment I step out, I'm on and off with the heat again.

My other question is if anyone thinks I should go back to taking Lyrica at a normal dose or just at night to help me sleep, cause I'm hardly sleeping a couple hours a day from the hot flashes, nausea, and TONS of leg pains (imagine sciatic pain from moving around, but you can't stop moving your legs cause of "Restless Leg Syndrome" type of withdrawal symptoms from the meds I stopped, basically a Catch 22 of nerve pain). If I take Lyrica, it could cause me to go through withdrawals all over again, but it could be that only Suboxone is causing it... I just need some sleep but I don't want to go back to taking meds just to delay the discomfort.


For good news, I guess this means I'm sober for now (unless I decide I have to use Lyrica again, or THC) and I might be able to stop taking Testosterone injections (cause all the opioids fucked with my hormones and I had essentially no Testosterone at all). With THC, I know all my symptoms (potentially not the hot flashes though) can be well-managed with it, but should I really go back to using a different substance? Do I tough it out and hope I can slowly improve my back without the pain reduction? I guess I'm just curious if you guys would personally go to Lyrica or THC for that pain relief or if you think that's counter-productive.

 

[plumbus-nine]

The dose (450mg) of lyrica isn't too high, they give up to 600mg/d for anxiety and fibromyalgia and I know of a case where 900 were prescribed. Don't go higher though, I recently had a seizure from the irresponsible but not unheard dose of 1.6g.

I personally don't get withdrawal from pregabalin when tapered and opioids are worse here yet its very individually dependent. You have to judge the risk of withdrawal versus the benefits of less pain.

Also in substitution they start with a few mg's of buprenorphine, 75mcg is a very low dosage but I know for pain sometimes they start so low.

How did you take the ketamine, which route, how much and often, and did it do something?

For cases like yours it's sad that longer acting dissociatives aren't approved yet and probably never will but I feel that when strictly limiting dosage and speed of onset like with a retard caps, these had great potential as alternative painkillers.

Did you try other opioids than fentanyl and buprenorphine? Maybe you don't get nausea from one or another of them. I didn't get any from morphine in pretty high dosages but it also shot my T. It's recovering though, and there seem to be substances which aid in restarting natural T production, you'll find more when you look around here. Wouldn't surprise me if a doc either hadn't heard of or just doesn't use them.

If THC works for you, maybe medical marijuana?

Good luck!

 

[MrBaconHawk]

The dose (450mg) of lyrica isn't too high, they give up to 600mg/d for anxiety and fibromyalgia and I know of a case where 900 were prescribed. Don't go higher though, I recently had a seizure from the irresponsible but not unheard dose of 1.6g.

I personally don't get withdrawal from pregabalin when tapered and opioids are worse here yet its very individually dependent. You have to judge the risk of withdrawal versus the benefits of less pain.

Also in substitution they start with a few mg's of buprenorphine, 75mcg is a very low dosage but I know for pain sometimes they start so low.

How did you take the ketamine, which route, how much and often, and did it do something?

For cases like yours it's sad that longer acting dissociatives aren't approved yet and probably never will but I feel that when strictly limiting dosage and speed of onset like with a retard caps, these had great potential as alternative painkillers.

Did you try other opioids than fentanyl and buprenorphine? Maybe you don't get nausea from one or another of them. I didn't get any from morphine in pretty high dosages but it also shot my T. It's recovering though, and there seem to be substances which aid in restarting natural T production, you'll find more when you look around here. Wouldn't surprise me if a doc either hadn't heard of or just doesn't use them.

If THC works for you, maybe medical marijuana?

Good luck!

Thanks for the feedback

About the Lyrica, I forgot to write my 2nd part (like with bupe, I wrote what I regularly take as well as my max dose I've taken). I have taken a max of I believe 9-12 pills within 24 hours, possibly more but I'm not sure it's much higher than that. 9 x 150mg is 1.45g, 12 x 150mg is 1.9g so I believe somewhere in that range. Never had bad side effects, from what I can recall. Only done that 2 or 3 times though, usually I'm taking 3-6 a day, at night. I used to take 2 days of pills at night to sleep, then the next day just tough it out so I don't run out too quick.

As far as Ketamine, it was only given at the ER a few times cause of my opiate tolerance but all it seemed to do was make me dizzy and a little hard to focus my eyes, my thoughts were a little more prominent, but I believe I was still in pain, then 20 minutes after, it was gone as if I never took anything. They told me it's cause it's short acting but 20 minutes seems really short.

I may stick with THC, but I've gotta find 1) a source to get it from and 2) a better way to take it, cause vaping is really not good or what I want to do, but I haven't had luck with edibles or anything else yet regarding pain relief and I'm not sure why.

 

[MrBaconHawk]

Thanks for the feedback

About the Lyrica, I forgot to write my 2nd part (like with bupe, I wrote what I regularly take as well as my max dose I've taken). I have taken a max of I believe 9-12 pills within 24 hours, possibly more but I'm not sure it's much higher than that. 9 x 150mg is 1.45g, 12 x 150mg is 1.9g so I believe somewhere in that range. Never had bad side effects, from what I can recall. Only done that 2 or 3 times though, usually I'm taking 3-6 a day, at night. I used to take 2 days of pills at night to sleep, then the next day just tough it out so I don't run out too quick.

As far as Ketamine, it was only given at the ER a few times cause of my opiate tolerance but all it seemed to do was make me dizzy and a little hard to focus my eyes, my thoughts were a little more prominent, but I believe I was still in pain, then 20 minutes after, it was gone as if I never took anything. They told me it's cause it's short acting but 20 minutes seems really short.

I may stick with THC, but I've gotta find 1) a source to get it from and 2) a better way to take it, cause vaping is really not good or what I want to do, but I haven't had luck with edibles or anything else yet regarding pain relief and I'm not sure why.

A few months ago (more like 6 or 7 months now) I had taken around half a bottle of Oxy (I think 300-450mg) with whatever Lyrica I had in an attempt to Overdose. (before this, the most oxy I had taken was 40-50mg and usually felt decently heavy) I sat in my car in a parking lot and went to sleep not expecting to wake up. Sure enough, the next day around noon I slowly started to wake up, I couldnt move my body at all for 20-30 minutes and my left foot was completely numb for 3 days. I tried to get to my phone to stop the scheduled text I made from sending to my wife but it ended up going through (it was scheduled to only send after I believed I would be long gone, I didn't really think about what happens if I survived cause I really wasn't expecting to).

Needless to say, my wife was obviously hysterical thinking I was gone, she called the cops and showed them my text, tracked my phone location and the police showed up (which is what I was hoping for, but not with me alive, I left instructions on how to collect the Life Insurance payout which covers suicide). They took me to a Psychiatric Hospital and they let me go after 3 days cause I denied attempting to do anything and played it off to them as a really shitty joke (I guess I also did that so I could ensure I didn't get sympathy from any of them, I wanted to punish myself for what I was doing to myself and my wife and kids) so they let me go since there wasn't anything more they could do for me.

I had already been to the Psych hospital 2 times voluntarily for my "life-long treatment resistant depression" as they call it. I've tried most anti-depressants (around 10 or so different ones, for 2-3 months until stopping each one) with no results, talk therapy obviously isn't going to change the reality of my life, who I am, what I've done, and what been done to me, they tried Electroconvulsive Therapy 2 years ago, put me to sleep, shock my brain until I have a seizure, then I would wake up with headache and bruised feeling on my head, 3 times a week for almost 2 months. No lasting results from that so we don't have real options for treating the depression aspect. I've tried shrooms because of promising results when combined with therapy (I'd do different therapy exercises when taking it) but I couldn't seem to get much of an effect from them. I bought 5 grams of Golden Teachers and took it all my first time, it changed my mood a little and colors seemed more vibrant/saturated but nothing really too crazy, I figured it was bad potency so I grew my own and tried fresh ones, around 7-10 grams of dried equivalent with similar results so I sold the rest to a friend, he got pretty high off only one or two shrooms while I was eating handfuls so I sort of felt cheated there that it wasn't really effecting me for whatever reason.

I guess I just felt cornered because I could not see anything improving and I felt terrible for the way I would treat others at times, how I felt so disconnected from everyone, the back pain really did me in cause I haven't been able to work for over a year now, my wife's parents obviously hate me so I'm stuck on an Island (Hawaii) with no real support, no income, no car (my head gasket blew a few months ago and I can't fix it myself cause of my back) and this is as good as its been for me really. So I definitely felt worth more dead than alive (a $400k Life Insurance payout is a lot and I felt I was forcing my wife and kids to live and deal with me, just felt like I was dragging them down) so I had planned to play the long con and get my wife to divorce me or something in the nicest way possible like growing apart so I could kill myself without them dealing with it, then have someone anonymously give the money to them as a gift... It was a far fetched idea and that day I just kept thinking about it and decided I couldn't wait around to make it happen and that's when I decided to kill myself.

I know I'm not doing anyone a favor by trying to kill myself and I'm obviously aware of the pain it would cause but I often feel that if I don't, I'm going to cause far worse lasting damage to my wife and kids. They're young and she's only 25, plenty of time to live a new life if I was gone. What do you do when you seemingly have no options to fix your pain, your history, or your future? Its the reason I don't bother talking to "professionals" or anyone really anymore cause I'm tired of hearing the same shitty reasons to stay alive like "Oh, but things will change, just watch" as if wishful thinking changes reality, or "What about your family? Don't they love you?" as if I haven't been sticking around for 6 years now for them because I can't figure out if I'm ever going to change my way of thinking. I just don't think people really understand how hard it is to come up with valid excuses to live another day. Most people like me just try to forget and ignore it cause we can't come up with an answer.

Im just tired of being me honestly, we're looking into treatment for Complex PTSD (my dad physically abused me and used torture methods on me as a kid when I didn't listen, he was a Marine so he knows a thing or two about that) which is what we *currently* believe I have which would explain why antidepressants don't have an effect. No luck on treatment so far, I'm not getting my hopes up but I'm still here trying because I failed when I tried it my way (with the suicide) so it's only fair I do more to explore options... It's just tough when you don't see progress, when you think you're moving ahead you're really just adding in more factors, stresses, and responsibilities that all get fucked up cause of the baggage from my history of abuse, homeless as a teen playing guitar on the street, etc etc. It's frustrating cause it feels so unfair to have to deal with it all for the sake of other people... But I guess it's what I've always done. I gave my only shoes to another homeless person, I give away the money I'd earn to other people on the street when I could, I tried to do as much good as I could in hopes that it could balance out whatever I must have done to deserve it all. Life is unfair and cruel, sure, but why does it have to be? Why can't we just get a break? Too many people feel like this and it doesn't really help to know you're not the only one dealing with it... It just makes it seem more unfair to me.

 

[MrBaconHawk]

Anyway, guess I just wanted to put it to words or something, I'll look into THC options and just go from there. Thanks

 

[Keif' Richards]

Hey there @MrBaconHawk

I'm pretty bummed to have to read your story. You've dug yourself a really shitty hole. This is a judgement-free statement, but you've gone off the furrough to a considerable extent and there is going to be some sinificant discomfort involved in getting back to normalcy. The bigest thing here is that you need to cut the bullshit and be completely honest with yourself. I'm not lecturin you either, but you have a tinge of denial regarding your situation that I'm all too familiar with.

You're asking yourself "what is wrong and how do I fix it?" and 90% of your problems are going to be ultimately wrapped up in using your medications excessively. This isn't going to be fixed easily, but it can be fixed and we can help you with it.

It's the addict's lament. Why is everything so wrong in my life? Then you cycle through everything wrong, rapid-fire, not really addressing anything directly, just brooding. What you need to do is take the first step... of many.

I understand you're really going excessive with pretty much everything, but the first step is going to be finding out the lowest possible, tolerable dosages for your medications. I'm not asking how high you can go, but what your actualy average is or, what it takes to keep you from getting sick.

To help us help you, start with that. Tell us where you're starting from and we will break it down into bite-sized pieces for you. We will help you however we can, but you will be doing most of the work.

 

[Just a little pinprick]

A few months ago (more like 6 or 7 months now) I had taken around half a bottle of Oxy (I think 300-450mg) with whatever Lyrica I had in an attempt to Overdose. (before this, the most oxy I had taken was 40-50mg and usually felt decently heavy) I sat in my car in a parking lot and went to sleep not expecting to wake up. Sure enough, the next day around noon I slowly started to wake up, I couldnt move my body at all for 20-30 minutes and my left foot was completely numb for 3 days. I tried to get to my phone to stop the scheduled text I made from sending to my wife but it ended up going through (it was scheduled to only send after I believed I would be long gone, I didn't really think about what happens if I survived cause I really wasn't expecting to).

Needless to say, my wife was obviously hysterical thinking I was gone, she called the cops and showed them my text, tracked my phone location and the police showed up (which is what I was hoping for, but not with me alive, I left instructions on how to collect the Life Insurance payout which covers suicide). They took me to a Psychiatric Hospital and they let me go after 3 days cause I denied attempting to do anything and played it off to them as a really shitty joke (I guess I also did that so I could ensure I didn't get sympathy from any of them, I wanted to punish myself for what I was doing to myself and my wife and kids) so they let me go since there wasn't anything more they could do for me.

I had already been to the Psych hospital 2 times voluntarily for my "life-long treatment resistant depression" as they call it. I've tried most anti-depressants (around 10 or so different ones, for 2-3 months until stopping each one) with no results, talk therapy obviously isn't going to change the reality of my life, who I am, what I've done, and what been done to me, they tried Electroconvulsive Therapy 2 years ago, put me to sleep, shock my brain until I have a seizure, then I would wake up with headache and bruised feeling on my head, 3 times a week for almost 2 months. No lasting results from that so we don't have real options for treating the depression aspect. I've tried shrooms because of promising results when combined with therapy (I'd do different therapy exercises when taking it) but I couldn't seem to get much of an effect from them. I bought 5 grams of Golden Teachers and took it all my first time, it changed my mood a little and colors seemed more vibrant/saturated but nothing really too crazy, I figured it was bad potency so I grew my own and tried fresh ones, around 7-10 grams of dried equivalent with similar results so I sold the rest to a friend, he got pretty high off only one or two shrooms while I was eating handfuls so I sort of felt cheated there that it wasn't really effecting me for whatever reason.

I guess I just felt cornered because I could not see anything improving and I felt terrible for the way I would treat others at times, how I felt so disconnected from everyone, the back pain really did me in cause I haven't been able to work for over a year now, my wife's parents obviously hate me so I'm stuck on an Island (Hawaii) with no real support, no income, no car (my head gasket blew a few months ago and I can't fix it myself cause of my back) and this is as good as its been for me really. So I definitely felt worth more dead than alive (a $400k Life Insurance payout is a lot and I felt I was forcing my wife and kids to live and deal with me, just felt like I was dragging them down) so I had planned to play the long con and get my wife to divorce me or something in the nicest way possible like growing apart so I could kill myself without them dealing with it, then have someone anonymously give the money to them as a gift... It was a far fetched idea and that day I just kept thinking about it and decided I couldn't wait around to make it happen and that's when I decided to kill myself.

I know I'm not doing anyone a favor by trying to kill myself and I'm obviously aware of the pain it would cause but I often feel that if I don't, I'm going to cause far worse lasting damage to my wife and kids. They're young and she's only 25, plenty of time to live a new life if I was gone. What do you do when you seemingly have no options to fix your pain, your history, or your future? Its the reason I don't bother talking to "professionals" or anyone really anymore cause I'm tired of hearing the same shitty reasons to stay alive like "Oh, but things will change, just watch" as if wishful thinking changes reality, or "What about your family? Don't they love you?" as if I haven't been sticking around for 6 years now for them because I can't figure out if I'm ever going to change my way of thinking. I just don't think people really understand how hard it is to come up with valid excuses to live another day. Most people like me just try to forget and ignore it cause we can't come up with an answer.

Im just tired of being me honestly, we're looking into treatment for Complex PTSD (my dad physically abused me and used torture methods on me as a kid when I didn't listen, he was a Marine so he knows a thing or two about that) which is what we *currently* believe I have which would explain why antidepressants don't have an effect. No luck on treatment so far, I'm not getting my hopes up but I'm still here trying because I failed when I tried it my way (with the suicide) so it's only fair I do more to explore options... It's just tough when you don't see progress, when you think you're moving ahead you're really just adding in more factors, stresses, and responsibilities that all get fucked up cause of the baggage from my history of abuse, homeless as a teen playing guitar on the street, etc etc. It's frustrating cause it feels so unfair to have to deal with it all for the sake of other people... But I guess it's what I've always done. I gave my only shoes to another homeless person, I give away the money I'd earn to other people on the street when I could, I tried to do as much good as I could in hopes that it could balance out whatever I must have done to deserve it all. Life is unfair and cruel, sure, but why does it have to be? Why can't we just get a break? Too many people feel like this and it doesn't really help to know you're not the only one dealing with it... It just makes it seem more unfair to me.

Hmm, sorry but I don’t buy into the whole “ life is unfair” crap, You put yourself into this situation and by the sound of you you’d like an exit strategy. Since you mentioned suicide attempts and mental wards my suggestion is go commit yourself and leave your well being in the hands of people more qualified then yourself ,be honest about your drug history and what’s going on in your head ,You’ll be medicated and looked after by professionals and not taking advice from random folks on the web.

Get comfortable being uncomfortable ,tis a long road ahead.

Good luck.

 

[sedgewick1]

I've been taking Suboxone for 15 years or so. It really doesn't have any pain relief component that I can tell -- maybe it does at first, but after a while you just normalize to it. Although I've read one BL member saying the patch works really well for pain. Maybe that would be an option? FWIW: several years ago I went into detox for another drug. I thought while I was there I would try getting off Suboxone, I found that about 3 days in the WD started kicking in and they were bad. I ended up checking out of detox early since I knew I'd not get any more there. A few weeks ago I went to jail and they didn't give me any subs. I was in 3 days and wasn't really feeling any WDs, so I decided to see how long I could last. 8-9 days and I didn't really experience any WDs other than maybe a mild weakness. So I'm miraculously off them now! Although I do take an 8mg strip every once in a while to catch a small buzz.

One thing I think you most def should try is mini-dosing RC PCP analogues -- I'm thinking either 3-meo-pcp or 3-ho-pcp. They have much longer legs than ketamine. They're pretty cheap (about $100 per gram where you'd be taking about 2-3mg per dose so like around $2 per dose with maybe 2 doses per day). I think they definitely have analgesic properties and at the very least you'd experience a mood lift, and they are totally not physically addictive.

The only other thing I can think of is getting back on lower doses of hydros or oxys. If you don't think you can stay within the limits of what's prescribed maybe this wouldn't be a good option for you.