Opioids Methadone Cold Turkey - How Bad Will It Get?

[alex_anders_8]

So after 3 years I've finally decided to come off methadone. I've gained 2 stone (28lb) while on it and for some reason it makes me sweat A LOT more than I should. I've always been very fit but now even a brisk walk will bring me out in a sweat. Plus, it's a pain in the butt going to the chemist every day.
My dosage creeped up over the years from 35mg to 60mg (I've been using heroin and oxy intermittantly on top of my methadone). Over about 2 months my key worker tapered me down to 30mg/day which I've been on for 6 weeks or so now.

I haven't used heroin or any other opiate (not even co-codamol) in 11 days and apart from the odd craving it was surprisingly easy (I'm also an alcoholic so that may have masked some of the WD symptoms).

Last week I tried to kill myself by slashing vertically all the way up both forarms. It was bad enough that I needed two lots of surgery to repair tendons and nerves). I missed my methadone Tuesday/Wednesday/Thursday as the hospital doesn't "keep" methadone and they had to have a doctor with a licence to prescribe it to order some in. I had my 30mg on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Sunday was the last time I took it.

Today is day 5 of cold turkey for me. The first three days I can't say I noticed much in the way of WD (oh, I did insufflate 2mg of buprenorphine 2 days ago. Yesterday (day 4) I was constantly clammy and had moderate nausea and diarrhea. Today I feel weird like my brain feels like it's stuffed with cotton wool. Basically the same symptoms as yesterday but a little worse. I've only been awake a few hours: 10:10am here, but I've had 5 beers and a glass of wine and I'm a lot calmer and feel less sick.

Basically, I'm asking how long can I expect to experience the withdrawal for, and when is the peak? I'm drunk like 98% of the time so I'm thinking that might help in the same way benzos would?

 

[JM357]

I have to say.... if coming off methadone causes you to drink more I couldn't say I would recommend it. Alcohol abuse, which isn't even a drug being dispensed in a controlled manner would probably be worse. And at some point in your WD say you start throwing up and can't get alcohol down, then what? Alcohol WDs can kill you, methadone WDs may suck (and alcohol WDs suck even more from what I've seen- I only experienced alcohol WDs once on a very very minor level (drank what would probably be considered relatively small amounts by most alcohol dependant people (maybe a 750ml a day spread out to where I usually had 1-3 drinks in my system) for a few weeks many years ago after a bad break-ups and due to the WDs I immediately started doing H again to mask them (and am not saying that is a good idea either)) but they won't kill you, at least not without some other physical problems being present (but opioid withdrawals can cause suicidal tendencies in people which you seem to be having (and that is not a judgement- I have attempted suicide before)).

That said- I jumped off methadone once at about 40mgs- while the withdrawal was long lasting I didn't think it was that bad in comparison to heroin (more like the 7 days of dope withdrawal spread out over 3-4 weeks). The worst part was lethargy and changes in sleep patterns/insomnia. But the thing is I ended up back on dope within a month (some studies have shown extremely high relapse rates in people that just jump off maintenence (and even in many people who slowly get off maintenence) and it is generally not recommended for this reason). But as I said coming off 40 was not terrible in my experience like you hear everyone say about methadone. Coming off 90mgs was another story, but I also ended up in a detox that pulled my clonazepam from me while in there (was RXed 2mgs a day- ended up just having more left the day I got home, I don't know what they were thinking (oh, I do actually- bad drugs must stop all now! no taper....)) so to be fair I can't really say in that case as benzo WDs were so bad.

While I don't fault you for wanting off, alcohol is a worse addiction (I don't know if you are drinking more, I know you said you are already an alcoholic- have you increased your use?) in the sense of physically dependency and long term health effects. You probably already know this. Usually though it seems like doctors (around here) that while they don't like to dose methadone in patients who currently have alcohol in their system, the solution is a detox where they are given methadone (I was in detox, the time I came off 90mgs, with an alcoholic/methadone patient and he recieved his methadone) while detoxing from alcohol. Then they work on the methadone when that is done.

Why do you want off the methadone? (I know here they push very hard for people to not drink on methadone and have a breathalyzer they ocassionally use at the clinic; I do understand the going in every day is a problem (why I'm not on methadone as opposed to bupe now)). As far as the bupe goes: I know here, just as you said you have to go to the chemist daily, a big thing is that methadone clinics require attendance for a long time with 100% clean urines other than RX medications before you get any take homes meaning you must go every day (with rare exceptions like a few holidays a year where everyone gets take homes and if they believe there will be a state of emergency due to a storm then everyone gets take-homes) and as a result many people find switching to suboxone- which is a once a month RX once the doc feels comfortable with it (again, here, not sure where you are- I'm in the US and I'm guessing you are maybe not due to different terminology used0, to be much preferable and at 30mgs your dose is low enough (and you said you did use bupe- which if I read correctly was only 2days after the last methadone dose which could cause precipatated WDs). Not trying to push it, I just think usually stopping alcohol is the first step as opposed to the opioids due to its higher risk level and other factors. Do you just not want to stop alcohol? Everyone is free to make their own choices and if that is the truth I don't fault you.