Opioids Suboxone to Vivitrol withdrawal

[amber74]

Hi my name is Amber. I want to switch from suboxone to vivitrol. Can anyone tell me about their experience going through a full physical detox from 6mg daily of suboxone? I have been on this dose for about 3 months. Thanks so much

 

[Zerwas]

Well first of all you should taper your Suboxone dose down to less than 1mg before even considering to put your body through a rapid withdrawal with Naloxone (Vivitrol).

I haven't done this myself and never will but switching from 6mg would be a ridiculously intense and hellish withdrawal for sure.

Why do you want this in the first place? If you want to come off the Subs, why just not taper them down to 0,5 or 0,25mg and then just jump off? I feel like the Naloxone is not needed after "only" 3 months of Suboxone treatment. We need more information to help you, like what opioids did you take before and how much daily etc. How long have you been addicted?

 

[amber74]

Thank you for the response. I have abused Vicodin and Percocet on and off again for 10 years. Twice where it severely affected my life. Last summer (2014) I was up to 180-200 mg/day of Vicodin/Percs. After much prodding from my psychiatrist I decided to give Suboxone a shot. I lasted one week because I happened to get really sick at the same time. I was convinced it was because of the Suboxone and associated just being sick with it. Stopped the suboxone and stayed off pills for 3 weeks. Then I got into a car accident and was easily prescribed Vicodin. Being clean only 3 weeks I jumped at it and of course it was a quick downward spiral again from there. By May of this year I was back to taking 180-200 mg of pain pills a day. It was basically a matter of money that got me to try the suboxone again. I had maxed out my credit cards and cleaned out my savings. Basically didn't have the desire to get off the pills, just didn't have the financial means to get them anymore. So I started 8mg of Suboxone the beginning of June. And I have to say it's gone well. I relapsed once and it sucked hard. I'm glad the relapse happened because the way it made me feel made me not want to even try that again. I have no cravings anymore. I was told by my doctor when I started the Suboxone again in June that I would wean down every 20 days. It's been 4 months and I have only weaned down once from 8mg to 6mg. I know ultimately it's my decision, but my doctor seems to want to keep me at 6mg because of the PAWS symptoms I'm having. He doesn't seem to believe in PAWS much and just thinks I'm not ready to wean down yet. C'mon. I've been on 6mg for a good 3 months. My body is definitely stabilized on this dose. Which brings me to today and what I'm thinking of doing. I've been doing a lot of research on PAWS and Suboxone. From what I gather, every time I wean down from Suboxone I'm going to go through the minor physical withdrawals and then start the process of going through PAWS all over again. So from my understanding, I won't actually start the real process of PAWS until I'm completely off the Suboxone which could be who knows how long at this rate. I'm severely depressed and irritable. I have crying spells and am tired all the time. I'm angry with myself for ever letting it get to this point. I'm missing out on life with my son. So I was at my sub doctor last week and happened to see a brochure for Vivitrol. I liked what I saw. I don't want opiates or synthetic opiates in my body anymore. I'm mentally prepared to be done with it. The Vivitrol is appealing to me because it is opiate free... not a "maintenance drug." I feel it would be a good next step until I'm completely confident that I won't take pain pills anymore. Another reason I'm considering jumping from such a high dose of Suboxone. Part of me wants to go through a ridiculously intense and hellish withdrawal as a harsh reminder. I want to get this shit going so I can be well for the holidays. So I can enjoy these things with my son and family. If that's what I want, I would have to do it now. I could start the taper, but then I will be constantly going through minor withdrawals and the beginning of PAWS. Are you talking about doing a quick taper or a slow taper? Would a quick taper make my withdrawals from jumping off at 0.5 or 0.25 mg much easier? If so, that would definitely sound like a better plan to me aside from the part of me wanting to go through a terrible withdrawal period. Like I said, I want to switch to Vivitrol in conjunction with the one-on-one AODA counseling I'm already doing until I'm completely confident I won't go back to using pills again. I don't want to wait around by doing a slow taper though.

 

[Abrahallic]

Amber74, im curious if you ever decided to go through the wds with the vivitrol shot or not? I understand where you're coming from wanting a reminder because that's what I did. Am I glad I did now? Yes. Were the wds way worse than I thought? Fuck yes. I won't go into detail on just how sick I was but imagine the worst heroin or opiate or sub wds and times it by 20..no exaggeration. But vivitrol is tricky...I was not forced to get it but still, I have times where I think it'd be nice to get high but then I realize I can't bc im on vivitrol. Ive heard of people trying to get high and dying or just feeling nothing so it's not really worth it to me, I've smoked weed to eat and sleep and help w nausea but that's it. I'm sticking with vivitrol bc I've only had 4 months off opiates since I started 7 years ago and can't seem to stay clean on my own so im going to try this for a year. Basically, the moral of the story is only do vivitrol if YOU want it and be real with yourself. And also, the wds are bad. U want to know in detail, just askip but I don't recommend it. I got vivitrol the first time and never stopped using, my last shot of H was 2 hours b4 the vivitrol shot. Do not suggest anyone do things how I do but at the same time, being that sick for like 5 days was a harsh wake up call. Hope this helps.