Sounds more like an allergic reaction to me and they gave you antihistamines which would do nothing on a real overdose but just my 2¢. Had puffy skin with red speckles from my first doses of DXM (which is, structurally, related to opiates) but was too spaced out to really notice it. Somehow never got it again even with higher dosages.
No that is exactly what a codeine and dihydrocodeine overdose is like.
You don’t get the stereotypical opioid respiratory depression that usually follows a OD and can kill, you get a huge release of histamine that either leads to anaphylactic shock or very similar symptoms.
Taking a codeine/dihydrocodeine OD would be no where near as peaceful a way to go compared to a oral, intranasal or IM/IV morphine, Heroin, oxycodone, fentanyl, methadone etc OD.
When it comes to properly overdosing on opioids and needing naloxone, I’ve only done that once and it was a suicide attempt, luckily never ‘went over’ through personal/recreational use.
The other times I’ve ‘overdosed’ on opioids but not needed medical attention were involving dihydrocodeine once and morphine and methadone another time and morphine by itself IMed.
I had the puffed up lips from histamine from 1.5g of dihydrocodeine and it looked like I’d had lip fillers that some people/women like to get, so much so my mam and sister saw them and were wanting to know how I’d gotten them so fat and looking good but were disappointed with the answer.
I had raspy breathing slightly too with my chest being slightly tight when breathing as if I had a bit of an asthma problem.
The other time I’d taken 2g morphine orally, crushed slow release stuff.
About 2 hours later and taking it I went and scored around 250mg - 300mg of methadone and had that orally too.
About 45min’’s later as the morphine was starting to peak and the methadone was kicking in a bit I had feel myself struggling to breathe and ended up vomiting up.
Luckily either that helped or within about 20mins I was ok, neither feeling sick or struggling to breathe.
Another time I IM’ed 1.5g is morphine and I realised as I was putting in the last syringe worth I must have put the stuff right next to a vein and it had partially been absorbed that way as I started getting an IV rush and my breathing became strained and I was thinking “Fuck! Is this it?” but that too after 20min’s of very laboured breathing I was ok.
