Opioids Loperamide (Immodium) Megathread: We have now lost at least 2 of our own from Lope

^you don't think it could be a combination of both? small amounts of lope getting in the brain, but also it potentiating naturally produced opiates.

No. I can't say for sure, but I highly doubt it and am confident enough to say no, it is not potentiating endorphins.

Oh, ok, it just made alot sense to me when I thought it up. Thanks for your replies

so....been thinking

had a friend report that once, after predosing with 500 mg of ketoconazole, followed by 120mg of loperamide, then the next day, drinking a small dose of poppy tea, as he was feeling very let down by the lope, and a little bit sick....after a shower, he was nodding and itching like he'd shot morphine...

so, as those were his last ketoconazole pills, he's never been able to recreate this....so, lately, he's been wondering about the possibillity of mimicking ketoconazole's effect with a higher than average dose of cimetadine, followed by loperamide, followed by poppy tea....does anyone know the effective difference between ketoconazole's ability to inhibit cyp3a4, and cimetadine's? are there any otc cyp3a4 inhibitors that would work AS well as ketoconazole?

his thoughts on the original experiment follow the above sentiments.....all the opiate receptor's aside from inside his bbb were already well saturated with loperamide, so the dose of opium made a much more efficient trip to the ol' brainium? right?

I just wanted to say that i've been out of Suboxone since last thursday, and I've been taking between 16mgs and 32 mgs for three years.

On Thursday I took 6 oz of grapefruit juice, 40 mgs of Lope, and my effexor. Felt fine if I added twenty mgs of Lope every three hours or so On Friday I did the same, but added prilosec. I dare say that this whole weekend I felt great. better than "not withdrawing" not "some relief", I felt FANTASTIC. I figure if I start tapering the lope today, I'll be through the worst of my Sub withdrawals and can manage without it.

Everybody's different, that's for sure, but for me, Lope is a miracle.

jesus, how are you people taking such high doses. 40 mgs, 50 mgs, shit I saw 120mgs being mentioned above. no judgment, god bless...but I went off Bupe last week and on days 3-5 all I needed was 6 MG a day to get me through. Even at that low of a dose I felt backed up and bloated for days. I know how it is to be sick and you'll try anything to get out of it, but 40 mg is 20 Imodium pills. wtf? do they come in doses higher than 2mg/pill ?

Most of us can use large amounts of loperamide and still shit regularly. I go everyday. Just because 6mg works for you doesn't mean it will for others, especially with loperamide, a drug that seems to not work the same way in anyone using for withdrawal aid. It's really hard to tell how much a person is going to need, because it appears as if it cross the blood-brain barrier differently in everyone. Maybe it crosses more efficiently for you. I had a 6mg Suboxone tolerance when I quit, and 6mg was nowhere near enough for me.

So yeah, everyone is different and how much a person needs depends solely on them.

Also, let me ask you, why are you so against anyone taking 40mg (20 pills)? Just because it's 20 pills? That means nothing. Other opiates, like hydrocodone, the suggested dose is around 5mg. Some people take 100mg or more. That's twenty 5mg pills.

By the way, I understand that you aren't judging people for this, so this rant is intended more for the people who do regularly complain and judge and criticize people for how much loperamide they take.

The number of pills isn't what matters. It's the dose. So why is 100mg of hydrocodone respectable for people with a tolerance, but 40mg of loperamide is not? They are both 20 times the recommended dose.

Just because it's over the counter and labeled anti-diarrheal doesn't mean it's absurd to take such a large dose (it's not even a large dose compared to what a lot of people take anyway). It's still an opiate just like all the other opiates. It constipates you just like all other opiates, it eases withdrawals just like all other opiates. What it's labeled as doesn't make it any less of a drug than other drugs. It annoys me to no end when people bash a drug just because it's labeled as an anti-diarrheal and fail to remember that it's the drug on the inside that matters, no what it's supposed to be used for. Lots of drugs are used off label by drug users, yet none of them get as much criticism as loperamide.

It makes no sense to me.

Loperamide structure is very similar to methadone's, just add a few things here and there so it doesn't pass BBB easily and you're done but it still works in the gut. Just about every regular opioid will stop you from taking a shit so what's wrong with using loperamide as an aid during w/d etc.? When you get high off just anything, not only hydrocodone, you actually overdose as well.

Amen to that.

^ It DOES cross the BBB, just not readily, or in other words, in very very small amounts.

I've dealt with chronic constipation since I was two years old. I've actually been hospitalized for it as a toddler, when I went 30 days without a bowel movement and got sick from it. Since I've been on every type of painkiller for the past seven to ten years, I'm used to not going for days at a time. A week without pooping is no great shakes for me, so I'm not worried about it. I haven't had any stomach cramping, pain or cold sweats either, so I'm not concerned about the dosage.

any comparisons on the efficiency of cypa34 inhibition between things like ketoconazole and cimetidine?

(sorry for the double post, just wanted to ask it straight up)

getting high off of loperamide

hello. i have been addicted to opiates for about ten years. i remember the first day i ever took one. i also have 3 herniated discs in my lower back. my doc gives me 120 hydrocodone per month 10/325. sadly i run out. one time the pharmacist made a mistake and gave me 180 and i still ran out. anyway, i am usually out 3 days before my next appt and i get typical detox. i use loperamide (immodium) generic from the dollar store. it costs $4.00 for 48 tablets. at the height of detox i take 4 in the morning and 4 at bed time and some OTC sleeping pills. anyway I CAN ASSURE YOU.....I KNOW OPIATE HIGHS.... I FEEL THE SAME WAY ON LOPERAMIDE only far less fun and far less high as i do on hydro's. when i start my day and take 4 loperamides i get hungry and mellow the same as when i am on hydros. i am not bragging....i am saying LOPERAMIDES DO MAKE ME FEEL A LITTLE OPIATE HIGH. one downside MAJOR DOWNSIDE.....i feel all sluggish all over and one time my doc tried to get blood and she could barely get 2 tubes. I WOULD ADVISE LOPERAMIDE ONLY TO GET THRU DETOX....NOT TO GET HIGH. most i took in a day was like 10 loperamides in a 24 hour period. most hydro's i ever took was 11. hope this helps someone. loperamide is like OTC opiate detox heaven. plus i dont feel overwhelmed and depressed.

ok , I have a question. I've been trying to cut back on my suboxone dosages. if I were to substitute several of my doses through the day (I I.V btw, .25 on avg per shot) with loperamide, would that hold me over but still effectively allow me to taper? Or would I just be replacing one thing for another and my tolerance wouldn't really go down? I'm guessing that it would still go down because bupe is pretty potent compared to loperamide, but I just want to make sure.

Znegative said:

ok , I have a question. I've been trying to cut back on my suboxone dosages. if I were to substitute several of my doses through the day (I I.V btw, .25 on avg per shot) with loperamide, would that hold me over but still effectively allow me to taper? Or would I just be replacing one thing for another and my tolerance wouldn't really go down? I'm guessing that it would still go down because bupe is pretty potent compared to loperamide, but I just want to make sure.

Click to expand...

Well you probably initatlly switched another opiate for bupe right? I would think that if you were to have equivalent effective dosages of suboxone and loperamide that your tolerance would raise because loperadmide would be a full agonist. Suboxone being a partial agonist (or atleast I think I'm correct), allows for tolerance to drop.

I have noticed that since being on bupe my tolerance has dropped dramastically, even after only my first week of being on it. I believe that is because of the partial agonist/antagonist properties.

Also, I see many people in this thread talking about bupe taper, and running out of their bupe early. Personally I think that a lot of you most likely are taking WAY more bupe than needed. It's really quite effective in small dosages, no where near the 32 or 28 some people take. Additionally, I can go days without taking any bupe and feel fine. I used to have a gram+ day heroin habbit.

I have only read the last couple pages of this but to the person asking about trading one thing for another. To me it seems that lope tends to alleviate almost all of the physical symptoms but not all of the mental symptoms. IT is a ton easier to taper down from the lope than other opiates. Honestly its quite painless for me now that i have the lope detox down.

It seems that it takes 2 or 3 hours to feel them. And to me they also seem to have a very long half life. I just came off a 160 to 320 per dose oc habit (dosing 2 or 3 times per day orally). I would generally do a fast taper down with what i had left (just enough to keep me well, which for me was 40mg per dose the first day then 20 mg per day the second day). On the third i would sub in 32 mg of lope. This generally wasnt enough but if i take to much it feels quite dysphoric to me. After this about every 3 hours i would take 16 more mg until i was feeling about right. Once i got to feeling good (when i say good i mean litterally no symptoms besides craving that opiate buzz and a bit of depression.) I would take 24 mg 3 times per day in the sames spots i used to take my oc. I would do this for 3 days since that is when most of the oc is out of your system.

This is when i would start tapering my lope down. Since i am taking 24mg per dose 3 times per day i would jump down to 16mg on the 4th day. 12 on the 5 day. 8 on the 6 day. 4 on the 7 day. 2 on the 8 day. All these doses were 3 times per day. ussually when i woke up at about 11 am then at 6 or 7 pm. Then again at 1 or 2 am before iwent to sleep.

Interesting, those of you noting the effectiveness of Effexor (venlafaxine) on the increased effect of loperamide, apparently due to it being better able to cross the BBB.

Black pepper can possibly facilitate this?! Thank you JB69 for posting that! I want someone to try this experiment... I'm so far along in my most recent opiate withdrawal that I'm not the best candidate to experiment, but someone should make plans to try a certain amount of black pepper before loperamide while using it in withdrawal to see how it works. This person should be sure to try without first, to set as a control test. I'm optimistic that it works reasonably well at least, given how venlafaxine seems to allow it to cross.

well i guess for harm reduction somebody should mention that loperamide is potentially dangerous if it enters the brain at high doses. i don't think anyone really knows what happens with humans, but one of the metabolites is similar to mptp.

however, i am sure that if loperamide was neurotoxic in small amounts there would be cases in the literature about it. there are thousands of people out there with compromised BBBs.

I want to say this and I'd like EVERYONE to read it.

I read this entire thread about loperamide and it blew my fucking mind. All you really need to read is the first page.
http://forum.poppies.org/index.php?showtopic=8805&mode=threaded

I agree 100% with that poster, and I think lope can work for ANYONE. I just think there are 2 main issues with it.

1) is matching dose
2) is you NEED to taper off it like any other opiate to fend off wds

I seemed to have matched my dose perfect but I want to say this.
Tapering off pods PODS THEMSELF weren't keeping me out of wds (as I would never go above the day befores dose). I ordered the best kratom I could from the best supplier I could find, and likewise kratom barely did anything for the pod wds.

I have suboxone but refused to take it, but I can't imagine subs being much more effective.

Long story short, LOPE IS THE BEST FUCKING THING that has ever happened to me. Its made the end of my taper the easiest thing in the world. I am not dealing with a single symptom of wd, and its the only thing that has worked so good for me.

I am tapering the lope now and plan to take it for another 2 weeks when I jump off pods completely tommorow or the next day. I haven't even needed to take my pods thats how good the lope works, but I'm just taking it to finish my taper how I originally planned.

I can't help think that some people out there might be in wd, may take a few lopes, not feel anything and give up.
I DID take lope a while ago for wds, and it didn't do anything. I had taken 6mgs back then with no affect.
This time months later, in mere desperateness, I took 12mg and OMG every single symptom of pain, anxiety, RLS and EVEN my blood pressure all went back to normal.

I think its important if you use lope to get off opiates, you need to be on the lope solo at the end and taper off it slowly, otherwise if you stop the lope from a high dose you will have wds.
I just needed to say lope has basically saved my life, and made getting off opiates one of the easiest things in this world.

DO NOT underestimate how affective this shit is for wds. Its a godsend.

^I'm glad it worked for you. I want to point out that your taper had you decreasing your dose every single day, and that is why you were withdrawing. A proper taper would involve your body growing accustomed to the new, lowered level before lowering the dose further.

Maybe there is some simple chemistry to transform loperamide into an opiate that's more willing to cross the BBB?