Opioids methadone to suboxone, how much suboxone to take?

Hello-

I am addicted to opiates/opioids. I generally take norcos, but just started taking methadone about 10 days ago. I am up to about 120 MG of methadone a day, and am going to stop and get on subxoxone to try to get off opiates and get clean. I have been taking methadone for about 10 days, and am wondering 1) how long to wait until taking the suboxone, and 2) how much subaxone to take to initially start off.

From what I read, I should wait a good 72 hours at least to start taking the subs, but how much subs should I start with? I have 8mg tabs.....

Thank you anyone, any help would be greatly appreciated!!

First of all, you need to taper down to at least 30mg or below. I'm honestly not sure if you can switch from that high of a dose of methadone to Suboxone successfully. If so, I have never heard of it. When you do manage to taper that low, take 2-4mg of bupe once a day. I realize you are new here, but this info is readily available via the search engine.

As ^he^ said it will be very, very difficult to transition from methadone at 120 mg to bupe. The "Ceiling Effect" for suboxone is equal to ~30 mg of methadone(the reason he said 2-4 mg is because after that it has no effect but lasting longer, so you can just redose when you need to, you will not get any more relief and 1 mg of buprenorphine is = to 5-10 mg of methadone), so you would need to either ween down or stop for long enough to get your tolerance down to 30 mg of methadone before you got adequate relief. Also with methadone's crazy long half life and the risk of precipitated withdrawal (which from what I have read is most common when going to subs from methadone) you would need to wait a long time to take it safely. You will be sick for days prior to being able to take suboxone without precip w/d happening.

Now IDK if it makes a difference that you have only used methadone for 10 days, but I must ask how many norcos were you taking to need 130 mg of methadone? I mean that is usually I dose for someone booting 1-2 g's of raw a day or something along those lines. I am guessing you at least didn't get the subs from a dr because they will not lot you go from 'done to 'xone without weening way down. And I am doubting you got the methadone from a clinic either or they did you a huge injustice giving you 130 mg a day for a norco habit.

I think I replied, but it didn't show up. Would subs take away some of the WD symptoms, or would it simply do nothing?

And I don't have any dones to taper, I only have 30 left. I guess I could take 2 a day for 15 days, or 3 a day for 10 days, what do you suggest? But again, I have only taken dones for 10 days, albeit a lot.

I started off at 4 or 5 a day, then upped it as my tolerance grew in the last 10 days. I did not get dones from a doctor, but I did get subs from my doctor for norco addiction, just haven't taken them yet. Thought I would do one last fling with dones and then jump on subs for a handful of months to get away from it all.

I'd drop down to 60mg for a few days, then gradually down to 20mg. Methadone builds up in your system over time, so you quickly taking escalating doses really makes you vulnerable for overdosing since you have tripled your dosage in the past 10 days. You are playing with your life. Methadone is nothing to take lightly. I have overdosed twice because of it.

Or you could try to go straight to 20mg. It sounds like you are just trying to get high from methadone, which after a while, will not work. Not to mention how incredibly dangerous attempting to get high from methadone actually is.

Yes, I was trying to just get high from methadone. Ok, I think I like the sound of going straight to 20mg for about 15 days. And then jump off to subs after waiting the 72 hours? You think this will work?

Thanks Brutus and everyone.

popperstopper said:

Yes, I was trying to just get high from methadone. Ok, I think I like the sound of going straight to 20mg for about 15 days. And then jump off to subs after waiting the 72 hours? You think this will work?

Thanks Brutus and everyone.

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You should edit your title explaining to everybody what 'not to do' for ten days in a row...
thin ice, Mein froind!

Sounds like a solid plan to me man. Trying to get high from one of the most dangerous opiates isn't a wise decision. I'm glad to see that you won't be doing that anymore.

Brutus-

Given I just stopped taking 120mg, arond day 10, and I hop down to 20 mg for 15 days, do you think I will feel any type of withdrawal from this jump down during this period? And is 15 days at 20mg enough you think to then start the suboxone?

Thanks so much.

If you are a junkie "no offense" u are better of on subs. They will
Get rid of withdrawals. If you have ligitmit chronic
Pain then methadone is the KEY.
BTW I'm a dependent / addict so don't take
Any harm in my response. Just telling u
How it is SUBOXONE SUX FOR PAIN.

Btw I have a herniated disk in my lower
Back pushing on a spinal nerve Nd had a rib
And a mass cut out of my chest.
Tried subs always went back to oxy + opana.
I never knew pain like this existed to man kind
It was unreal.......
No pain subs
Pain methadone

Doubtful if you have pain see my prior posts
20 mg methadone is nothing dude, u likely need at least
8 to 16 sub mg per day to start then u can lower it
Again if u have pain subx won't help!!!! Ure lucky
Right now.

popperstopper said:

Brutus-

Given I just stopped taking 120mg, arond day 10, and I hop down to 20 mg for 15 days, do you think I will feel any type of withdrawal from this jump down during this period? And is 15 days at 20mg enough you think to then start the suboxone?

Thanks so much.

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Brutus and friends are right about transitioning from 120 mgs of methadone onto suboxone, normally you'd wanna be much lower, but given the fact that it's only been 10 days, you MIGHT be able to drop down to 30 mgs of methadone over a week or so and then jump onto the bupe, MIGHT!

120mgs of methadone is a huge maintenance dose and is more than most hardcore IV heroin users would ever actually need! How much hydrocodone were you doing in the first place! You are really just fucking yourself in the ass with a cactus and no Vaseline on this one bud!

The risk of switching from methadone to subs isn't necessarily that the subs won't work, it's that you may become deathly ill as the suboxone(partial agonist/antagonist) pushes the methadone off the receptors and sends you into withdrawal...It's sounds like you just made a rookie mistake here and may not have had that much of a habit in the first place...Dropping down quick and switching over would be what I would try, no guarantee that it will work, but the longer you give the methadone to set up shop on your receptors, the more likely it will be a difficult transition....man, you got yourself into a situation without realizing it! Research this shit in the future! Physical opioid dependence is no fucking joke man!

Yea a jump from 120 to 20 u will have withdrawal no doubt
U need to make the switch under a doctors care not in your room bro.

Ok, here is my last question, I see it that I have 3 choices (I have 30 dones left).....

1) Jump down to 30mg per day for 10 days, then start subs.

2) Jump down to 20mg per day for 15 days, then start subs.

3) Switch back to norcos for X amount of days and then switch to the subs. If this seems to be the best option, how many days should I be back on norco to wait until the switch to subs?

Thank you so much. Yes, it was a rookie move, and I have learned a lesson for sure. But my goal here is to stay away from any type of withdrawals obviously, in the goal to get on the subs as soon as possible.

Thank you, thank you!

^This is hard to answer...you were taking 120mg of methadone for 10 days, so your habit definitely isn't 120mgs....Meaning, how much do really need a day to stay well? The fact that you've been on methadone so short a period of time, part of me wants to tell you to just stop taking the methadone immediately or do a very quick 3 day taper and switch to whatever, and then switch to sub....Part of me even thinks you may be able to just stop the methadone, take Norco for 3-4 days and then go on the sub, but I wouldn't want you to take the suboxone too soon and experience precipitated WDs....Methadone is the hardest opioid to transition to sub from.....

The fear I have with a long methadone taper is....even though you're taking smaller and smaller doses of the methadone every day....It's a powerful drug and those extra days of being on it at all may give it more time to get it's hooks into you! Even 30mgs of methadone is uquivalent to a whole boatload of hydrocodone!...

I'd do a fast five day taper 30 mgs a day or something like that....once you get to 20 switch to the Norco for days or so....wait until you're in the worst WD you can physically stand and then take the sub....

I'm sorry if that's not the most coherent post but I'm tired...I didn't really sleep last night

Wait until you are sick. Then wait until you absolutely can't stand the sickness any more. At that point, take 2 mg of suboxone. If it doesn't help at all after 30 mins, take another 2 mg. Bupe is really powerful...my friend manosisimo used to use a half gram of East Coast powder heroin every day and now he only needs 1, maybe 2 mg of buprenorphine in a day. He thinks that 8 mg is really excessive and is used to keep people on bupe so sub doctors can make money.

As previously mentioned, methadone has a long half life, so you have to wait to avoid "precipitated withdrawal". PWD REALLY blows!!

Also, interesting to note: Tramadol still works pretty well even when you are on subs.

Ok, well I took 20mg dones yesterday, and 20mg dones today. If I get minor WDs doing this for X amount of days, how many days should I keep up 20mg dones?

Or, better yet, should I just simply stop taking dones altogether now, and immediately switch to an amount of norco per day that can make me feel "normal" and keep the WDs at bay? And then do this for how many days? You just said "Norco for days" above, I think you forgot to say how many days I should be on Norco before switching to subs. I'd even feel comfortable taking norco for at least a week or two, just to make sure the dones got as much out of my system as possible, then switch to subs. Do you think this will be the best route? Like you said above, I do not want to take dones at all if necessary.

Sorry to be a pest, I just want to get this right and not screw up, like I have been doing.

Thank BlueHues, and get some sleep.

popperstopper said:

Ok, well I took 20mg dones yesterday, and 20mg dones today. If I get minor WDs doing this for X amount of days, how many days should I keep up 20mg dones?

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You could keep doing the 20 mgs until your sickness goes away and then continue to taper down.

Or, better yet, should I just simply stop taking dones altogether now, and immediately switch to an amount of norco per day that can make me feel "normal" and keep the WDs at bay? And then do this for how many days? You just said "Norco for days" above, I think you forgot to say how many days I should be on Norco before switching to subs. I'd even feel comfortable taking norco for at least a week or two, just to make sure the dones got as much out of my system as possible, then switch to subs. Do you think this will be the best route? Like you said above, I do not want to take dones at all if necessary.

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If you have access to Norcos, stop taking the methadone for a while, and then when you start to get sick, take Norco until you feel well, or you have a level of sickness that you can handle. Remember you will have to experience some sickness - no free lunch. I have done this before (used a short-acting full agonist to jump off subs or dones). I would say continue with the Norcos this way (as small a dose as possible) for 2-4 weeks, tapering down as low as you can, and then jump. I used low doses of oxycontin for my full-agonist subjump-taper because they seem to be pretty long-lasting when taken orally. I got down to 10 mg of oxycodone a day and then jumped - had withdrawals, but only for a few days. It was amazing.

I meant to say 4 days, sorry, but whoever just posted above me gave you good advice. I'd try to taper even lower than twenty with the methadone if you can....because the methadone most likely made your Norco tolerance spike quite a bit. even if you have a 20mg a day methadone habit, that's gonna translate to a lot of Norco. If you have enough of them to taper with those for a few weeks, do it...but you shouldn't have to taper with the norcos so much as long as you wait until you're in moderate WD before starting the sub....

Sub isn't that hard to get on really, unless its methadone or unless you've been on it a few times already and were using on top of the suboxone...then it's a bitch...but as long as you put a good 5-7 days between the sub and the methadone, you should be good! Good luck with it, it sounds like you're in good shape with the meds you need!