Tapering Does tapering Oxy really minimize withdrawls at the end?

[ElleAZ]

I will be tapering from 20 mg a day of Oxy to 10 mg this week. Next week I go to zero. I have no emotional addiction or attachment to these pills. They’ve never brought me pleasure. As I’ve been taking them for only nine weeks how bad do you think my w/d will be?

I am trying to decide if I want to ask my doctor for heavy hitter medications as I have to attend my son’s college graduation. I have clonidine and Zofran and Calm support. I have Bentyl for stomach cramps. I have 2 mg of Valium, four Ativan 1 mg apiece and 10 Ativan .5 mg apiece. And I honestly don’t know how to use them. I have already had one Valium withdrawal in the last nine weeks.

 

[spacejunk]

Have you been addicted to opiates before?
It tends to be worse if you have.

But to answer your question, the lower the dose you're taking when you cease taking it all together, the less your withdrawals tend to be. If you can taper to a low dose, i think it is absolutely worthwhile

 

[ElleAZ]

This is my first go with opiate dependency.

Is 10 mg considered a low enough dose to jump?

 

[spacejunk]

i'm not really sure because i've never used much oxy, but i'm sure someone else will know.

i imagine you'll experience some discomfort, but often the anticipation of withdrawal is worse than the actual detox....

good luck, and please keep us posted

 

[Baron27]

10mg is a fairly low dose. That’s equal to about 2 Percocet a day. You might have some anxiety and insomnia but it may not be too bad. You haven’t been on the oxy for that long so that’s certainly going to minimize things. I would try jumping off at 10 and if things get rough try going down to 5. If you have the discipline to taper then it’s definitkey worth while. It honestly shouldn’t be that bad at all and it won’t last very long.

 

[spacejunk]

The thing you have in your favour is having measured pharmaceutical doses, so as above - if you feel too rough, you could go down to 5 over the course of a few days, and even halve it again. And can draw the sickness out a bit though - some people swear by just getting it over with, which makes sense too. 10mg isn't a huge dose, and in my experience clonidine helps a lot.
I think also because you're not getting really high off them, or feeling attached to them, the rebound anxiety and depression hopefully won't be as bad.

My advice is to lock yourself away with a series of nindless tv or a bunch of movies or something, just to distract your mind, because the head stuff can be one of the hard bits - and the insomnia. If you get restless legs or arms, clonidine helps a lot.
Hot showers or baths are a godsend. If it's getting too much, have a shower or a soak in the tub.

 

[Jabberwocky]

With those benzos and the clonidine you'll probably be okay. The best way to do this would be to get something like buprenorphine and take it for a few days (4-7) as you go through the acute withdrawal.

Tapering with oxycodone (and other shorter acting opioids) is difficult and most find it easier to switch to something longer acting like methadone or buprenorphine to detox. But if you can tapering is always a good policy when it comes to getting off opioids. Generally you don't want to taper more than once every 3-7 days, or about once a week. But whatever works for your body, habit and metabolism, works.

Keep in mind the "easy" part of this is the detox and acute withdrawal. The rubber really meets the road with opioid use after you've detoxed from them and work to reoriented your life (this transition will be easier if you only took opioids as prescribed for physiological discomfort - it's more challenging when opioids have been used to regulate one's mood or address psychological/emotional/spiritual pain (spiritual pain is basically alienation and loneliness).

With the clonidine, as long as your system can handle it regarding blood pressure, take the clonidine at 0.2mg once to twice a day as needed. Definitely take it at bedtime. Do this for seven days.

With the benzos, about 10mg of diazepam is equivalent to 1mg lorazepam (more or less). Generally you want to take 10mg of diazepam two to three times a day. The longer you can wait before taking any benzos, the more they're help. Try taking 1mg of lorazepam in the morning and again in the evening for the first and second day, add 2mg of diazepam with to the lorazepam on day three or four of withdrawal (that is normally when it's worst), and just take 1mg lorazepam twice a day for about a week.

Let us know if you have any questions. What are the circumstances you're detoxing under?