Opiates used to give me energy HELP

[Queenbean413]

I am a patient of pain management. My doctor prescribeds me 3 roxi?s 30mg/day and 2-20 mg OxyContin. When I first started taking these medications they gave me a ton of energy. They made me feel good which made the pain less tolerable and i was able to get up and do a bunch of things. I?m a widow w/ 3 children so I really need this energy back. Why am I so tired now? They totally don?t have the same effect anymore. Does anyone have suggestions of how I can get these medications at this level to give me energy again? I?ve tried snorting & smoking the Roxie?s. I?ve tried taking 1.5 Roxie?s at one time and the other 1.5 a few hours later. I?ve even plugged chopped up OxyContin & disolved them first w/hot water. I also tried chopping the OxyContin up & swallow them. I just really need the energy for chunk of hours during the day so I can get off the couch & get things done!! But I have to be careful I have some left (like one OxyContin) so I don?t wake up with withdrawals in the middle of the night. Should I take two or three of my Roxies within a couple hours instead of spreading them apart? Would that help? I do have some extra OxyContin I can add to my regimen. I don?t think my pain dr will give me more at this time.

 

[Jekyl Anhydride]

Hi Queenbean, I saw your Thread in Site Technical Help and left a post about old Threads. Welcome to BL

This reduced effect and diminished energy is the age old conundrum and has left most every chronic opioid user in a quandary about how to solve it. There is no magic solution other than trying to find a balance of effect and cessation. In other words opioids are like a loan, a debt from your brain that needs to be paid back in one way or another. Every hour of relief and energy has to be traded for an hour of no relief and less energy if that makes sense.

Now you can take them as prescribed and settle for a fixed level of relief that will not make you soar with energy and euphoria but not leave you in withdrawal. This is actually how they were intended to be used and this balance of "some relief" is actually the goal because constant euphoric energy is impossible to sustain for any real length of time without increasing the dose to the point of side effect problems and risk to your health.

Another thing is that Oxycodone has a good oral bioavailability and all of these different ROA's- routes of administration are gaining you very little for all of the effort; And by taking several pills at once in any fashion will leave you ill when you run out early. It's a heart-breaker but the Honeymoon phase is over and now a balance must be struck to avoid some very uncomfortable repercussions like acute withdrawal. I wish you the best of Luck in returning to your prescribed regimen.

 

[Queenbean413]

Thank you so much for the information. The problem I am having is the pain medication does not seem to be helping my chronic pain so much as when it gave me the boost of energy. Basically the pain meds never really help the pain, it just messed with my brain enough so I didn’t care and would be able to get things done that needed to get done. I doubt my dr will give me more but he would probably let me switch to something comparable. Do you think that might help with tolerance or when you are tolerant to one opioid are you are tolerant to all? (I’m really glad I found this community on the internet...although I’m just now posting I’ve been reading Bluelight for a few months here and there)

 

[Jekyl Anhydride]

Once upon a time physicians used to rotate pain meds to try and cut down on tolerance, at least a little bit because there are varying amounts of cross-tolerance. Which means something like Methadone would have less tolerance if you switched from say Morphine or Hydrocodone. It's not a big difference, but it also gave patients a chance to see if a particular pain med worked better for them than another one. Some people had good results and others just went back to their original med but at least there was room to experiment a little.

In the current climate if you're receiving pain meds at all you're fairly lucky, maybe lucky isn't the right word but at least it's a little help to people in pain. The relief can be wanting sometimes and that worsens with time and tolerance but helping you ignore the pain is about as good as it gets sometimes. If you have periods of acute, intense pain, it's best to try and stay on a low dose till the intense pain begins then use a "breakthrough" dose to help with the rough stuff. When taking the maximum amount all the time it doesn't leave much room for improvement. Discuss it with your doctor if you think another med would be the way to go but beware, he might even chop the dose a little as things are unstable at the moment with the opioid crisis.

Glad you're with us Queenbean!

 

[Nooby]

Queenbean, I know it sounds obvious but have you tried taking your meds 30 mins before you want to get shit done with really strong coffee? I’m also a very tolerant long term pain patient and since my last hospital admission and pain spike I’m on the highest dose of oxy I’ve been on for years but it’s really dragging me down whereas for a decade it’s really got me through the hideous days. Or at least, given me enough relief to charge on and get stuff sorted and then crash - like nearly all long term pain patients do. So I’m not usually a coffee drinker but I’m having really strong espresso with my morning meds and sometimes it works! Jekyll is right, getting down to a lower dose will be the thing that helps, because then it really works when we need it to. I’m gutted that I’d got my dose to half of what it is now and then one episode and I’m back where I was. Best of luck to you. X

 

[T. Calderone]

Excellent advice, Jekyl! It would seem that the honeymoon phase is indeed over with oxycodone. Queen, when you take the ER version orally do they not work for you? I had a doctor give me methadone 10 mg so I would not have pain at night. Mind you, this was in 2006 and I don't know if doctors do this nowadays. Pain management isn't what it used to be as I've recently discovered.

You may not get your energy and stimulation to the way it once was due to tolerance building. One thing I would suggest is try not to smoke or snort the pills. They will not last as long and are better absorbed taken orally. Nooby makes a good point in drinking coffee because caffeine can boost pain medication's effectiveness. You could try that and see if it helps you get some things done. Take care.