Quitting opiates, taper or cold turkey?

I will be extensively reading threw this thread and many in the dark side as I am truley trying to rid my life of opiates.

I soon hope to be posting in sober living and to be visiting both forums regularly.

Never sick you are a genius! I can barely soak up all this incredible information and ive been read in in these recovery threads for days!

Welcome fellow traveller! :D

Great to see so many people gaining strength and getting a bit of hope and faith back in their lives that we do and can recover from this battle-scarred terrain.

I've found that the KEY thing that has helped to strengthen my will to quit this demon, is hearing from others who have made it out the other side. Yes we then have to continue the work, but as the old saying goes, nothing comes without hard work! It's so easy to lose sight of that when we get used to having instant gratification in the brain's reward centres. But it's not the same as the real satisfaction gained from re-developing the single minded determination to set a realistic goal and the great feeling of achieving it.

You'll get a huge boost from getting back a bit of the old YOU and old school spirituality back.
 
To those who truly suffer chronic pain, you are not addicts until you use for fun.
I used Kratom twice a month for a long time to stop wds. My Hydrocodone script was gone in two days and the Roxicodones I boughteach month. were shot up in 2-3 days. Kratom helped those but didn't touch Dilaudid and Opana wds. I just decided to quit shooting them one day. I went into my room and suffered the hell by myself. It was 4 days of brutal
torture and then the physical part was over. I think cold turkey no taper is best. I will never forget that sickness.

No. It doesn't work like that. There is a difference between physical dependence and psychological addiction. Pain comes in several forms. There is physical pain and there is emotional (psychological) pain and opiates numb BOTH. Opiate addiction is not always about getting "high" as such, or for the fun, because for many opiate addicts, it can be about just getting "normal" because they use opiates to self-medicate away painful events in their lives, or to try and lift their mood from psychological/mental health conditions such as severe depression, anxiety, etc. This is sometimes referred to as "dual diagnosis". The cycle of addiction means that often just trying to stop opiates can result in huge anxiety, depression and insomnia and that alone, let alone the physical dependence, drives users back to using again. This cycle gets more and more severe and difficult to break as time and addiction progresses and with every use/quit/restart sequence. The compulsive behaviour underpinning addiction is a feature for most chronic pain opiate users.

Chronic pain is medically defined as unremitting pain that lasts longer than several months and which intereferes with the ability to live and perform functions of daily living. Speaking as someone who has no shortage of experience with physical pain and knowing others in similar situations, it is my experience that most, if not, all, people with chronic pain, do also experience profound depression at some point or another when they have been living with pain and reduced quality of life for some time. For many pain patients, having huge doses of opiates and feeling periods of being either pain free, or far less pain, CAN feel like being high or fun.

When you have a constant stream of pharma grade medical opiates going into you, sooner or later, colossal tolerance occurs and bigger and bigger doses are needed to obtain pain relief AND stop ever more frequent and bigger withdrawals commencing. Most chronic pain patients and those who have been using opiates to also medicate emotional pain away, at this point or often far sooner, tend to start to run out of their meds earlier and earlier. A months's worth of meds gone in under a week for example. Then the ability to stop gets harder and harder.

Addiction is powerful, cunning and baffling. We can stop one substance and think we are "cured" but abstinence alone does not make recovery, as a relapse often shows, or addiction switching from one drug of choice to another, or keeping a reserve stash i.e. "holding onto a reservation" in recovery language such as NA or other addiction fellowships.

Well done for quitting. That sickness gets more and more brutal the longer we use opiates and the more we stop/start/stop/start.

How long have you been off all opiates now? How are you feeling in mind and body?
 
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Thanks rapper=D Its hard for me not to have picked up a little wisdom with all the mistakes and wrong turns I have made on my insane journey getting utterly lost and trying to find my way home.

It is not necessary for people to be clean and sober to post in SL.. this thread is a great way to find motivation, inspiration, and support.. we fire up a new on every month and its all about Getting and staying clean or sober or free from active addiction. You guys should think about joining in.. March Getting Clean Thread v. If I can do it, you can too!


There are many techniques to use against the PAWS, but the biggest is changing the way we think or the way we choose to perceive what is going on in our lives. when I get a little more time I post some of the things that have helped me allot.


Your really doing great even though it may not feal like it beingreborn!!!

I'm so grateful for your continued and unfailing support NSAM! You've learned so much about the negative cycles of thinking and behaviours that feed addiction.

Every time I go into anal-warrior-perfectionist-I want INSTANT results or I've failed-I can't do this-I'm-a-useless-victim-might-as-well-say-fuck-it-routine, I used to slide into negativity and despair. Now, I ask myself, if/when I heard some other poor fool saying all this and making these insane demands on themselves, I'd be saying GIVE YOURSELF A BREAK, YOU'RE A HUMAN, NOT A MACHINE!!!

But I struggle to cut my own self some slack and calm the fuck down and just keep doing the work to progress.

Having one person keeping believing in you and fighting in your corner makes a HUGE difference. You've been that person for me and so many countless many others here!!! Thank you, thank you, thank you for what you do here for this community!!!! Hey, did I say thanks?! Haha. I am trying to pay it forward by helping a few people too, as much as I can while still so limited currently myself.

OK - round 2 of more detox coming soon! That sleep thing is over-rated anyway. Ho ho. NOT!
 
Hello :D

Time for a much needed update and hopefully some advice.

Something really dramatic has happened in the last week or so. I have energy! I have happy feelings! I have a libido! I am hungry! I want to do things! I am doing things! I have big pupils again! Can this really be....life?!

I had forgotten it was possible to feel this good.

Here's why I am confused and a bit shell-shocked, to say the least.

I'm now down to the lowest dose of liquid morphine in years and managed to stretch out the time between doses now to almost 8 hours (from 2 hourly!!) - it seems that my body is finally, finally starting to adjust to this now and it is getting easier and I am waking up far, far less sick and getting less withdrawals - before I started this, I was having withdrawals 6+ times per 24 hour day!

What's going on? Has my tolerance decreased that much that my body is re-adjusting even though there is still a low amount of morphine left to reduce off?

Don't get me wrong, I have suffered brutally through this horrendously slow torturous taper, but I am absolutely blind-sided now by just HOW good I feel. It is like mania, compared to where I've come from!!
 
WTB, it sounds to me like you are getting to the end of the w/d's.
As I read this thread I found your comments becoming increasingly lucid as well.
Good going, let us know when you jump off and what it is like, I am right behind you.

This is my third time quitting: 1st time I tapered, second time I jumped after a 1 week taper, this time I'm tapering again.
I've got too busy of a life to take time off and go through acutes.
I do have a couple weeks off in April, so hopefully I will be down to zero by then and can enjoy some time off without being in hard core w/d's.
 
Thank you all who have replied since I was last here. Life is improving! Slow progress, but it sure beats going backwards! I don't wake up with that full bore horrific sickness any more and I have so much more energy and fitness. I have natural happiness returning! Feelings rock! I had totally lost the concept to imagine I could even feel this good (apart from withdrawals).

I am definitely more lucid. I do feel that my mind is far clearer and much stronger already and I am still tapering. My determination, motivation and coping skills and overall mood are improving. It is up and down with detoxing, but I am expecting this and trying to keep reminding myself that the ride will get rocky in the short to medium term, but things will level out longer term. When possible, I am enjoying being out in the sun, some social time, hobbies and just feeling a bit more carefree instead of massively stressed and depressed. The old me is returning! It really is like a miracle!

I've had great support both here and offline and since I've started reaching out and getting honest and asking for help, my life has already improved in leaps and bounds.

I've learned that we cannot fight this battle alone and that acceptance has been instrumental in getting me over a mental barrier in my own thinking, that was making me more sick and increasingly addicted, which I can see now, was inevitable when we become emotionally isolated and go into that false independence of numbing ourselves.

From a chronic pain perspective, I am struggling. But I am keeping an open mind as to what real level of pain is there after detox finishes. I do feel that overall, my pain level has reduced and I am far more functional and fitter. I do feel that from my experience and that of others, that opioid induced hyperalgesia is a real phenomenon for chronic pain opiate users.

I will come back and make more updates when I have a bit more time.
 
WTB, it sounds to me like you are getting to the end of the w/d's.
As I read this thread I found your comments becoming increasingly lucid as well.
Good going, let us know when you jump off and what it is like, I am right behind you.

This is my third time quitting: 1st time I tapered, second time I jumped after a 1 week taper, this time I'm tapering again.
I've got too busy of a life to take time off and go through acutes.
I do have a couple weeks off in April, so hopefully I will be down to zero by then and can enjoy some time off without being in hard core w/d's.

Thanks for the reply buddy.

I was the same - just not in a position to do a cold withdrawal, but tapering is also very difficult and really needs a structured plan and support. If you need to chat, you are welcome to pm me and starting a thread (if you haven't already) will help you access support here too.

It won't be long now before I do the jump off, so I will be updating here when I do. That's going to be the toughest part for me, but I have accepted things will get worse before they get better.

You can do this. If I can do it, anyone can. You'll get loads of support and help here. A better life is within our reach but it does take hard work and patience.
 
Yep

Now thats fantastic news SuccessfullyReborn =D<3=D

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Hell Yes!! HELL YES!!!! Amazing Work Want2 & Well Done=D And :|8o8(:(:\:):D=D%)<3Reborn

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For bright sunshine days!!
Fantastic achievement !!
And awesome celebration above!!:)
 
I haven't been on here for a bit as I was ill with a chest infection over the holidays, which lingered for many weeks, thankfully it is slowly getting better.

Well, I'm soon coming into my ninth month off the morphine and wow what a journey this has been. It was this time last year that I was in that rock bottom despair and didn't think I'd ever make it out of that opiate addiction hell. It was a very, very dark place. It has not been easy but it was worth it. Every day as soon as I wake up, that first ten minutes is spent in blissful realisation that I am not in the heavy duty withdrawal I used to be in. Freedom from active addiction is absolutely fantastic. I still have medical issues but these are ongoing. Right now I work very hard on recovery and have really come to love NA and made some good friends there. I do meetings, steps, sponsor and service. Learning to cope with feelings again without drugs numbing them is a rollercoaster. I won't deny that it's very difficult. I've changed a lot already.

It's taken all this time for me to start eating properly and sleeping properly again. I just wanted to update here to show that it CAN be done and recovery from full bore opiate addiction IS possible. It is a long road and doesn't happen overnight. Hope someone gets something out of this.
 
Not sure if this thread is still alive.

I had about 2 years clean and then relapsed on percocets 2 months ago. For about 2 months I've been taking anywhere from 10-30mg a day. It's much less then I was using before my clean time (around 90mg of roxys plus sniffing several bags of dope a day). I went cold turkey starting last night (about 18 hours ago). I'm wondering if anyone can give me an idea of how many days it will take until I return to normal? Right now I have acute feelings of lethargy, feel tired, not so motivated, etc. Physically I'm okay (no restless leg syndrome, cold sweats, etc). I just need some idea what to expect, like some sort of a time line I can wrap my head around so I can keep pushing through the symptoms until I'm back to normal. If anyone can help I'd appreciate it. Thanks.
 
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