Opioids Dependency. A function of dosage or time?

[SaosinEngaged]

I know the answer is both, but my question is more appropriately; which matters more?

First off, I just wanted to say I've been reading this forum for a while and I have a tremendous amount of respect for what many of you guys have gone through and the sheer strength it takes to get through some of this seems monumental. Love and respect guys...

Onto my situation. I not naive to opiates, my best friend kicked a habit of 300mg of Roxy's a day for 4 years earlier this year. He had to go to inpatient treatment because his family didn't believe he could do it himself. His addiction ruined my friendship with him and we don't speak much to this day.

Now about me. I first took a Roxy about two years ago. 30 mg broken up into four pieces, one at a time, does it for me. I've been off and on for about two years. Never touching the stuff for more than a week at a time, every other month or so.

Recently, I've just been having real severe bouts of depression, and Oxys are the only thing that helps. Not due to anything in particular, I live with my girlfriend, the love of my life, and I have a good job and am still going to school. I guess it's just the combined pressures of all those things.

I just picked up about 15 30mg pills, and have been planning something of a "binge week" to relax myself a bit. I know, believe me, that this is a slippery slope. Fortunately, I don't have ready access to them; I have to jump through a few hoops to get them. It's probably what has, in the past, kept me from developing this habit further.

My main question is this: Can I binge like half of those 15 over the next two weeks and walk away without physical dependency? I can't get any more for quite some time, so even if I'm mentally craving them I'll be unable to get more for a while, so I'm not really all that concerned about progressing a habit.

Secondary question: I know it's all relative, but what in general is more prominent in determining dependency? How much you do? Or how long you do it?

Can you really be dependent upon, say, 5mgs a day? And if so, are you likely to face bad withdrawals from that low a dosage?

Please excuse my ignorance, and at the same time understand I mean no offense to anyone who's struggled with serious addictions far outweighing the plights of my noobish post.

 

[SmokeTrails]

are you still breaking your roxis up into quarters and dosing that way? how many are you planning on taking per day? i might have missed this info.

for me ive only gotten bad withdrawals from high dosages over an extended period of time. the withdrawals ive gotten from a week or two long binge has been almost unmentionable.

 

[trippytrojan]

You'd be lucky to take 30+mg a day and not get withdrawals after you stop. I doubt your symptoms will be horrible, but you should experience physical withdrawals.

Edit: This is just in my experience by the way.

 

[SaosinEngaged]

Probably no more than 7.5-10mg/day

Honestly a dose of 5mg will get me buzzed, and 10mg will make me "whacked."

Because I've never gone "hard" on these, I don't have much, if any tolerance to them.

 

[stray cat]

i don't think any way you do 15 30 mg roxis over the course of one week will give you any physical wd to speak of, provided you have no physical addiction going in. all at once (don't do that!) or spread out over the week... regardless, i do not think you will experience anything much when you stop.

as far as your length/dose question, i'm really not sure. you hear about little old ladies getting withdrawal from stopping 10mg/day hydro habits and such, so I guess people do have physical dependence from low doses over the long term. then again, plenty of people have high tolerances and really blow it out for a couple days then stop. ime, length and dose go sort of hand in hand. that is, the longer you take something regularly, the more you take. i guess it's safe to say that a lengthy high-dose habit would be the worst thing to deal with. sorry i can't offer more insight; it really just depends on the individual for the most part.

 

[Ksa]

Neither one. Dependency is a function of how much you enjoy a substance. If you enjoy a substance in an incredibly intense manner, you can become addicted after your first dose. I have taken d-amphetamine for years, with various doses and I never became addicted because I don't enjoy it.

 

[CitioKid]

But you will begin to acquire a tolerance to the pills. If an addict could get away with only doing 5 to 10mg a day and still get that awesome high, they would.

But after 10 days of daily usage, you'll notice 10mg won't quite get you "whacked." And so the slope begins.

One thing I've noticed about opiate tolerance is it is much slower to develop if you only get high once a day. Seems that taking 20mg, for example, all at once every morning will keep your tolerance down longer than if you take 5mg four different times throughout the day. If you constantly saturate your brain with oxycodone, it will rapidly adjust to it.

Good luck!

 

[dokomo]

The bigger concern is being able/willing to quit after that week-long period. A lot of people get started by telling themselves they're only going to do it X number of times and you slowly re-negotiate with yourself over and over.

The best advice would be to get through the depression without substances and (if you still want to take them) save the opioids for pure enjoyment on other sparse occasions.

 

[affasd]

I think your more likely to get withdrawals if you spread it out. Like say you take 20 mg every day for like 22 days your more likely to get some physical w/d than if you took 3 of the pills every day for 5 days. But also you might be more likely to get mentally addicted to the high if you get super faded all day for 5 days straight, youll know how good it feels to do large amounts at once and you might end up chasing that feeling. I would be careful though either way because you would be cutting it close with 15 30s and even though even if you did get some withdrawals they would be very minor and easily dealt with but still thats not something you want to get started on.

 

[Ksa]

But you will begin to acquire a tolerance to the pills. If an addict could get away with only doing 5 to 10mg a day and still get that awesome high, they would.

But after 10 days of daily usage, you'll notice 10mg won't quite get you "whacked." And so the slope begins.

One thing I've noticed about opiate tolerance is it is much slower to develop if you only get high once a day. Seems that taking 20mg, for example, all at once every morning will keep your tolerance down longer than if you take 5mg four different times throughout the day. If you constantly saturate your brain with oxycodone, it will rapidly adjust to it.

Good luck!

good advice even though I don't go crazy for ppl using downers recreationally. What he says is true, I would bet my ass on it.

 

[SaosinEngaged]

Everything's great so far, thanks for all the replies guys. Appreciate it.

I gotta say, sometimes I feel like my body deals with Oxycodone a bit strangely.

For instance, tonight I took a dose of 10mg (Roxy split in 3). The first hour came and went, and I didn't really feel too much other than relaxed. Same with the third. Just very relaxed. Then at about 3 1/2 hours I actually started feeling the usual Oxy high. Like it hit me harder 3 1/2 hours in. How could that be?

Either way, I'm takin it easy and not allowing myself to go nuts. I want this to be pure recreation and not a life changing addiction. I know it's easier said than done, but I think I have a fairly good handle on things.

Won't let myself dose twice in one day, will stop for a few days-week if feel tolerance start kicking in, etc.

This is definitely the most frequent I've done them, but I've taken them several times for the past two years and had a good handle on things.

 

[Bella_Luvs_Blues]

Sounds like the onset of addiction to me

 

[monstanoodle]

Neither one. Dependency is a function of how much you enjoy a substance. If you enjoy a substance in an incredibly intense manner, you can become addicted after your first dose. I have taken d-amphetamine for years, with various doses and I never became addicted because I don't enjoy it.

This is a good point. Dependency could be seen as a different thing to addiction in my eyes:

Dependency is more of a Psychological thing where, well, you depend on the substance to live your life. So it'a all about how much pleasure you experience from the drug.
I'd consider addiction to be more related to the Physical withdrawals and such.

Using for a week will likely produce some very mild withdrawals when it comes to the doses you mentioned.
Withdrawals are brought about because of a combination of dose and time, but I can't help but feel that the duration of continuous use is more likely to cause withdrawals than the dose.

If you used 80mg in the space of 2 nights, I doubt you would experience anything in the way of withdrawals. But if you were to use 10mg a day for 8 days then you're much more likely to experience withdrawals because your body / brain are getting used to having the substance in your system.

 

[Jabberwocky]

This is a good point. Dependency could be seen as a different thing to addiction in my eyes:

oh, definitely. for instance a lot of people are dependent on pain management medicatons and never abuse them.

self medicating, in the instance of the OP, is almost never a wise route to go down. chewing you up and spitting you out worse off than you were in the first place.

if you've got depression, coming from an addict and dependent user, don't self medicate with oxy. face your problems face first using other tools. you're only masking your problems and compounding issues by numbing yourself.

 

[Cane2theLeft]

This is a good point. Dependency could be seen as a different thing to addiction in my eyes:

Dependency is more of a Psychological thing where, well, you depend on the substance to live your life. So it'a all about how much pleasure you experience from the drug.
I'd consider addiction to be more related to the Physical withdrawals and such.

Using for a week will likely produce some very mild withdrawals when it comes to the doses you mentioned.
Withdrawals are brought about because of a combination of dose and time, but I can't help but feel that the duration of continuous use is more likely to cause withdrawals than the dose.

If you used 80mg in the space of 2 nights, I doubt you would experience anything in the way of withdrawals. But if you were to use 10mg a day for 8 days then you're much more likely to experience withdrawals because your body / brain are getting used to having the substance in your system.

Medically speaking you have it backwards. Physical dependence is purely physiological and is the adaptation the body goes through with regular dosing so that the substance becomes necessary for homeostatic functioning. This often happens with non-'addicting' drugs such as oxymetazoline nasal spray, beta blockers and even paracetamol to a small extent (via rebound headaches after regular use).

Addiction (confusingly called substance dependence in the psych community) is the all-encompassing biospychosocial disease that can include physical dependence (tolerance and withdrawal) but is more so characterized by the psychological craving and impact it has on all facets of the afflicted's life.

 

[Jabberwocky]

i was waiting for your $0.02 on the matter

 

[Cane2theLeft]

^you offered some excellent advice I didn't see before responding to monsta... Spot on, brother.
Depression is a bitch, although numbing it temporarily may feel wonderful, eventually it'll catch up to you and having a habit on top of the depression will make things exponentially worse.
Another note on the rest- the differences are largely semantic, I was just using the recognized nomenclature I've had to learn in classes.

 

[Jabberwocky]

well don't take your cake and eat it

i was just pointing out, in an obscure way mind you, that what you said was correct. afterall this kind of subject is a close interest of yours and i always enjoy reading your spiels.

anyone else for an OD circle jerk? i don't think we've had a public orgy for a while. get your tickets now, they're running hot, hot like a UTI burn.

 

[Cane2theLeft]

^yeah, I did notice you admiring my spiels at that last public orgy. At least wash your fucking hands next time, I *did* get a UTI after that circle jerk, jerk.

Too bad the other staff are slumbering or they could join in, but C.H would probably want to film it...

 

[Jabberwocky]

BLOP's get filmed regardless. sorry to the OP for taking your thread off topic, we're usually law abiding citizens.