whataboutringo
Greenlighter
(I padded this with information about what led to my current problems, for those who have the time and interest, otherwise feel free to skip to the near bottom to get straight to my Suboxone questions. PLEAAAASE just give the bottom question a read if nothing else! Thank you!)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Firstly, I apologize for throwing out some of my formalities... I would introduce myself a bit better were my brain not a bit mushy but nonetheless I seek answers, wisdom, thoughts, hope, and beyond. Please feel free to ask any questions that help you get to know me and or my current situation, which issss
Suboxone Detox... right off the bat I have to be honest and say this is my 2nd time doing this... and I have absolutely no defense for putting myself back in this position. I was a good month into PAWS... I try to say I was still depressed and having trouble sleeping... but I want to keep it real and admit that it was mostly cravings. I cannot sit here with a straight face and insult you all by saying my PAWS were unbearable after 40 days because if someone makes it that far they have been through the worst of it... at least in my case it was true, I read many stories about extremely long PAWS and don't mean to discount your own experiences. Anyways, my point is... I have the basic information needed, I know what my brain is trying to do, I realize this is a long and drawn out process, that one "pays to play". Yet, there is much I don't know, and this is my first time seeking help from the online community. So! Let me try to give the bullet points... and I know I need not scapegoat everything for my addiction, but I am going to include some of the catalysts and reasons for why I believe I ended up this way.
2007- After trying a few times here and there and never enjoying it, I am given a hydro 10 to snort and instantly fall in love. I play Command And Conquer Red Alert 2 for several hours and this was one of the few times I "touched the dragon" so to speak.
2008- Things ramp up but are still nowhere near my love for marijuana. I was able to get perfectly lit on about 10-15 mgs of Percocet or Hydro's, but it was still an only sometimes thing. I remember taking a few trips and being far more concerned with having a bag of weed than pills. So I was very smitten at this point, but not quite addicted and far from dependence- both physically and mentally. I also tried some of the lessers like codeine, darvocet, etc... wasn't a huge fan.
2009- This was for my timeline, at least, when the old pinkish/reddish OC 20's and above were becoming prominent amidst users. Even then... I had found OC's superior for the high and lack of APAP, but I was still on relatively low doses. 20 mg tops throughout a day, maybe 30. I should add that my preferred ROA has always been snorting... and shiver to think of the amount of acetaminophen that has passed through my nose. A lot of my addiction is ritual and I realize that now. As 2009 wore on, I began to "need" the pills more and more, and would tell myself I was dopesick on days without, but I laugh at myself thinking that looking back now. Then shit got kind of heavy... we all have our tragedies and by no means am I trying to get all woe is me, I am just trying to offer as much honest insight as possible. 2009 ended up being a myriad of struggles. My mother died in March, I was 19 years old and had brought her to live with me and a girlfriend. She was like a big sister in many ways. She brought me up with taste, often letting my little ass jam Counting Crows and watch Tarantino Flicks. That was me and my mom! 7 years old and having fairly deep discussions about Pulp Fiction and life in general. Anyways... she had married this guy who was my 2nd stepfather for a while. Decent enough dude but they both fed into each others' alcoholism. He drank himself to death in 2007 and as such my mother's downfall started there. Things spiraled out of control for her, and when I heard she was heavy into Xanax and doing this and that, I decided to bring her to live with me and my girlfriend of the time. Long story short, she was dead within 3 months. For a while I carried guilt... my mom would just lay in bed and read Anne Rice and more all day... she would escape with a bottle now and again but mostly she was lonely and heartbroken, I believe. I was only 19 at the time and to be honest I was a little emotionally absent for her. Then again, we both kind of dealt with things privately. She gets her taxes back and goes on a bender. Meets some random guy, moves in with him... and they're drinking and getting it on left and right. She caught a bladder infection and essentially ignored it. I really was naive to think it would sort itself out back then, but how would I ever expect what came next? The last time I ever saw my mother, she had called me in a stupor saying my biological dad was killed in a "drive by shooting" (he lives in FL and neither of us have contact with him...) I showed up and she was really out of it. The whole thing was made up, along with some other weird stories. I actually have a notebook from the last week of her life with some really bizarre shit written in it. Anyways, she had some money left from her taxes and my main reason in going up there was to hit her up... she also bought some benzos from someone I had kiiiind of put her in touch with a long time ago and I try not to blame myself but yeah... Long story short, the binge drinking, bladder infection, continued sex and abuse of benzos on top of it led to her death. Not sure exactly on the point A to point B. Showed up one day to say hi with a friend and the guy told me she was in the hospital. By the time I got there she was already pretty much done... alive on life support, but unconscious and with her hands and feet turning black and swelling up. There were no other contacts for her... I gave the go ahead to pull the plug and dealt with her funeral. My girlfriend left me soon thereafter and in hindsight I can't blame her... it was a lot for anyone to deal with, let alone two kids under 20. After that, my drug use peaked and I found myself on a different path and not many friends stuck around... it was a very hard time.
2010- I moved in with my grandparents as I was no longer able to even really care for myself. I jonesed to get high every single day as I didn't have connections at first... going as far as stealing corn poppies from yards and trying to dry them and make teas... buying hydro 5's at a buck a mil, you name it. Physically, I had gone months without anything at this point, but mentally it was one of the most addictive periods mentally. I had convinced myself by this point that opioids were my Popeye's spinach. All of my energies and creative sparks, I linked to pills. "I can play guitar even better when I'm high! I can clean the house much easier when I'm high" You know the drill. Problem is, this shifts the dynamic of who you are when you AREN'T high. Even then, my problems in 2010 were nowhere near what they became.
2011-2014- Everything kind of becomes a blur. I was getting connected again in 2011 and abusing a decent amount of oxy... never a steady supply. Was pawning things and stealing from friends just to buy overpriced hydro. I had long since tried uppers, benzos, crank, etc... opioids just did it for me. The perfect anti-depressant, or so I thought. Eventually, I find some suboxone on the street and fall in love with it. A potent high, that lasted all day, at a relatively cheap price. Flash forward 6 months to a year and I'm going to Wyoming to get put on the suboxone maintenance program. I was so ecstatic... I remember being so smug in thinking I had beat the system somehow, and I was going to be able to get high everyday, and my grandparents knew about it, and so on... I shit you not, the very first official induction of suboxone was the very first time I had it not effect me anymore in the narcotic sense. Don't get me wrong, I was still pretty addicted to the sub. I was trying to balance it with other pills, rebounding with it, snorting here and there, etc. My brain was stimulated but mentally I wanted more, I wanted to get high, I wanted a ritual... eventually I just settled on suboxone and decided to maybe quit flying by night on all of the pills. January 2013 my dad (who was really my first stepfather, but always considered my dad) was out of nowhere dead from a self inflicted gunshot wound. Initially it was sworn up and down it was an accident by his wife, and I did recall him being a bit foolhardy with a new pistol he had purchased... but I guess he was cleaning with or messing with the gun and it went off... she turned around, he was already to his knees and then he bled out and died in front of her. It wasn't until after dealing with his funeral that I began to find inconsistencies, as the first time she told the story she was in the kitchen, then she was right by him when it happened, then it happened during an argument... didn't add up. The gun also had two safeties and my father was also adamant about not looking down the barrel of a gun. I don't have proof but I believe he killed himself intentionally, and a cousin of mine claims he got the widow to confess to this, but I can't prove it. I'm getting ahead of myself though... (I really don't mean to use my grief for self serving purposes... I just want future readers in my situation to know they aren't alone in turning to drugs because of grief... and I want people offering me advice to have a thorough glimpse into my psyche. It really made my trust in humans shaky at best)
So right after his death, I dedicated getting clean to him and began my first Suboxone detox. I hadn't been on it all that long and I didn't have the knowledge and fear of w/d that I now do... so I was off like seriously only a day or two sick and then snapped out of it pretty well. I was doing better and coming out of my shell for a few months. Eventually I relapsed though... I can't entirely blame the whole "my dad ditched me on this mortal plane" thing but it was definitely a factor. I found a source of street suboxone and hit the ground running...I was giving this guy like a qyarter of weed and getting about 10-12 8's in exchange. At that time I was already limiting myself to like 2 mg's per day. Flash forward many months and I am deciding it is time to clean up. I still had a sense of belief in myself and a lot of inner strength. And so in May of 2014, I began the most difficult experience of my life- a REAL suboxone detox. I went through it alone, there were vague support systems but I tend to try and keep people at arm' length with this kind of shit. The first few nights/days were horrible as you all probably know... but the PAWS was what really caught me off guard. I remember waking up day after day after day just hoping to God I would feel normal but instead I would wake up writhing. Puking. Hot and cold flashes. Fatigue. Depression, depression, depression. Insomnia. Misery. You know the deal. Listened to "The Church" Starfish album and a lot of The Cure and I did feel my brain responding to music again in a positive way... I had some BOOST supplement drinks and looking back on it, I think immodium is NOT the answer to everyone's detox... I became very sensitive to all that entered my body and I swear lope was doing more harm than good. As I said earlier, I got somewhere between 30 and 40 days clean and moved back to my hometown, and somehow a sub fell into my lap and I thought I could be a weekend warrior. Before you know it, I was copping subs again about once every 3 months, though this time I was down to 1mg a day and for some reason deadset on snorting it. To each their own, but for me snorting subs always felt more effective. I began trying to build up friendships again and be a productive person... but over time every day turned into a sense of fear and dread. I knew I couldn't stay on subs forever, and deep down I don't want to... I can feel my soul closing off when I'm on subs and my sex drive changes and I can't travel and yada yada... it gets old. But basically I have at the very least built up some positive things in my life in anticipation of needing natural dopamine when I go clean. So I do have things to try and focus on and I know that finding new "rewards" without drugs will be crucial in my recovery. However sometime in the last 6 months something in my brain clicked and I just became more jaded and reclusive, and very convinced that my self worth and my life is dime a dozen. Basically I lost my belief in my self. I can only hope it was/ is part of the addiction.
Which brings me to my question...
--------------------------------------------
My Questions Regarding Suboxone Withdrawal
--------------------------------------------
I have decided to go clean once again, though it is much less because I want to and more because I need to this time around.
I weened down to about .75 mg a day, and might have got to about .50 before stopping... it was hard to tell. Having said that,
I wonder if my insistence on snorting them means I was actually on an even lower dose... I know the intranasal B.A. is supposed to
be higher, but I always felt like some of it was inevitable lost and that the nose has only so much space to absorb things. Probably wishful
thinking but I would like to think having snorted it for so long that maybe it's not as concentrated inside of me as much as it would be
sublingually. They were also generics, so maybe I was getting more of a psychological effect. Moving on.
KRATOM!
The 2nd night off of suboxone I was already feeling the spasms and the hot/cold flashes. I recalled the existence of Kratom, and while I know that
it is kind of just trading off withdrawals/ keeping my brain from fully recovering, I am trying to use kratom to mitigate the suboxone withdrawal a bit this time around. I figure even if kratom withdrawal is equal or even worse than suboxone, at the very least I feel I can have a mental edge. See, I have built suboxone detox up in my head to be the worst thing imaginable, hell on Earth, living in that Jacob's Ladder movie, and so on. I feel like if I can even just use Kratom while more and more sub gets eliminated via half life over time, that I can hopefully have a much more manageable withdrawal and feel like it won't be quite as endless or hopeless as suboxone withdrawal... I know it's a junkie's justification, but there must be some validity to it, yes? By no means do I expect to get off of things scot free... but I do believe using the kratom for now is letting my brain get used to less opioids while simultaneously letting more and more bupe clear out of my blood. Right now I am on day FOUR and I am sure I have some suboxone left in me due to the half life, but otherwise I have been very surprised. I don't feel great or particularly motivated, but I am moving around, eating, and not crying/ shaking. I honestly think the kratom is holding off a lot of the suboxone w/d symptoms. In fact, I know it is to at least some extent because in the morning I DO feel many w/d symptoms, a lot of twitching, RLS, hot/cold, nausea... and about 40 mins after dosing kratom they almost entirely go away. The kratom has such a short half life though... so I keep waking up with symptoms at about 4am and I take one or two kratom capsules and fall back asleep. It could all just be a psychological edge, I'm not sure. I know I still have to face a withdrawal of some sort... but does anyone here have experience with coming off of suboxone via kratom and then just sweating out the kratom?
And most importantly, I keep reading days 4-7 are when w/d usually peaks... but I mean I haven't puked yet. It might get worse, but can anyone offer a glimmer of hope? I personally am in shock that I am on day 4, and able to type all of this and keep a relatively decent mood. Am I counting my chickens too soon? Suboxone half life be damned, one would at least be feeling some of the symptoms at 4 days with no suboxone, yes? I am not trying to mentally get stuck on Kratom. I am limiting my dose of kratom to 3-4 grams 2-3 times a day. I really just want to feel normal again. I miss the fun loving, resilient person I was. I barely even listen to music anymore.
TL;DR:
SO BASICALLY-
Has anyone used kratom to mitigate Suboxone withdrawals, and found that it helped provide you a more managable detox and a slightly easier PAWS? I feel like even mentally it is an advantage for me to feel like I am coming off of kratom and not suboxone. I plan on using Kratom no more than 2.5 weeks. I have just built up such a fear of suboxone withdrawal at this point that I think mentally I am making it much harder on myself and causing physiological symptoms to flare up, and so on. I mostly hope there is some truth to this. My resolve is so brittle these days, and I have no one to turn to who has been through this in my family or friends... so yeah. Thought I would finally post to bluelight. I am sorry for the lengthiness and autobiographical madness... but it has kept me distracted for a while at least. All thoughts and advice is massively appreciated... and please only give me a harsh dose of reality if you feel it is absolutely needed! I think the horror story forums sometimes make it that much worse but I do feel like this kratom is indeed keeping me whole while the suboxone ekes out of my system and I just hope that the kratom comedown and PAWS will be much more manageable... I need to get new rewards and activities either way you slice it. No getting around that. But is it possible I might have an easier go this time? I came off at about 2mg sublingual during the last suboxone detox. This time I got to like half a mg and was always snorting them. I know snorting makes a proper taper a lot more complicated but I also do think you get more out of less with intranasal use so mayyybe I have been more psychologically addicted this time around? Idk, I'm ranting and ranting and repeating things. Sorry folks. Any input is massively appreciated! Thank you and well wishes to all of you who have went and or are going through this. I really think even with a half life left in me of sub after jumping off at .5 ish that I should be doing this well on day 4. Different for everyone, but I'd love to hear when a lot of people's bad days started... I would feel like shit just missing a dose when I was on sub... so I still know that the kratom is helping somewhat. Albeit still stimulating the receptors and kinda prolonging things... but at least helping to buy a little more time for the sub half life to die down... All input appreciated!
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Firstly, I apologize for throwing out some of my formalities... I would introduce myself a bit better were my brain not a bit mushy but nonetheless I seek answers, wisdom, thoughts, hope, and beyond. Please feel free to ask any questions that help you get to know me and or my current situation, which issss
Suboxone Detox... right off the bat I have to be honest and say this is my 2nd time doing this... and I have absolutely no defense for putting myself back in this position. I was a good month into PAWS... I try to say I was still depressed and having trouble sleeping... but I want to keep it real and admit that it was mostly cravings. I cannot sit here with a straight face and insult you all by saying my PAWS were unbearable after 40 days because if someone makes it that far they have been through the worst of it... at least in my case it was true, I read many stories about extremely long PAWS and don't mean to discount your own experiences. Anyways, my point is... I have the basic information needed, I know what my brain is trying to do, I realize this is a long and drawn out process, that one "pays to play". Yet, there is much I don't know, and this is my first time seeking help from the online community. So! Let me try to give the bullet points... and I know I need not scapegoat everything for my addiction, but I am going to include some of the catalysts and reasons for why I believe I ended up this way.
2007- After trying a few times here and there and never enjoying it, I am given a hydro 10 to snort and instantly fall in love. I play Command And Conquer Red Alert 2 for several hours and this was one of the few times I "touched the dragon" so to speak.
2008- Things ramp up but are still nowhere near my love for marijuana. I was able to get perfectly lit on about 10-15 mgs of Percocet or Hydro's, but it was still an only sometimes thing. I remember taking a few trips and being far more concerned with having a bag of weed than pills. So I was very smitten at this point, but not quite addicted and far from dependence- both physically and mentally. I also tried some of the lessers like codeine, darvocet, etc... wasn't a huge fan.
2009- This was for my timeline, at least, when the old pinkish/reddish OC 20's and above were becoming prominent amidst users. Even then... I had found OC's superior for the high and lack of APAP, but I was still on relatively low doses. 20 mg tops throughout a day, maybe 30. I should add that my preferred ROA has always been snorting... and shiver to think of the amount of acetaminophen that has passed through my nose. A lot of my addiction is ritual and I realize that now. As 2009 wore on, I began to "need" the pills more and more, and would tell myself I was dopesick on days without, but I laugh at myself thinking that looking back now. Then shit got kind of heavy... we all have our tragedies and by no means am I trying to get all woe is me, I am just trying to offer as much honest insight as possible. 2009 ended up being a myriad of struggles. My mother died in March, I was 19 years old and had brought her to live with me and a girlfriend. She was like a big sister in many ways. She brought me up with taste, often letting my little ass jam Counting Crows and watch Tarantino Flicks. That was me and my mom! 7 years old and having fairly deep discussions about Pulp Fiction and life in general. Anyways... she had married this guy who was my 2nd stepfather for a while. Decent enough dude but they both fed into each others' alcoholism. He drank himself to death in 2007 and as such my mother's downfall started there. Things spiraled out of control for her, and when I heard she was heavy into Xanax and doing this and that, I decided to bring her to live with me and my girlfriend of the time. Long story short, she was dead within 3 months. For a while I carried guilt... my mom would just lay in bed and read Anne Rice and more all day... she would escape with a bottle now and again but mostly she was lonely and heartbroken, I believe. I was only 19 at the time and to be honest I was a little emotionally absent for her. Then again, we both kind of dealt with things privately. She gets her taxes back and goes on a bender. Meets some random guy, moves in with him... and they're drinking and getting it on left and right. She caught a bladder infection and essentially ignored it. I really was naive to think it would sort itself out back then, but how would I ever expect what came next? The last time I ever saw my mother, she had called me in a stupor saying my biological dad was killed in a "drive by shooting" (he lives in FL and neither of us have contact with him...) I showed up and she was really out of it. The whole thing was made up, along with some other weird stories. I actually have a notebook from the last week of her life with some really bizarre shit written in it. Anyways, she had some money left from her taxes and my main reason in going up there was to hit her up... she also bought some benzos from someone I had kiiiind of put her in touch with a long time ago and I try not to blame myself but yeah... Long story short, the binge drinking, bladder infection, continued sex and abuse of benzos on top of it led to her death. Not sure exactly on the point A to point B. Showed up one day to say hi with a friend and the guy told me she was in the hospital. By the time I got there she was already pretty much done... alive on life support, but unconscious and with her hands and feet turning black and swelling up. There were no other contacts for her... I gave the go ahead to pull the plug and dealt with her funeral. My girlfriend left me soon thereafter and in hindsight I can't blame her... it was a lot for anyone to deal with, let alone two kids under 20. After that, my drug use peaked and I found myself on a different path and not many friends stuck around... it was a very hard time.
2010- I moved in with my grandparents as I was no longer able to even really care for myself. I jonesed to get high every single day as I didn't have connections at first... going as far as stealing corn poppies from yards and trying to dry them and make teas... buying hydro 5's at a buck a mil, you name it. Physically, I had gone months without anything at this point, but mentally it was one of the most addictive periods mentally. I had convinced myself by this point that opioids were my Popeye's spinach. All of my energies and creative sparks, I linked to pills. "I can play guitar even better when I'm high! I can clean the house much easier when I'm high" You know the drill. Problem is, this shifts the dynamic of who you are when you AREN'T high. Even then, my problems in 2010 were nowhere near what they became.
2011-2014- Everything kind of becomes a blur. I was getting connected again in 2011 and abusing a decent amount of oxy... never a steady supply. Was pawning things and stealing from friends just to buy overpriced hydro. I had long since tried uppers, benzos, crank, etc... opioids just did it for me. The perfect anti-depressant, or so I thought. Eventually, I find some suboxone on the street and fall in love with it. A potent high, that lasted all day, at a relatively cheap price. Flash forward 6 months to a year and I'm going to Wyoming to get put on the suboxone maintenance program. I was so ecstatic... I remember being so smug in thinking I had beat the system somehow, and I was going to be able to get high everyday, and my grandparents knew about it, and so on... I shit you not, the very first official induction of suboxone was the very first time I had it not effect me anymore in the narcotic sense. Don't get me wrong, I was still pretty addicted to the sub. I was trying to balance it with other pills, rebounding with it, snorting here and there, etc. My brain was stimulated but mentally I wanted more, I wanted to get high, I wanted a ritual... eventually I just settled on suboxone and decided to maybe quit flying by night on all of the pills. January 2013 my dad (who was really my first stepfather, but always considered my dad) was out of nowhere dead from a self inflicted gunshot wound. Initially it was sworn up and down it was an accident by his wife, and I did recall him being a bit foolhardy with a new pistol he had purchased... but I guess he was cleaning with or messing with the gun and it went off... she turned around, he was already to his knees and then he bled out and died in front of her. It wasn't until after dealing with his funeral that I began to find inconsistencies, as the first time she told the story she was in the kitchen, then she was right by him when it happened, then it happened during an argument... didn't add up. The gun also had two safeties and my father was also adamant about not looking down the barrel of a gun. I don't have proof but I believe he killed himself intentionally, and a cousin of mine claims he got the widow to confess to this, but I can't prove it. I'm getting ahead of myself though... (I really don't mean to use my grief for self serving purposes... I just want future readers in my situation to know they aren't alone in turning to drugs because of grief... and I want people offering me advice to have a thorough glimpse into my psyche. It really made my trust in humans shaky at best)
So right after his death, I dedicated getting clean to him and began my first Suboxone detox. I hadn't been on it all that long and I didn't have the knowledge and fear of w/d that I now do... so I was off like seriously only a day or two sick and then snapped out of it pretty well. I was doing better and coming out of my shell for a few months. Eventually I relapsed though... I can't entirely blame the whole "my dad ditched me on this mortal plane" thing but it was definitely a factor. I found a source of street suboxone and hit the ground running...I was giving this guy like a qyarter of weed and getting about 10-12 8's in exchange. At that time I was already limiting myself to like 2 mg's per day. Flash forward many months and I am deciding it is time to clean up. I still had a sense of belief in myself and a lot of inner strength. And so in May of 2014, I began the most difficult experience of my life- a REAL suboxone detox. I went through it alone, there were vague support systems but I tend to try and keep people at arm' length with this kind of shit. The first few nights/days were horrible as you all probably know... but the PAWS was what really caught me off guard. I remember waking up day after day after day just hoping to God I would feel normal but instead I would wake up writhing. Puking. Hot and cold flashes. Fatigue. Depression, depression, depression. Insomnia. Misery. You know the deal. Listened to "The Church" Starfish album and a lot of The Cure and I did feel my brain responding to music again in a positive way... I had some BOOST supplement drinks and looking back on it, I think immodium is NOT the answer to everyone's detox... I became very sensitive to all that entered my body and I swear lope was doing more harm than good. As I said earlier, I got somewhere between 30 and 40 days clean and moved back to my hometown, and somehow a sub fell into my lap and I thought I could be a weekend warrior. Before you know it, I was copping subs again about once every 3 months, though this time I was down to 1mg a day and for some reason deadset on snorting it. To each their own, but for me snorting subs always felt more effective. I began trying to build up friendships again and be a productive person... but over time every day turned into a sense of fear and dread. I knew I couldn't stay on subs forever, and deep down I don't want to... I can feel my soul closing off when I'm on subs and my sex drive changes and I can't travel and yada yada... it gets old. But basically I have at the very least built up some positive things in my life in anticipation of needing natural dopamine when I go clean. So I do have things to try and focus on and I know that finding new "rewards" without drugs will be crucial in my recovery. However sometime in the last 6 months something in my brain clicked and I just became more jaded and reclusive, and very convinced that my self worth and my life is dime a dozen. Basically I lost my belief in my self. I can only hope it was/ is part of the addiction.
Which brings me to my question...
--------------------------------------------
My Questions Regarding Suboxone Withdrawal
--------------------------------------------
I have decided to go clean once again, though it is much less because I want to and more because I need to this time around.
I weened down to about .75 mg a day, and might have got to about .50 before stopping... it was hard to tell. Having said that,
I wonder if my insistence on snorting them means I was actually on an even lower dose... I know the intranasal B.A. is supposed to
be higher, but I always felt like some of it was inevitable lost and that the nose has only so much space to absorb things. Probably wishful
thinking but I would like to think having snorted it for so long that maybe it's not as concentrated inside of me as much as it would be
sublingually. They were also generics, so maybe I was getting more of a psychological effect. Moving on.
KRATOM!
The 2nd night off of suboxone I was already feeling the spasms and the hot/cold flashes. I recalled the existence of Kratom, and while I know that
it is kind of just trading off withdrawals/ keeping my brain from fully recovering, I am trying to use kratom to mitigate the suboxone withdrawal a bit this time around. I figure even if kratom withdrawal is equal or even worse than suboxone, at the very least I feel I can have a mental edge. See, I have built suboxone detox up in my head to be the worst thing imaginable, hell on Earth, living in that Jacob's Ladder movie, and so on. I feel like if I can even just use Kratom while more and more sub gets eliminated via half life over time, that I can hopefully have a much more manageable withdrawal and feel like it won't be quite as endless or hopeless as suboxone withdrawal... I know it's a junkie's justification, but there must be some validity to it, yes? By no means do I expect to get off of things scot free... but I do believe using the kratom for now is letting my brain get used to less opioids while simultaneously letting more and more bupe clear out of my blood. Right now I am on day FOUR and I am sure I have some suboxone left in me due to the half life, but otherwise I have been very surprised. I don't feel great or particularly motivated, but I am moving around, eating, and not crying/ shaking. I honestly think the kratom is holding off a lot of the suboxone w/d symptoms. In fact, I know it is to at least some extent because in the morning I DO feel many w/d symptoms, a lot of twitching, RLS, hot/cold, nausea... and about 40 mins after dosing kratom they almost entirely go away. The kratom has such a short half life though... so I keep waking up with symptoms at about 4am and I take one or two kratom capsules and fall back asleep. It could all just be a psychological edge, I'm not sure. I know I still have to face a withdrawal of some sort... but does anyone here have experience with coming off of suboxone via kratom and then just sweating out the kratom?
And most importantly, I keep reading days 4-7 are when w/d usually peaks... but I mean I haven't puked yet. It might get worse, but can anyone offer a glimmer of hope? I personally am in shock that I am on day 4, and able to type all of this and keep a relatively decent mood. Am I counting my chickens too soon? Suboxone half life be damned, one would at least be feeling some of the symptoms at 4 days with no suboxone, yes? I am not trying to mentally get stuck on Kratom. I am limiting my dose of kratom to 3-4 grams 2-3 times a day. I really just want to feel normal again. I miss the fun loving, resilient person I was. I barely even listen to music anymore.
TL;DR:
SO BASICALLY-
Has anyone used kratom to mitigate Suboxone withdrawals, and found that it helped provide you a more managable detox and a slightly easier PAWS? I feel like even mentally it is an advantage for me to feel like I am coming off of kratom and not suboxone. I plan on using Kratom no more than 2.5 weeks. I have just built up such a fear of suboxone withdrawal at this point that I think mentally I am making it much harder on myself and causing physiological symptoms to flare up, and so on. I mostly hope there is some truth to this. My resolve is so brittle these days, and I have no one to turn to who has been through this in my family or friends... so yeah. Thought I would finally post to bluelight. I am sorry for the lengthiness and autobiographical madness... but it has kept me distracted for a while at least. All thoughts and advice is massively appreciated... and please only give me a harsh dose of reality if you feel it is absolutely needed! I think the horror story forums sometimes make it that much worse but I do feel like this kratom is indeed keeping me whole while the suboxone ekes out of my system and I just hope that the kratom comedown and PAWS will be much more manageable... I need to get new rewards and activities either way you slice it. No getting around that. But is it possible I might have an easier go this time? I came off at about 2mg sublingual during the last suboxone detox. This time I got to like half a mg and was always snorting them. I know snorting makes a proper taper a lot more complicated but I also do think you get more out of less with intranasal use so mayyybe I have been more psychologically addicted this time around? Idk, I'm ranting and ranting and repeating things. Sorry folks. Any input is massively appreciated! Thank you and well wishes to all of you who have went and or are going through this. I really think even with a half life left in me of sub after jumping off at .5 ish that I should be doing this well on day 4. Different for everyone, but I'd love to hear when a lot of people's bad days started... I would feel like shit just missing a dose when I was on sub... so I still know that the kratom is helping somewhat. Albeit still stimulating the receptors and kinda prolonging things... but at least helping to buy a little more time for the sub half life to die down... All input appreciated!
Your problem, as you have written it yourself is the messed up life that have lead to messed up you. Firstly, realise that when you get off buprenorphine with kratom that you will be on the beginning off the fight for opioid free life. I believe that you have many things to resolve and if you don't do anything about that (depression, anxiety, ptsd...) you will not stay opioid free for long. That is true for all of us that got dependent on opioids.