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  • BDD Moderators: Keif’ Richards

Are opiates really bad for your health?

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+1 to swimmingdancer being ace, please do stay :) also, cane, post more. thanks in advance.

Chubbs_Peterson said:
Interesting read!

Can I ask the same but about Tramadol, because I know it's an Opioid. (Despite what the nurses tell me, LOL.)

Does Tramadol have adverse effects on the liver/kidneys? And to the libido discussion I find that Tramadol makes me horny as hell just completely unable to function! Haha :(

At my most frequent usage of Tramadol I was taking maybe 14 50mg tabs (NOT all at once) once a week on a weekend or sometimes both Sat and Sunday, nothing like a regular every day habit/addiction... I treat it much the same as alcohol. I enjoy it once in a while!
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Nurses tell you tramadol isn't an opioid??

HR bit first - don't take more than 400mg in 24 hrs as it lowers the seizure threshold; people have seized off less so this is a very real risk. Don't take it if you are epileptic or are taking other drugs which can lower the seizure threshold. Don't take it with serotonergic drugs (MDMA, DXM, many psychs etc) as you can get serotonin syndrome.

The "unable to function" bit could be due to the opioid or the SNRI action.

I don't know of any other specific dangers of long term tramadol use, but I can certainly run a search for you later.

Back to opioids in general - this is probably not serious compared to the risks of overdose etc but long-term opioid use also appears to impair your immune system - something which could actually be incredibly important when you consider the rate of infectious diseases in IVDUs. Here is a paper I was reading earlier.
 
Not entirely sure about this, swimmingD, brain development and change is not a field of expertise for me, and in fact even the specialists still admit to a very limited understanding, but it seems that the brain is sorta unique as an organ in its development and response to stimulae. In short its not just your thoughts, but the architecture of your brain itself that responds to its environment - imagine the analogy from anthropology/archaeology wherein male skeletons from the uk middle ages frequently show a distinct and characteristic differential in bone growth between right and left arms due to enforced longbow practice. This cannot necessarily be described as 'damage', more of a characteristic of particular behaviours - as further research is done, I'm sure many further such will emerge, even perhaps a 'suburban lifestyle' braingrowth characteristic. This is not to say that opioids are harmless, though compared to many drugs such as (most notably) alcohol, the health effects from the drug itself (rather than administration practice and contamination) may appear relatively benign, just that the 'brain damage' paradigm is not sufficiently clinically proven. Yet.

Nor, by the way, would I encourage anyone to treat any opioid lightly. I did.
 
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Rattles said:
Not entirely sure about this, swimmingD, brain development and change is not a field of expertise for me, and in fact even the specialists still admit to a very limited understanding, but it seems that the brain is sorta unique as an organ in its development and response to stimulae. In short its not just your thoughts, but the architecture of your brain itself that responds to its environment - imagine the analogy from anthropology/archaeology wherein male skeletons from the uk middle ages frequently show a distinct and characteristic differential in bone growth between right and left arms due to enforced longbow practice. This cannot necessarily be described as 'damage', more of a characteristic of particular behaviours - as further research is done, I'm sure many further such will emerge, even perhaps a 'suburban lifestyle' braingrowth characteristic. This is not to say that opioids are harmless, though compared to many drugs such as (most notably) alcohol, the health effects from the drug itself (rather than administration practice and contamination) may appear relatively benign, just that the 'brain damage' paradigm is not sufficiently clinically proven. Yet.
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I suppose it depends on what you consider brain "damage". If you only consider physical trauma to the brain to be brain damage, like part of the brain being completely missing or holes in the brain, then yes it is not known exactly how much of that type of damage opioids cause. If you consider changes to the physiological structure of the brain, parts of the brain not working, and parts of the brain over-working to be brain damage, then opioids definitely cause brain damage. I don't agree that it hasn't been clinically proven, just that that information is not widely available and that perhaps there haven't been a huge number of well-known studies on the lasting effects of long-term opioid use. You're right that some of it is probably caused by the behaviours of addiction, but much of it is caused by the drug itself (many of these changes don't exist, at least not to the same degree, in the brain of someone who has other addictive behaviours). Regardless, I consider all these changes to the brain to be "damage" because they are damaging to one's mental health (depression, anxiety, poor memory, pain, joylessness, etc). But the journal "Neuropathology and Applied Neurobiology" published studies that stated the "brain damage" (that was the word used) caused by (long-term) use of heroin and methadone as similar to the damage caused by Alzheimers. Then of course there is also serious brain damage caused by overdose. There are also types of brain damage associated with specific drugs and ROAs, for example smoking heroin can cause Leukoencephalopathy.

It's true that all environmental factors do make subtle changes to the brain, but that does not minimize the changes to the brain caused by long-term opioid use, which are not on par with average daily life. Maybe closer to having an extremely traumatic life and being hit over the head a few times ;-)
 
Thanks for the info SwimmingD, to be fair, I hadn't really researched my post, and may look into it further - I was just passing on may understanding that the topic wasn't fully understood and not clinically proven; no direct causual relationship or method of effect have been established. The methodology would be extremely complex, especially given denial and misrepresentation of use amongst opioid users. It's not that I necessarily disagee, but my feeling is that presenting arguments that are (as yet) unproven to discourage drug use can be counter productive. Also, it is entirely predictable that a respected medical journal would describe the effects of drug use (or should I say abuse as they would in a journal?) as 'brain damage', proven or not.

That said, I myself suffer from most of the symptoms you mention (though Ive also lived a IMHO a 'traumatic life' and 'been hit over the head a few times') and I am willing to accept that opioids are somewhat to blame, though co-replacement behaviour with alcohol complicates causality for me.
 
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i against i said:
any info on the cause? not the foil apparently
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Not so sure bout that link you posted bc it says
Aluminum neither melts nor vaporizes at the temperatures that it would be
exposed to in the course of smoking heroin.
Click to expand...
In my own experience foil can & has melted on me. I smoked a "bowl" and there were holes melted where I had put the lighter.
Some believe it's a "filler" in the heroin, other studies suggest it is from inhalation of heroin.
Www.erowid.org/chemicals/heroin/heroin_health2.shtml
 
"...Reynolds Wrap®. Although the company does not recommend smoking heroin off their product..." LOFL!

Man this has been a great discussion. Many thanks!

Just a little insight/reflection about my little opioid experiment you may find interesting - I had read that basically opiates are extra appealing to people who's lives completely suck like homeless, abused etc. and that they are the type most likely to become dependent because they desperately crave an escape from their situations in life, blah blah blah. So I thought to myself that my life is not too bad at all, so that's one thing that would be in my favor as far as not getting strung out. Well, upon reflection, it was like the drug itself SHOWED me I did have a problem and that it could fix it for me. Wow, tricky bitch.
 
Opiates impact your entire bodys hormone levels and your entire neurology, both of which are kindaaaa important and shouldn't be messed up. Plus they are constantly processed by your liver, and while most might consider them "relatively safe" years and years and years of use will leave to SOME accumulative effects on the liver/kidneys (according to my doctors/nurses/conselors. I'm told it takes a bit of time and they are safer relative to other drugs, but that years of abuse will have some effects).

I'd say they're pretty bad. Even if the last part is false and all of my doctors are mistaken, the first two parts are pretty bad in themselves (hormones/neurology). Plus addiction I mean comeon. Writing that off as somehow separate from the "normal effects", madness. All part of the game that are opiates.

So yes i'd say theyre pretty bad. Honestly I feel most people espousing their safety like theyre the holy grail of drugs is probably just justifiying it. Saying "Oh its not bad at all, except for all the addiction, and neurological, and libido effects. But besides all of that, totally safe!" I mean comeon are you listening to yourself when you talk like that? lol

I'm with swimmingdancer and Cane on this one. I also used to shamelessly profess the safety of opiates for my body. Now that I'm not in the haze of opi addiction, I would like to confess ay how much bullshit I spewed out at the time: 24/7, just to rationalize it to myself, let alone others.
 
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One of the major negative effects of opioids is the constipation. It can be completely circumvented with methylnaltrexone. Methylnatrexone is an opioid antagonist but unlike naltrexone, it can't cross the blood brain barrier.
 
effie said:
+1 to swimmingdancer being ace, please do stay :) also, cane, post more. thanks in advance.



Nurses tell you tramadol isn't an opioid??

HR bit first - don't take more than 400mg in 24 hrs as it lowers the seizure threshold; people have seized off less so this is a very real risk. Don't take it if you are epileptic or are taking other drugs which can lower the seizure threshold. Don't take it with serotonergic drugs (MDMA, DXM, many psychs etc) as you can get serotonin syndrome.

The "unable to function" bit could be due to the opioid or the SNRI action.

I don't know of any other specific dangers of long term tramadol use, but I can certainly run a search for you later.

Back to opioids in general - this is probably not serious compared to the risks of overdose etc but long-term opioid use also appears to impair your immune system - something which could actually be incredibly important when you consider the rate of infectious diseases in IVDUs. Here is a paper I was reading earlier.
Click to expand...

Yeah! Got into an argument with one (a friend) who disagreed with me because the 'sister' told her so... She said it was 'morphine based' and an 'opiate', to which I retorted, 'so why is it okay for someone allergic to opiates to take Tramadol...? Anyway... lol.

No more than 400mg's?! So that's 8 caps... That's only sort of enough to give me a mild buzz. I usually take 8 at once then about 2/3 hours later take another couple... Never had any sort of seizure and done this LOTS of times.

How would you suggest I take 400mg most effectively?

Thanks so much for the advice...

As for the tinnitus comment, don't think I've experienced that yet! But I'm sure my vision goes a bit sh*t whilst on it??
 
One last question, if I may, before we let this dead horse rest in peace ... the answer on this wasn't totally clear: hypothetically, if I were to take 5mg of hydrocodone every day, i understand tolerance would rise until I no longer felt the effects of the drug. But if I continued taking it anyway at the same dose, would I eventually come to a point were I had to up my dose just to not get sick with withdrawal symptoms?

This will conclude Opiates 101 for me.
 
I'm guessing that you would not actually WD if you continued to take the same dose ad-infinitum, but would end up feeling nothing apart from the relief at stopping the pain. Do you really want that kind of ball and chain? Being tied forver to your supply and any costs that would incur - unable for instance, to go on holiday without ensuring a supply, probably having to lie to conceal your use to workmates, partners and family (and the strain and isolation this causes), living in fear that your supply might be interrupted - all this for feeling nothing in the end. And of course, whilst I don't know you personally, the end result is almost always giving in to the desire to escalate use, always chasing that original feeling. And this is not to mention the various actual Mental and physical health problems already explained. Opioid addiction is definately not worth it if you're really in the position to make a choice.

Good luck though BMX, whatever you decide, but please consider the advice of those who have trodden this path before you.. each and every one of whom probably also believed that their opioid use was controlable.

Love,

Rattles
 
i against i said:
any info on the cause? not the foil apparently
Click to expand...

I heard that another reason why the foil has been discounted as the cause of Leukoencephalopathy is because a few people who didn't smoke their heroin off foil seemed to get it as well and it hasn't been found in people who smoked other drugs off foil. No one understands exactly what causes it. It is a problem where I live so the local universities were studying it and they couldn't determine a cause, like whether the cause was the heroin itself, something it was cut with, something it was contaminated with (like a prion) or something to do with the method of smoking. It has only appeared in users who smoked heroin, so users around here are actually encouraged that injection is a safer ROA. Several in-depth studies have been unable to determine the toxicological cause, so some people have suspected it is something to do with inhaling heroin, and not a particular cut. But who knows. It does seem to be more prevalent in specific areas. I had 2 friends who got it, were in comas for a very long time and never fully recovered. I have heard of a number of other people who got it.
 
Seriously? Dont you realize that millions of people have been trying to do this since the begining of time. Of course the pills will mislead you in the begining, she will grab you like a sexy young flirt and seduce you into her until one day you will realize you are just another mindless drone that is chained to a master and she no longer provides you any enjoyment, just pain and suffering all you will care for is when and how to get your next dose but heres the irony, the next dose will not even get you high it will be just to keep you normal. The reason there are rehabs and clinics and so much research has been done in addiction is because of people like you that beleive they can master it and use drugs as a tool...no offense but thats not possible move along please before she gets her claws too deep into you.
 
there not bad for you in the sense that they wont make you die young (unless you OD) but the highs are followed by even extreme lows
 
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