Would it be possible to become dependent of buprenorphine, methadone, diazepam, or other dependence-forming drugs with long half lives by dosing them less than daily? For instance, if you were to take buprenorphine twice a week, how many weeks would it take to develop dependence? I have the same question with respect to benzos. Also, how severe does benzo dependence have to be before cold turkey becomes too unsafe to attempt?
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BDD Moderators: Keif’ Richards
Developing Physical Dependence to Long Acting (long half life) Substances
- Thread starter DroneLore
- Start date
Yes, physical dependence can form with certain substances even if you aren't dosing them daily, absolutely. With respect to benzo dependence in general (however it is attained), any cold turkey is really frowned upon in the interests of harm reduction. People's responses to discontinuing benzos really vary from person to person, so you always want to be on the safe side. Any benzo dependence is generally advised to be discontinued with a taper, if it is a slight dependence, the taper doesn't neccessarily have to be long. It varies from dependence to dependence.
In the longer term its unlikely your going to keep to dosing twice a week, I'm sure some people manage it and they have my greatest respect as I am not able to deal with substance this way at all. Benzos are likely to creep up on you and before yo know it you've got a habit and its getting bigger, its the tapering that is the worst part IMO, I can give most stuff up, as I have in the past and just go CT and face it down, you dont really have that choice with benzos unless you want to risk seizures which could result in injury and could also lead to exposing you drug issue to people you don't want to know about it.
Given the chance again I would go anywhere near a benzo, but I don't have that choice so continue to struggle to rid myself of the habit
Given the chance again I would go anywhere near a benzo, but I don't have that choice so continue to struggle to rid myself of the habit
Let's assume the 2x a week schedule is kept though, in an ideal world. How long would it take to develop dependence? Also, is there any reason to worry about w/ding from benzos but not knowing about it until you start seizing? It will be pretty obvious if you're withdrawing from benzos, right?
I would start here, its been posted numerous times but for good reason, if you still have unanswered questions after reading it then come back,
http://www.benzo.org.uk/manual/
I'm not sure its really possible to give an answer, if I were taking twice a week and in relatively low doses (20mgs or less per dose) for more than 6 months I'd still go to one dose a week for a month then half that dose for another month just to be on the safe side and avoid any unpleasant WDS like rebound anxiety.
http://www.benzo.org.uk/manual/
I'm not sure its really possible to give an answer, if I were taking twice a week and in relatively low doses (20mgs or less per dose) for more than 6 months I'd still go to one dose a week for a month then half that dose for another month just to be on the safe side and avoid any unpleasant WDS like rebound anxiety.
Sepher
Bluelight Crew
Certainly taking something like methadone even twice a week if you're a slow metaboliser could easily cause tolerance and addiction to develop because you'd never be fully eliminating it from the body allowing it to recover. There'd potentially be sufficient levels continuously in your system to have an effect on receptors and endorphin production to the point of causing withdrawal when you stop using with high enough, frequent enough repeat doses for sure. How much and how long that would take is difficult to say as it's very much down to the individual, genetic factors that determine individual metabolism and opiate sensitivity I'm sure playing a major role in that.