Opioids Did I just relapse?

[Wolfmans_BrothEr]

Last night was day 7 of bupe w.d and I buckled down and took 70mg of loperamide. I jus couldn't take the RLS. since lope is absorbed through the stomach did I technically relapse?

 

[DrapedUpDopedOut]

Aren't these types of threads not allowed? How are we supposed to know if you "relapsed". That is up to your own discretion and nobody can tell you whether you did something that affected you physiologically/psychologically. If you think you did, then you did. If you think you did not, then you did not.

 

[mcgrCONTIN]

Well, if you were on buprenorphine in order to get off of opiates, hadn't used them in a week, and then decided that you couldnt handle the withdrawal and took an opiate other than a maintenence one (suboxone, subutex, methadone, etc), I'm pretty sure most would agree that that constitutes a relapse.

 

[woamotive]

Hmmm this is a tough one. As said above, this one is up to you to answer. If you took it as an opiate (because it's all that was around and you needed it's opiate related properties - then I guess 'yes' it was a relapse), but if you took it as 'lopermide' unrelated to your opiate addiction - then 'no.

*Wow, that was really hard to put into words. To sum it up, I would just say, 'try to put it behind you. Don't obsess over it, just reflect a bit about why you took it (not just the superficial reasonings) - mental, emotional, physical reasons?

 

[Wolfmans_BrothEr]

I never took lope during my opiate addiction, ive only recently found out about it. I guess I could see what your saying about it being my decision whether I relapsed or not but I mean if a recovering heroin addict did dope or oxy and didn't call it a relapse that's bullshit, it's a relapse

And plus plenty of people abuse maintenance meds, and so if they dose while trying get clean, maintenance meds or not, they took the drug they were abusing. To me, and everyone I know who knows about addiction constitutes that as a relapse

The only reason I'm questioning the lope is b.c it doesn't go thru the brain like other opiates, but the stomach and I've read it doesn't constitute an official opiate/opioid

 

[woamotive]

Yeah yeah, I know why you are having a hard time categorizing. That's why I'd say - just call it a minor slip up. Clearly it messes with your mind ('guilt', etc) so - just tell yourself it happened, try not to deal with the RLS the same way again. Toss your lopermide and try to stretch the crap out of your body a couple times a day.

 

[Wolfmans_BrothEr]

^tru, I was also stressin whether I'm gonna have to deal with more w.d since I took that lope last night, but I guess if it's not a full opioid and I only dosed last night I guess I shud be alright

 

[anterrabae]

In my opinion, I'd say it was simply a method of dealing with withdrawals. It's not like you took it to get high, right? Lopermide is very commonly used to deal with opiate withdrawal, and much less commonly, as I've seen in this forum, as a method to get high.

 

[Cane2theLeft]

^tru, I was also stressin whether I'm gonna have to deal with more w.d since I took that lope last night, but I guess if it's not a full opioid and I only dosed last night I guess I shud be alright

It IS a full (agonist) opioid. At therapeutic doses which are usually around 2-6mg, it doesn't appreciably cross the BBB so it doesn't produce central effects such as sedation, analgesia, etc. and it only produces the GI effects (constipation primarily).

At massive doses such as 70mg and even much less for most, enough crosses the BBB and isn't exported back by P-glycoprotein that it produces the full spectrum of central opioid effects.

In the addiction treatment field, we use relapse to mean when a person who has spent some time in recovery goes back to their old life of using again. Even brief, time-limited use is considered a slip and not a relapse (some call it a lapse).

Whether you want to term it a 'relapse' or not is really irrelevant and there are too many variables involved for us to know if you're going to have worse withdrawals as a result, etc. so others were right - these types of threads aren't allowed.

If the withdrawals are that bad, perhaps try taking just enough of the loperamide to make it bearable and then dose 1-2mg less per day. It has a long half-life so I've found it suitable for single daily administration. If you have any questions about this or the closure, feel free to PM me and if you'd like more perspectives on ways to manage withdrawals, check the directory or search around

I hope you feel better soon!