If I was able to come off opiates for a while, how long does it take for the side effects to go away completely? Like how long would I have to stay off it to find out if my fatigue and memory issues I've been having are due to the bupe, or something else?
Background is that I'm a long-term medical opioid user; been on bupe patch (20mcg) since 2007 plus other meds for breakthrough pain (first oxy, then more bupe since oxy doesn't work much combined with bupe). I've only ever used medical-grade opioids, so side effects of street drugs aren't a concern; just how long the bupe would take to totally clear from my system so I could find out what I'm like without them now.
I'm not sure if I'll be able to come off them but I'm curious about how long I'd have to stay off them to know. I talked to a nurse about it yesterday, and it seems that because the pain I have is more like cancer pain than other chronic pain (though I don't have cancer, thankfully), my perception that I'm more functional on bupe than off it is probably accurate... but would be kinda nice to know for sure!
Background is that I'm a long-term medical opioid user; been on bupe patch (20mcg) since 2007 plus other meds for breakthrough pain (first oxy, then more bupe since oxy doesn't work much combined with bupe). I've only ever used medical-grade opioids, so side effects of street drugs aren't a concern; just how long the bupe would take to totally clear from my system so I could find out what I'm like without them now.
I'm not sure if I'll be able to come off them but I'm curious about how long I'd have to stay off them to know. I talked to a nurse about it yesterday, and it seems that because the pain I have is more like cancer pain than other chronic pain (though I don't have cancer, thankfully), my perception that I'm more functional on bupe than off it is probably accurate... but would be kinda nice to know for sure!
