Methadone: Guest dose horror stories?

[Deinonychus]

Hey there! Long time bluelighter here, wanted to start fresh since I lost/forgot my passwords to both my account and the email address it was linked to. Anyway without further ado:

I am a daily opioid user, have been for almost a decade. Since I quit doing dope I have been registered at one methadone clinic or another for anywhere from a few weeks to nearly a year in one case. I have twice gone on vacation for week-long periods while registered to and participating in methadone programs in my area. Once was to the east coast and went perfectly smoothly. The other however was to the west coast and was a total and complete disaster.

I left via plane on a Friday in the early morning. I had dosed at the clinic I was attending at about 5 AM before I went to the airport. I arrived at my destination the same day, and was supposed to go to the clinic I'd be guest dosing at on the following day, Saturday, to do the intake etc. so, I get there Saturday at roughly 11 Pacific time... and they had no idea who I was, had no guest dose papers for me or anybody else at the time, etc, even though I had watched my counselor at the clinic in my hometown fax them. So I called my clinic... and they were closed! Oops, forgot about the time difference, right? This was bad, because I had dosed very early the day I left on the plane to my destination, and due to the time difference my normal clinic was closed and thus couldn't re-fax he papers.

Worse, it was a Saturday, and thus I would not get dosed that day, nor Sunday, which would have been a 'take home' dose from the guest dose clinic. And to top it off, Monday was a federal holiday, meaning it would have been a second take home dose! So I ended up having to scour the city I had flown to for dope to stay well. Luckily I found it, and so I didn't had to last three days without either methadone or dope/other opioids, and got it cleared up that Tuesday when I went in to the guest dose clinic really early pacific time to ensure my clinic, on central time, would still be open and could re-fax the necessary documents.

Anyway, I was just curious if anybody else had ever experienced any clusterfucks like that with guest dosing at clinics while on vacation. I have never personally heard any stories about things like this happening, even though it was a long time ago and I've been on methadone ever since and have asked other people that go to my current clinic if they have experienced or heard of similar bullshit going down.

So has anybody else been in a similar position? Or is this case potentially just a one in a million accident (absence of evidence =/= evidence of absence etc)?

 

[Znegative]

Didn't have the time to read this yet, but would love to soon. Gonna transfer to drug culture.

 

[Deinonychus]

Yeah it is a subject that's rather well-perched on the borderline between OD and DC. It'll probably get more attention here too, so thanks for the move!

 

[pbuilder]

Never experienced it myself but a funny story anyways . I though meth clinics drug test you, but I guess a temporary one just while on vacation wouldn't. Do meth clinics not offer take out doses for events like vacations ? Seems to me faxing all that shit to another methadone clinic would be much more of a annoyance then giving the patient a weeks worth take out. I mean even in ur case, u got fucked outta ur maintenance dose for 3-4 days n hada score on the street of a random city cuz of a fuck up. Potentially putting ur patient in a situation where they wud be sick for 3-4 days and are basically forced to score street dope doesn't really make sense over simply just giving the patient a weeks worth for take out...

 

[Deinonychus]

They're really touchy about giving maintainence doses here in the Chi, depending on the clinic you need to test clean for up to three months to get a single day of extra maintainence besides Sundays and holidays. That's not the hardest barrier to getting more take-home doses though, for me the hardest part is that you can't miss any days either, and missing a day a month is probably average for me, just cause life's chaotic and sometimes I'll get there late and miss a day or be stupid and accidentally sleep too late.

I get their reasons for being tough about getting take-home doses: meth clinics here are notorious as basically open air pharmaceutical markets (outside the front door, not inside) and they don't want people selling doses like nuts. That said for vacations, where you're going to a strange city where you have no connects, it would be super awesome to be able to get a full maintainence package instead of guest dosing, just cause its a hassle and a half getting to a clinic and getting the intake done at a weird clinic in a new city.