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Need some help with Suboxone taper schedule

J

jigsawpuzzlepiece

Bluelighter
Joined
Jul 30, 2008
Messages
242
Location
Richmond
Hey TDS,
Brief recap I ended a nasty 2-week long heroin binge that left me financially and emotionally devastated and finally said enough is enough. Got up, ditched all my using friends and connects, ditched my phone, etc. got some subs. I've been recording my progress the whole way. I have a super fast metabolism so at first I was dosing twice a day, approx 12 hrs apart. All doses were taken under the tongue. Unfortunately the doses aren't super accurate so I use the ~ symbol a lot, I had to crush up 8mg tabs and eyeball them into piles as best I could. I wish I could have gotten 2mg ones that would have been easier to dose down to my level but beggars can't be choosers.

Sept 6 5:30pm 4mg
Sept 7 11:15am 2mg
Sept 7 7:30pm 1mg
Sept 8 <1mg
Sept 8 <1mg
Sept 9 ~1mg
Sept 9 ~.5mg
Sept 10 .5mg
Sept 10 .25mg
Sept 11 .25mg
Sept 11 .25mg
--switch to once a day--
Sept 12 <.25mg
Sept 13 ~.25mg
Sept 14 ~.2mg
Sept 15 .125mg (this doesn't appear to be holding me as well as I'd like but I'm going to wait a while longer)

Do I need to start slowing down my taper now that I'm so low? I thought at this point I'd be able to just jump off painlessly but I wake up every morning and seem to be experiencing the onset of W/Ds (albeit super mild compared to the heroin Wds I am used to, I am being a bit of a wimp about it because I have to work all week and can't even take the slightest W/d symptoms while I'm at work).

Can somebody with more experience help me write up the rest of my taper? I had hoped to quit taking sub altogether by now but as long as I continue to go down (and I'm only dosing once a day) I figure it will be OK.

Should I abandon the idea that this taper is going to get me off the hook completely with w/ds? If I'm going to have to man up and take a week or so of mild symptoms I can do it I just need to get a little time off work :(
 
jigsawpuzzlepiece said:
Should I abandon the idea that this taper is going to get me off the hook completely with w/ds? If I'm going to have to man up and take a week or so of mild symptoms I can do it I just need to get a little time off work :(
Click to expand...

You've done a great job so far... Very good taper to a tiny dose. I feel your pain through experience, but I think you should expect to have to go thru some wd without the help of benzos, which would be dangerous IMO... Take comfort in knowing that you'll have significantly milder wd for a much shorter duration.

Work doesn't help wd at all! IME I would always be way more anxious and way more agitated and sick @ work while wd ing. But laying around gets old fast as well, it's a lose/lose as far as I'm concerned.

Wait a while longer @ .125 and you should eventually stabilize there. Then you'r going to have to find a convenient time to jump off, when work will be less stressful or you can take some sick/vacation time.

I wish I had a better answer for you
 
Ya, echoed that you're doing a good job. Both in your decision to get off of it, and your ability to follow the taper. I do think you're pacing the taper a bit quick, especially at the start - not exactly a consistent decreasing of your dosage. With that said, I agree with the above. Wait at .125 until you are stabilized and not waking up feeling bad anymore. It will happen, but it might take a week or two. And then go for the finish line. It probably won't be all that much worse than when you first hit .125 and felt sick.

If you do feel sick, just try to stay hydrated and get some nutrition, and keep telling yourself that you're in no real danger and that it will be better in a week or two (the truth).

Good luck, and let us know if you have any further questions.
 
Thanks both. I did have to supplant the .125 dose with a little bit more (approx .zero eight) but I feel fairly stable now. I will do my best to keep at this dose until I can get a week off work, I think that will be sufficient.

Would you guys recommend doing something like this if possible:

Monday .125
Tues nothing
Weds .125
Thurs nothing
Friday .125
Sat nothing
Sun nothing
Monday .125

etc. when I decide to go off completely? The good news is I have plenty of sub especially since I'm at such a ridiculously low dose so I can continue this as long as necessary.

I'm kind of obsessing over getting completely clean but I know I need to calm down and realize this is going to take some time. I was addicted to heroin for over a year more or less.

Pretty much anything is better than going back to where I was before I decided to quit, and being on .25-.125mg of sub a day is not bad by comparison.
 
^ You could try that on-off thing once you've stabilized at .125. It might work for you, but then again it might not. When you're dealing with such small doses, it's less about making a plan that is physically safe, and more about one that's psychologically appropriate. There's really no harm trying it out, because you can always jump back onto the daily .125 if you feel like it's too much of a little roller coaster.

And I understand about wanting to be sober ASAP. I was like that on my last benzo detox, and learned the hard way that sometimes you just got to suck it up and taper slowly. At the end of the day, you need to take care of yourself. Getting off of drugs isn't a place where it's appropriate to try and be a hero, but instead you want to be a smart and consistent person. The guilt should have significantly dropped the day you reached for help through Suboxone. That's what you should be proud of. This taper stuff is just like "paperwork," if you see what I'm getting at.
 
Yes I do thanks for the great advice. I just needed to hear it from a couple people who have been through it. I'm afraid my metabolism is so fast that I won't be able to do the 1 day on, 1 day off thing but we'll see once I've stabilized. Much appreciated.

I think I got what I came for and needed to hear, you can close this thread if you like unless you think it will be valuable to somebody else.
 
Unless you specifically ask me to close it, I'd like to leave it open, so you can come back and update us within it on your progress. So many of the detox/tapering cases just kind of vanish in TDS and we never get to hear if the people turned out okay or not. So I suggest you use this thread to update us periodically on your progress.
 
Well I didn't expect to have an update so quickly. So yesterday I took about .2mg of sub at 10:30am. I woke up this morning feeling surprisingly good (albeit hungover from drinking a lil much last night) but no real w/d symptoms to speak of except for some minor psychosomatic stuff. Nonetheless I took .125mg because I was craving and worrying about something unrelated that I don't need to go into on here. I also had to go to work so I figured I might as well take some so I'll surely be ok.

But I also took 1200mg of gabapentin (neurontin) and I feel fantastic like almost a little high. Reminds me of a weird benzo or something. Best of all I no longer feel like I'm on the verge of w/d like I felt the past few days. But this worries me because I don't know too much about this drug, am I hurting myself by taking something like this? I would appreciate some input... I've heard of neurontin being used by meth addicts to cut the w/ds and it has also been indicated for painkiller addicts as well so I figured what the hell? I'll give it a shot.
 
Glad to hear that you are feeling better! Good for taking the .125mg, as you ideally want to be "feeling better" for a week or so consistently before you can acknowledge that your body has adapted to the lower dose.

I take gabapentin as well and love it. It's not a benzo, but in terms of brain chemistry, it acts kind of similar to one. Much more so than a lot of other drugs scripted for similar reasons. And it's not all that habit-forming, so you're good with that. It's often scripted for people tapering off of benzos, but I could understand it helping with other drug tapers as well. Don't worry about it being dangerous; it's not really dangerous, especially at the dose you are taking (some pain patients take upwards of 4000mg/day).

Bluelight has a Gabapentin FAQ Thread here. I'd definately check it out!
 
Redleader you fuckin rock thanks so much for all the great advice. I'm relieved to hear gabapentin is relatively safe, I have a decent amount and I'm actually excited about going to work tomorrow because I felt so normal today.

I've read the FAQ - I'm just concerned that the effects will diminish if I take the same dose tomorrow as people are saying its kind of a 1 time a month type of thing. What do you think?
 
It's hard for me to say, because I never got anything quite like a "high" from gabapentin. But for those who do, it does seem to be something where you'd need to use about as (in)frequently as benzos if you want to feel recreational value. So once every 5-7 days.

Your body will develop a bit of a tolerance for it. That, and because the high is so subtle, you'll just not notice it anymore after a bit. Not because it's not there, but because lighter highs are easier to psychologically adapt to. Kind of like how people who take benzos daily wouldn't describe it as a "high," as opposed to more of a "therapy." Now it's tolerance does not grow as fast as a lot of other drugs, but I'd use it no more than once a week if you want to use it as a recreational (here, you could increase your dose), no more than 2-3 times a week if you don't want your tolerance to grow, and daily's not the best idea.

I use gabapentin as a sleep aid. 900-1200mgs of the stuff dosen't knock me out, but it allows me to feel more calm and handle the hour or two before bed a lot better - the transition into sleepytime mode is a lot smoother with it. And also, since I've gone from a full-out benzo addict to now using a small dose of a gentle benzo every other day (trying to get off in a month or two completely), I'll use gabapentin on the days I am not taking a benzo to "take the edge off."

It really is an underrated drug, in my opinion. It's got a lot of bad press recently - for a small minority, it can cause extreme emotional outbursts and anger. And that, taken together with the fact that it's still a very speculative drug in current research (both in what it is best used to treat, and also actually how it affects the brain), makes it less-popular. But in my opinion, given that it's similar to benzos for a lot and does NOT carry the addictive danger, I'm all for it.
 
i too have just started trying to self detox and its so hellish for me. i had about a 5-6 bag (when conserving) to a 12-15 bag (when money was good) a day habit. i sniffed all my dope. before that i was all into oxys then end of april discovered dope and that was pretty much it for me til now. here and there id get some oxys when i couldnt get d. yeah i know my habit isnt that long and its not that bad but the w/ds have just been killing me. when i ran outta dope tues, weds i went and got a blue with i did around 430 which did almost nothing obviously but keep me from taking my subs so i was up all night restless with some chills and sweats but afraid to take my sub til about 8am. yesterday i took about 2mgs suboxone (didnt feel great but i was afraid to do more because i really want to avoid w'ds from it and i only have about 16 mgs left) and at night i took .5 kpin. i'm picking up some xannies later to help with anxiety and to help me sleep at night. i brought my girl to detox monday and she was the one i had here for me and helped me. now my head races about all the runs we did and going down and getting it and just the whole process. its killing me. i just want my life back. now i have no one. so i was wondering what doses should i be taking to avoid being sick at all costs while weaning off the shit? i'm just scared and i have to be okay and get thru this with the least pain possible.
 
Fortunately, I haven't yet gone to the needle. In my area of FL, Blue's (or Roxicet 15 & 30's) are the primary opiate of choice and supply. I was never a "painkiller" guy, though I had tried them several times, I was more an occasional MDMA, mushroom, coke, and almost daily weed smoker. I never understood the allure to painkillers, which were taking over my town until it was too late. After having surgery with some post op. issues I was put on Percocet with scripts renewed by all the doctors I would see in my quest to diagnose what so many other doctors could not...yet here's something to help with the pain and good luck. It was around that time that a friend of mine with a more serious condition had a large script of 30mg Roxicets - basically fast-acting oxycodone, and the on and off four year+ love affair was born. However, being someone who never likes to be dictated how to live especially by a drug...one that was killing friends and people I knew no less, I sought treatment on my mild 3-5 a day habit (90-150mg). I was put on Suboxone over which time I had a lot of stress in my life. The doctors were persistent to keep me on a low dose (2mg/day- according to them this was a low dose) and after nearly six months I made the overture to be weaned off the suboxone and return to life opiate free. WHAT THE DOCTORS DID NOT TELL ME....never was I made aware that the one-two weeks of hell I was facing was simply traded for literally two months of modest misery. To this day, I'm not sure which is worse...the intense hell that is cold turkey oxycodone withdrawal or the slow torture and false perception of being of clean while a month or more of tolerable but horrible withdrawals are felt from being on suboxone "too long". There is great debate about this subject as many feel while you are on suboxone you cravings are curbed and you can live a normal life....that and the longer you are on suboxone the longer the doctors profit. That said, it was partially this month long misery that led to my relapse. And ironically my 90mg a day habit turned into the minimum dose to have even a hint of pleasurable effects. So at three - four times a day my relapse had me taking up to 360mg just to feel "normal". There was a time in-between where I had purchased Subs to detox and I am in that period again (I hope for the last time)... it is my strong opinion that one should start off with the minimum amount of suboxone needed to take one out of withdrawal. (First be sure to be at least 12hr pref 24hrs since your last dose of oxycodone before you begin the suboxone...that important..too soon could send you into precipitated withdrawals, no fun & no way out for about 12hrs). Now each preceding day, noting what you took the day before, try to take less...really the least amount you need to feel not great but not bad. The ultimate goal is a personal one, but I feel it should be to get off of the suboxone ASAP. I have done this as have others over a week (a few even less) starting with as high as 16mg and quickly dropping 2-4mg each day until you are finished. Leave a little suboxone left and wait at least three days for it to exit your system to know that you are in the clear. Recently an anti-nausea drug called Ondansetron (Zofran) has been studied and the results claim that this non-narcotic, safe drug, is being claimed to help with withdrawal symptoms. I'm not sure if it could take the place of a full opiate detox drug such as suboxone but surely it could aid in the process from suboxone to nothing. The ideas listed here are just my opinions based on what has worked for me and maybe what may work for you, hopefully. Please research on your own further to determine your own conclusion. Good Luck!!
 
jigsawpuzzlepiece said:
Hey TDS,
Brief recap I ended a nasty 2-week long heroin binge that left me financially and emotionally devastated and finally said enough is enough. Got up, ditched all my using friends and connects, ditched my phone, etc. got some subs. I've been recording my progress the whole way. I have a super fast metabolism so at first I was dosing twice a day, approx 12 hrs apart. All doses were taken under the tongue. Unfortunately the doses aren't super accurate so I use the ~ symbol a lot, I had to crush up 8mg tabs and eyeball them into piles as best I could. I wish I could have gotten 2mg ones that would have been easier to dose down to my level but beggars can't be choosers.

Sept 6 5:30pm 4mg
Sept 7 11:15am 2mg
Sept 7 7:30pm 1mg
Sept 8 <1mg
Sept 8 <1mg
Sept 9 ~1mg
Sept 9 ~.5mg
Sept 10 .5mg
Sept 10 .25mg
Sept 11 .25mg
Sept 11 .25mg
--switch to once a day--
Sept 12 <.25mg
Sept 13 ~.25mg
Sept 14 ~.2mg
Sept 15 .125mg (this doesn't appear to be holding me as well as I'd like but I'm going to wait a while longer)

Do I need to start slowing down my taper now that I'm so low? I thought at this point I'd be able to just jump off painlessly but I wake up every morning and seem to be experiencing the onset of W/Ds (albeit super mild compared to the heroin Wds I am used to, I am being a bit of a wimp about it because I have to work all week and can't even take the slightest W/d symptoms while I'm at work).

Can somebody with more experience help me write up the rest of my taper? I had hoped to quit taking sub altogether by now but as long as I continue to go down (and I'm only dosing once a day) I figure it will be OK.

Should I abandon the idea that this taper is going to get me off the hook completely with w/ds? If I'm going to have to man up and take a week or so of mild symptoms I can do it I just need to get a little time off work :(
Click to expand...

Look you are at a perfect dose right now you do NOT need to drop any lower. If you're taking the sub sublingually you will barely have any wds jumping off .25mg.

Also, if you need to standardize your sub with vodka and put into liquid solution. Thats how I did it when I tapered. I put like 1-8mg sub in 16ml of vodka, then every 1ml had exactly .50mg. .5ml = .25mg, .25ml = .125mg. You can use a syringe to measure anything less than a ml.

I notice when I was doing crumbs I felt a lot shittier because when you get low like you're at now your body is way more sensitive to variations in the dose. Also take your you dose the same way everytime. Don't brush your teeth one day and take your sub then the following day eat a meal and take your sub. You will have different amounts absorbing which is why I always brushed my teeth/tounge prior to dosing. It makes it more consistent imo.
So I'd recommend standardizing the sub, standardizing how you take it as much as possible, and you don't have to drop any lower.

What you DO need to do however is stay at at least .25mg for 2 weeks minimum. Theres no need to just keep tapering and tapering imo. All I know is when I came off at .25 I felt fine and had no wds. I basically went straight into the paws phase about a week after I stopped dosing.

And my taper was pretty similar to yours with the drops, just that once I hit .25mg I stopped tapering and just stayed there for a couple weeks. And after that I was in the clear in terms of acute wds.

You are doing great imo and you are already low enough. You just need like 2 more weeks at that dose. Its not about getting as low as you can as much as its about STAYING at a low dose for long enough. Thats just what I've learned from experience. G/luck and keep us updated. Its really not hard at all to taper off sub, its just the paws and how bad your habit was that will determine what kind of paws you face.
 
That is a quick taper if you ask me. 4mg to .125mg in 9 days. Like Bo mentioned above I would stabilize on .125mgs for at least a week. Than hop off and it shouldn't be a problem. On second thought after looking back on your post you only used heroin for 2 weeks. Just hop off now and deal with it. Truthfully it probably wont get much better [easier?] if you stabilize. If you really want to avoid most w/d take some tramadol for a few days after stopping the bupe. Than medicate w/d symptoms with benzos/clonidine/sleepers.

peace.
seedless
 
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