Oxy to PST

[Camellia]

Hey guys. New poster... sorry if wrong thread. Am in NSW.

I developed an oxy habit of about 240mg/day and a concordant love of Scotch. About a bottle a day or sometimes more. Think blackouts, memory loss, narcolepsy, etc. Amazingly work/home life did not suffer. I work outdoors and I am able to work high and my partner likes the odd pill too.

Anyways the oxy supply ran out and the booze made me fat. I have kicked the booze with gabapentin and replaced the oxy with PST. Not great and quite messy but it's saving a lot of money. Only problem is the high is quite 'dirty' and a little soporific.

Anyway nice to meet you all and if anyone is in a similar place be nice to chat.

 

[jasperkent]

Welcome to BlueLight!
✌ ❤

 

[Eligiu]

Hey guys. New poster... sorry if wrong thread. Am in NSW.

I developed an oxy habit of about 240mg/day and a concordant love of Scotch. About a bottle a day or sometimes more. Think blackouts, memory loss, narcolepsy, etc. Amazingly work/home life did not suffer. I work outdoors and I am able to work high and my partner likes the odd pill too.

Anyways the oxy supply ran out and the booze made me fat. I have kicked the booze with gabapentin and replaced the oxy with PST. Not great and quite messy but it's saving a lot of money. Only problem is the high is quite 'dirty' and a little soporific.

Anyway nice to meet you all and if anyone is in a similar place be nice to chat.

I would suggest you stop taking poppy seed tea as soon as you can before you end up addicted to it. It is basically one of the hardest opiates to come off because all of the different metabolites and alkaloids are very, very long acting. You will eventually find that you are unable to get through the withdrawal because it lasts for upwards of 20 days and that is in high levels of discomfort.

Poppy seed tea is also a very dangerous drug to dose because there is no possible way to standardise your dosage day to day or batch to batch. It's wildly inconsistent, which also makes tapering off it completely impossible, and you will eventually find you drink some batches which do nothing for you while others knock your socks off. I've actually had to Narcan myself a few times due to poppy seed tea doses being too strong (granted I was also using close to 1.5kg of seeds at a time).

I ended up on Buprenorphine maintenance therapy twice due to poppy seed tea. I wasn't able to kick it. I'd get to day 4 or 5 and be in such extreme discomfort and know I wouldn't be able to make it through until day 20+. Poppy seed tea made my opiate tolerance so high that when I bought a couple of points of heroin off the dark web in June last year after having used since about March every second day or so, the couple of points basically did nothing for me.

When I went to DASSA (drug and alcohol services south Australia) to start tapering off suboxone in 2021 January and they asked me what opiate I'd been taking, I told them poppy seed tea. They had no idea what it was and I had to explain it. When I went back by June or July and said I'd used heroin but mainly been on poppy seed tea they said it was quickly becoming a big problem in Adelaide.

And its the truth, I walk across the train tracks sometimes out in the suburbs and I see bottles of poppy seeds which have had the water drained out of them, plus between march- June 2021 it was way harder to find the seeds in supermarkets than it was early 2020.

I know it sounds like it is a convenient drug now, and cheap, but I seriously want to warn you about the risks of this substance.

 

[jasperkent]

The Sun Magazine | Tea Time | By Alan Craig | Issue 514

At 3 AM my eyes snap open. It’s been about fifteen hours since my last fix, and I’m already edging into withdrawal. With a sigh I get out

www.thesunmagazine.org

Edit-- Incidentally, The Sun (not to be confused with the British tabloid) is an excellent magazine, printed monthly in Chapel Hill, NC. Fiction, nonfiction, b&w photography, and NO ADS. I've subscribed for 6 years)

 

[lonelyDude]

I would suggest you stop taking poppy seed tea as soon as you can before you end up addicted to it. It is basically one of the hardest opiates to come off because all of the different metabolites and alkaloids are very, very long acting. You will eventually find that you are unable to get through the withdrawal because it lasts for upwards of 20 days and that is in high levels of discomfort.

Poppy seed tea is also a very dangerous drug to dose because there is no possible way to standardise your dosage day to day or batch to batch. It's wildly inconsistent, which also makes tapering off it completely impossible, and you will eventually find you drink some batches which do nothing for you while others knock your socks off. I've actually had to Narcan myself a few times due to poppy seed tea doses being too strong (granted I was also using close to 1.5kg of seeds at a time).

I ended up on Buprenorphine maintenance therapy twice due to poppy seed tea. I wasn't able to kick it. I'd get to day 4 or 5 and be in such extreme discomfort and know I wouldn't be able to make it through until day 20+. Poppy seed tea made my opiate tolerance so high that when I bought a couple of points of heroin off the dark web in June last year after having used since about March every second day or so, the couple of points basically did nothing for me.

When I went to DASSA (drug and alcohol services south Australia) to start tapering off suboxone in 2021 January and they asked me what opiate I'd been taking, I told them poppy seed tea. They had no idea what it was and I had to explain it. When I went back by June or July and said I'd used heroin but mainly been on poppy seed tea they said it was quickly becoming a big problem in Adelaide.

And its the truth, I walk across the train tracks sometimes out in the suburbs and I see bottles of poppy seeds which have had the water drained out of them, plus between march- June 2021 it was way harder to find the seeds in supermarkets than it was early 2020.

I know it sounds like it is a convenient drug now, and cheap, but I seriously want to warn you about the risks of this substance.

I second this you will wish you were back withdrawing from oxy if you hit the pst too much.

 

[Eligiu]

I second this you will wish you were back withdrawing from oxy if you hit the pst too much.

Man I really wish people understood the dangers they get themselves into with certain substances because PST really isn't one to fuck around with. Once it's got you, it's got you and you're gone.

 

[negrogesic]

Welcome to bluelight!

I didn't know one could reliably obtain 240mg/day of oxycodone in Australia for long enough to develop a habit.

Poppy seed tea is like nature's version of methadone, and with a similarly nasty withdrawal syndrome. The problem is that the inconsistency and side-effect profile of PST makes it a relatively poor choice for maintenance therapy.

It sounds as if you are essentially wedded to opioids for the time being, so perhaps you might be better off skipping a few steps and going directly on methadone? Feels better than poppy seed too.

When I went to DASSA (drug and alcohol services south Australia) to start tapering off suboxone in 2021 January and they asked me what opiate I'd been taking, I told them poppy seed tea. They had no idea what it was and I had to explain it. When I went back by June or July and said I'd used heroin but mainly been on poppy seed tea they said it was quickly becoming a big problem in Adelaide.

Funny enough, as an American long-term visitor to Australia, I used to go to a DASSA run methadone clinic in Adelaide called Waranilla. It was a neat place, being in a large, very old home in an old historical part of town (was called Norwood, or Norwolk maybe). The street was lined with trees and large old houses, probably built by the wealthy and political elite of the 1850s.

Unfortunately they were unable to match what I was being prescribed in the US (380mg/day) and I was forced to drop to the maximum allowed dose (180mg/day). I suppose that's one example of the limitations of socialized medicine: inflexibility. Granted they charged me next to nothing, but it was rough. They could have at least given me a quick taper from 380mg to 180mg, but again, they seemed to be constrained by the bureaucratic guidelines

 

[Eligiu]

Welcome to bluelight!

I didn't know one could reliably obtain 240mg/day of oxycodone in Australia for long enough to develop a habit.

Poppy seed tea is like nature's version of methadone, and with a similarly nasty withdrawal syndrome. The problem is that the inconsistency and side-effect profile of PST makes it a relatively poor choice for maintenance therapy.

It sounds as if you are essentially wedded to opioids for the time being, so perhaps you might be better off skipping a few steps and going directly on methadone? Feels better than poppy seed too.



Funny enough, as an American long-term visitor to Australia, I used to go to a DASSA run methadone clinic in Adelaide called Waranilla. It was a neat place, being in a large, very old home in an old historical part of town (was called Norwood, or Norwolk maybe). The street was lined with trees and large old houses, probably built by the wealthy and political elite of the 1850s.

Unfortunately they were unable to match what I was being prescribed in the US (380mg/day) and I was forced to drop to the maximum allowed dose (180mg/day). I suppose that's one example of the limitations of socialized medicine: inflexibility. Granted they charged me next to nothing, but it was rough. They could have at least given me a quick taper from 380mg to 180mg, but again, they seemed to be constrained by the bureaucratic guidelines

You would be referring to Norwood.

I've never been on methadone so I can't speak to the maximum dosage level. I know the top dose of Suboxone is 24mg or 32mg. But I've never been on one that high.

Tbh I'd rather have socialised healthcare over the nightmare system you have in the US. My sublocade is free, I'm having surgery soon which is part covered by Medicare, my prescriptions all cost $5.60 a month. What's not to love.

 

[nznity]

You would be referring to Norwood.

I've never been on methadone so I can't speak to the maximum dosage level. I know the top dose of Suboxone is 24mg or 32mg. But I've never been on one that high.

Tbh I'd rather have socialised healthcare over the nightmare system you have in the US. My sublocade is free, I'm having surgery soon which is part covered by Medicare, my prescriptions all cost $5.60 a month. What's not to love.

Just curious, what would be the cost if you didn't have medicare?

 

[negrogesic]

Tbh I'd rather have socialised healthcare over the nightmare system you have in the US. My sublocade is free, I'm having surgery soon which is part covered by Medicare, my prescriptions all cost $5.60 a month. What's not to love.

Yeah it's better as a whole, the issues mainly arise when cases don't fit the mold.

 

[Eligiu]

Just curious, what would be the cost if you didn't have medicare?

Of surgery? Far as I know through the public system a hysterectomy is free. I have private health as well though so it's covered partially by that. I think my total cost will be something between $500-$1500.

The waiting list under public health is massive though because there's not heaps of surgeons and you need to have a 'medically necessary' reason to have the surgery. We have very backwards laws on hysterectomies here.

I couldn't say how much anything would cost without Medicare as we always have Medicare. It just always exists here. And everyone is covered by it.

 

[nznity]

Of surgery? Far as I know through the public system a hysterectomy is free. I have private health as well though so it's covered partially by that. I think my total cost will be something between $500-$1500.

The waiting list under public health is massive though because there's not heaps of surgeons and you need to have a 'medically necessary' reason to have the surgery. We have very backwards laws on hysterectomies here.

I couldn't say how much anything would cost without Medicare as we always have Medicare. It just always exists here. And everyone is covered by it.

I meant your meds, sorry for not being specific lol your sublocade

 

[Eligiu]

I meant your meds, sorry for not being specific lol your sublocade

All opiate maintenance therapy is free in Australia. Chemists choose the dispensing fee they will charge, which varies between $100-$200 per month. depending on the location of the chemist. The 4 other times I was on suboxone I paid between $100-$110 a month. This time it's free because I get dosed through DASSA at the state government drug and alcohol services.

You can either pay a week at a time, which usually is $30 or you pay one month at a time which gets you a discount. Basically the chemist has to be trained in supervised dosing so they charge a fee for that as it can only be done by certain trained chemists at each pharmacy, and they need to do all of the paperwork around making sure they have the correct number of doses, that everything is being stored in the right place, that they're counting everything. Etc etc.

So, free at some places, not free at other places.

 

[nznity]

All opiate maintenance therapy is free in Australia. Chemists choose the dispensing fee they will charge, which varies between $100-$200 per month. depending on the location of the chemist. The 4 other times I was on suboxone I paid between $100-$110 a month. This time it's free because I get dosed through DASSA at the state government drug and alcohol services.

You can either pay a week at a time, which usually is $30 or you pay one month at a time which gets you a discount. Basically the chemist has to be trained in supervised dosing so they charge a fee for that as it can only be done by certain trained chemists at each pharmacy, and they need to do all of the paperwork around making sure they have the correct number of doses, that everything is being stored in the right place, that they're counting everything. Etc etc.

So, free at some places, not free at other places.

Not entirely free really but I get it compared to paying for the actual medication is so much cheaper. Nice

 

[lonelyDude]

All opiate maintenance therapy is free in Australia. Chemists choose the dispensing fee they will charge, which varies between $100-$200 per month. depending on the location of the chemist. The 4 other times I was on suboxone I paid between $100-$110 a month. This time it's free because I get dosed through DASSA at the state government drug and alcohol services.

You can either pay a week at a time, which usually is $30 or you pay one month at a time which gets you a discount. Basically the chemist has to be trained in supervised dosing so they charge a fee for that as it can only be done by certain trained chemists at each pharmacy, and they need to do all of the paperwork around making sure they have the correct number of doses, that everything is being stored in the right place, that they're counting everything. Etc etc.

So, free at some places, not free at other places.

junky guard training.

really we need our own drug discrimination act.

 

[Eligiu]

Not entirely free really but I get it compared to paying for the actual medication is so much cheaper. Nice

No, the medication itself is free on the pharmaceutical benefits scheme. It is totally free, which is why if you get dosed at a government drug and alcohol site you don't have to pay.

You are paying the chemist to dispense it to you when you pick it up from a pharmacy in other cases.

 

[lonelyDude]

which equates to them putting it in a cup and giving it to you just like everything else they do at the pharmacy.

really it was a way to shut pharmacists up and get them to take on clientele as the stigma of having "junkies" at there pharmacy might effect there business.

 

[Camellia]

I know you aren't allowed to discuss sourcing, but the seeds I use are highly available and not very potent. Three bags in a drink bottle is the norm.

Could someone reliably tell me what methadone is actually like? I've always just been told that it's the opiate that doesn't make you high. Are we being misled? Do the patients leave the clinic with a buzz on??

 

[lonelyDude]

it makes you high but if your dosed so as to stop withdrawal it is set at a level so as not too increase your addiction.

we call it goose juice here as 90% of people on it turn into gooses with some delight in there personal smell for some reason.

makes your piss smell like troll shit and is awesome for working out on.

trust me it is far more value as a withdrawal prevention aid than getting high aid.

the big selling point of the goose juice over the chicken soup (bupe) is that you can still use when on it as it does not have an opiate blocker in it.

 

[Camellia]

Lol I might keep away then! Don't like stinking piss so much