@Painful One make sure to tell the doctor that you wasted loads by swallowing it before you got the hang of keeping it under your tongue, say you didn't realise at the time it was wasting it, now you know and won't have the same problem, plus you are now stable, I don't think she'll destablise you, fingers crossed.
I'm getting the holidays over first then I am looking seriously at how to get off this crap, or at least how to reduce it back down to a more sustainable level.
Everything I read contradicts everything else I read about the strength of pods. I think they are simply unique because it is a dependency on so many opioid alkaloids, they aren't refined so I get them all and I'll need even the ones I've not heard of to feel well. So I won't feel well. For quite a while. I'm not going to derail myself this time like I did last new year.
I'll taper pods first, I'll start by setting a 30gram limit on a day, from today (10am I've had 24g so far, I'm counting), come January I'll make that less.
@Squeaky how much do you reduce by each time? Is it a third, half, what is the proportion you recommend? I don't remember.
After a taper of pods I'll feel pretty bad I imagine, when I get down to 5g or 10g a day then it will be time to carefully switch to buprenorphine, each patch is a quarter mg a day so if I aim to wear four that will be 1mg a day of bupe and I'll just have to deal with the other withdrawals which happen concurrently. Perhaps less than four might do.
I'm going to add one more patch each day and see how that goes. Not yet, long way to go first. January and February are quiet in work, I can get all the unpaid leave I want and noone will mind because there's not enough work to go around then.
My goal is to be a good pain patient and use only buprenorphine after that, basically I need it so I am vulnerable to being cut off if they catch me.
As for weed, I hope they legalise it here someday, until then I'm not going to beat myself up about it. I smoked my first joint over forty years ago, I was in my twenties when I lost the ability to pick it up and put it down at will, then I abstained almost completely for years, it just is symbiotic with me now, morning to night part of me and I told key family members, including my adult children, so I'm not trying to hide anything any more. I'm a weed-human hybrid from this point forwards, but the opiates I am going to deal with.
Just like I DID !!
Trying to put the opioid habit behind me. I also take the occasional kratom which helps but I do slowly feel the physical addiction lifting which is a god send.