Positive The Tapering Supportive/Social Thread

[Nurse Ratched]

Monday’s suck! I don’t get any pain relief over the weekend so I choose to save my back for work and I do basically nothing on the weekend. Then Monday comes and I’m absolutely exhausted. The irony is that the less I do the less I have energy for. Days like these I’m questioning my decision to not be on permanent disability. It’s definitely nice to not be a slave to a bottle of pills but days like this are miserable.

Have you ever applied before, Squeaky? Maybe it's time to say you did your best and worked through your pain long enough. If you are eligible there is no shame in saying your body simply can't take it anymore.

 

[papercuts]

What did Hylite do to get a temporary ban?

Hylite, come back when you can, I find your posts very emotionally raw and this can be a place to heal and share the burden.

 

[Squeaky]

Have you ever applied before, Squeaky? Maybe it's time to say you did your best and worked through your pain long enough. If you are eligible there is no shame in saying your body simply can't take it anymore.

I climb telephone poles for a living. Along with carrying heavy objects or 110 lbs or more, climbing ladders up to 30 feet, and sitting in traffic for at least two hours per day. The surgeon who put the 20 screws in my back can’t believe I’m still doing this job because everyone agrees it was this job that destroyed my back.

I have had 3 doctors and my lawyer all tell me I’m a slam dunk for lifetime permanent disability. Problem is that I’m the main income for my little family and disability maximum payment is about 1/2 of what I’m earning now at my job (it’s a good union job at a major company). I basically have a choice between suffering through work or losing my house. On top of all of that, I have a child with special needs and my wife needs to be home to take care of him. Getting a free paycheck for the rest of my life sounds like the golden ticket, but I also live in one if the most expensive real estate markets in the world. I made a promise to my wife when we got married that I would always do my best to be a good provider and that’s what I’m doing..... so I’m kind of stuck between bad and worse. But at least if one day I lose it all..... I can sleep with the knowledge that I did absolutely everything I could to keep my promise.

Fortunately I’m not far from my full pension. Maybe in a couple of years I can revisit the question, but for today I’m going to work.

 

[Squeaky]

Hylite, come back when you can, I find your posts very emotionally raw and this can be a place to heal and share the burden.

No kidding. Makes me feel a tiny but hopefull that if Hylite is still hanging in there then maybe I can also.

 

[papercuts]

I got a shock last night.
I've to go to a place with no weed whatsoever for six days
I've not done that since, uh, early 2019 was the last time I went a week without it. So maybe I should go taper that instead because this opiate tapering isn't going well for me

 

[Squeaky]

I got a shock last night.
I've to go to a place with no weed whatsoever for six days
I've not done that since, uh, early 2019 was the last time I went a week without it. So maybe I should go taper that instead because this opiate tapering isn't going well for me

Rehab? Or Jail?
Sounds like hell.

 

[Squeaky]

I got a shock last night.
I've to go to a place with no weed whatsoever for six days
I've not done that since, uh, early 2019 was the last time I went a week without it. So maybe I should go taper that instead because this opiate tapering isn't going well for me

I have struggled with tapering for years. My experience (for me anyway) is that if tapering sucks that badly then my only choice is cold turkey. Tapering for me means trying to pretend life doesn’t suck for about 4 days, over and over each time I dropped my dose. Cold turkey is absolute hell for a week but at least I can hit it with everything I have: stay home from work, tell people I have the flu, etc... I’m not expected to be human for a week and I can get back to life (slowly).

Tapering is like pulling off a bandaid slooooowwwww. I’d rather get kicked in the nuts.

Also: Tapering means I’m going to be rude to everyone and nobody knows why. People think I’m just a jerk. Cold turkey makes it obvious that whatever I’m going through is real, and everyone treats me like a cancer patient (plenty of help, no judgment)

 

[papercuts]

I have struggled with tapering for years. My experience (for me anyway) is that if tapering sucks that badly then my only choice is cold turkey. Tapering for me means trying to pretend life doesn’t suck for about 4 days, over and over each time I dropped my dose. Cold turkey is absolute hell for a week but at least I can hit it with everything I have: stay home from work, tell people I have the flu, etc... I’m not expected to be human for a week and I can get back to life (slowly).

Tapering is like pulling off a bandaid slooooowwwww. I’d rather get kicked in the nuts.

Also: Tapering means I’m going to be rude to everyone and nobody knows why. People think I’m just a jerk. Cold turkey makes it obvious that whatever I’m going through is real, and everyone treats me like a cancer patient (plenty of help, no judgment)

That's a good point, it's better to have more good days than bad days, that way you get to keep your family!

 

[papercuts]

With weed, I'm going to wake up one morning and have something important to do so I don't vape or otherwise ingest cannabis for hours that day. Then I'll capitalise on that wellbeing and stick at it until day four when almost all cravings and irritability are gone. Bad as it seems at the time, it doesn't drag on forever like opiates. I mean tapering opiates could become a permanent way of life that is filled with worry and pain unless you get a break occasionally. But taking a break puts you right back at step one again (just a step, not the twelve steps, I can never get past that higher power thing at step four or five).
So my new opiate plan is strangely similar to my previous failed plan to get buprenorphine and then be able to ditch other opiates in favour of that single opioid.
My new opiate plan is to wait enough time then ask for a switch from bupe for the efficacy of the pain relief. The pharmacist told me they might switch me to fentanyl, he said that I would probably find it too strong to go straight onto, so wait a while until the bupe is ineffective.
I don't know how long to pretend the bupe is what I need.
Of course the law prevents me from informing the pharmacist of the real facts and I suspect if they gave me fentanyl I might find it as lacklustre as I now consider bupe to be.

 

[papercuts]

With weed, I'm going to wake up one morning and have something important to do so I don't vape or otherwise ingest cannabis for hours that day. Then I'll capitalise on that wellbeing and stick at it until day four when almost all cravings and irritability are gone. Bad as it seems at the time, it doesn't drag on forever like opiates. I mean tapering opiates could become a permanent way of life that is filled with worry and pain unless you get a break occasionally. But taking a break puts you right back at step one again (just a step, not the twelve steps, I can never get past that higher power thing at step four or five).
So my new opiate plan is strangely similar to my previous failed plan to get buprenorphine and then be able to ditch other opiates in favour of that single opioid.
My new opiate plan is to wait enough time then ask for a switch from bupe for the efficacy of the pain relief. The pharmacist told me they might switch me to fentanyl, he said that I would probably find it too strong to go straight onto, so wait a while until the bupe is ineffective.
I don't know how long to pretend the bupe is what I need.
Of course the law prevents me from informing the pharmacist of the real facts and I suspect if they gave me fentanyl I might find it as lacklustre as I now consider bupe to be.

I'm just reading over that and I don't understand why the US don't use these pain patches too. I know there are fentanyl patches there for severe pain but not buprenorphine patches for "moderate" pain.
I'd love to get my hands on pills instead, because the thing stopping me loving bupe is that it's so constant, no ups and downs, if you want a little more you have to extract from a patch so the feeling passes and the pain relief hasn't diminished after all, it's just the tricks the mind plays because it loves opiates more than it loves your overall wellbeing.
For folks who genuinely want constant pain relief without the option to have a little more, buprenorphine seems perfect.
I've never been able to get opioid pills. Even tramadol, I'd ask my husband to get for me. I've the more severe diagnosed pain condition, but the doctor is a million times happier to give my husband pills than me. They are told to exercise extreme caution if any mental health issue has ever been noted. Since depression was the only one I've had, it's either that or because I'm female. The gender disparity for pain relief has got so much attention in the last couple of years I expect they try extra hard now to listen to and even occasionally believe women. That reaction to bad publicity is probably why I suddenly got an opioid patch when I can't even get prescription strength cocodamol tablets. Official advice is to try pills first, not go straight from zero to a patch.
They're right of course, I'd abuse the fuck out of a pack of pills.

 

[Squeaky]

That's a good point, it's better to have more good days than bad days, that way you get to keep your family!

Exactly. It’s not a good plan, but it still might be the best option

 

[Squeaky]

I'm just reading over that and I don't understand why the US don't use these pain patches too.

The pharmaceutical industry is like an army of gophers. It’s not about patient care, it’s all about money. They dug themselves into every market they could, everywhere on the planet. Some places they ate an old lady’s tomatos, other places they eroded a whole mountain and caused the homes at the top to be condemned. All right under our feet without anyone knowing until it was way too late.

In the US you can have the same difference that you’re describing between your country and the USA, but that difference exists between two pharmacies that are a block apart. Or worse..... between two doctors in the same office. Everything you describe is available here but it’s really up to the doctor’s opinion to decide what medicine you get. Doctors here just generally avoid patches and patients/customers prefer the pills.

It sucks but I can get whatever I want if I lie correctly. I decide what will work best for me and then I design a whole story around my symptoms and what I have already tried so that the only choice for the Dr is to give me what I want without me asking directly for it.

 

[Squeaky]

They're right of course, I'd abuse the fuck out of a pack of pills.

That’s funny. I guess it’s not right that they don’t give you pills, except that they’re exactly right for not giving you pills?

 

[Squeaky]

I have an issue that I noticed many years ago. I’m stubborn and very set in my ways, and I am very resistant to change. Even small changed are very disturbing for me. I figured out however that it takes around 4 days for something to become ‘normal’ for me, thus making it not a change anymore after the 4th day.

It just also happens that every time I quit anything, it feels like a mountain I could never climb until about the 4th day. Like I get my 2nd wind at the 96 hour mark. Opiates, cigarettes, booze, even Pepsi. When I have quit these things it feels like hell for the first 3 days, but then I get a boost that gives me the determination to make it on day 4.

Just an observation. Maybe Papercuts is having a similar experience transitioning from whats normal to a new opiate??

 

[papercuts]

Maybe Papercuts is having a similar experience transitioning from whats normal to a new opiate??

Yeah, perhaps, I don't know what is normal these days, except I don't feel it until I do something illegal and that upsets me because I came from that way of thinking, then left it behind.
It was decades ago, but my country was under occupation when I was a small child and being indigenous did us no favours at all, the laws didn't respect us so we broke them any time we could get away with it. I built a completely new life for myself from age sixteen, on my own. Not a refugee or anything, just a runaway from a dysfunctional family in the general poverty of a war zone (fucking jackpot there).
The laws of my new country didn't matter to me either, but gradually I started to trust the authorities a little. Besides, I've never liked being in trouble, that was one reason I ran. Long story short, I ended up needing changes to be made in my life. So I got married, changed my name (phew, it was far too unusual) and my husband helped me away from the habits I'd developed with speed, LSD & cannabis (cold turkey on all three together, kept booze & cigs). He couldn't help his own drinking, but we muddled through, kept the right side of the law and gained the benefits of being able to fit into society adequately.
Opiates were the most dangerous thing on the face of the earth, both my parents said so, never touch that in any form. I was 100% wary and back then I'd no problems with opiates at all, I generally stayed away, or occassionally watched for people while not taking any myself.
I was also 100% sure I'd be addicted as soon as I let go and indulged.
I guess I decided to become addicted once the kids were grown. The house is paid, I have a job that's easy to do when stoned and plenty of time off for getting completely rat-arsed. If I lose my job for being stoned, it's ok, we own the fucking house, omg, like how did that happen?
It means the world to me to own just a tiny bit of it, where I'll never be homeless again.
It's more than just material stuff, having gained a respectability, I don't want to trash it all now. I've finally got it good, so I relaxed, let go and indulged.
Then every one of my old memories comes & plays on loop when I try to cut down.
That sends me spiralling into misery and I want to stay out of misery.
So I break the law and wish I didn't have to.

 

[papercuts]

That’s funny. I guess it’s not right that they don’t give you pills, except that they’re exactly right for not giving you pills?

Indeed, the irony isn't lost on me either.

 

[Squeaky]

Indeed, the irony isn't lost on me either.

Yeah, this website is completely filled with irony. If I tell the truth about anything, I’ll be labeled a ‘drug seeker’. So I have to lie to get what I need. The irony there is that if I ask for help I’ll most likely get cut off from the only stuff that helps because I’m addicted to something that was sold as ‘non-addictive’. It’s like being sold a Ferrari and then learn I could go to jail for driving it as fast as it was designed to go.

The only way to lose the fight is to give up, give in, or die. I’m not willing to let them win by becoming a statistic.

 

[papercuts]

Are there ANY people who can take oxy as prescribed?
Just floating that question out there, wondering did everyone on the clinical trials lie about it to the researchers? For the same reason we all manipulate our doctors

 

[Nurse Ratched]

Are there ANY people who can take oxy as prescribed?
Just floating that question out there, wondering did everyone on the clinical trials lie about it to the researchers? For the same reason we all manipulate our doctors

I have only known one person in my whole life that could. It was an older guy that got them prescribed for cluster headaches. I was in my 30's, he was in his 50's and I worked with him. He was sweet on me and one day at work I was complaining about something and he gave me one. Wasn't opioid naive but had never had any oxy. Needless to say,I was impressed. I am ashamed to say that I pretended to return his affections so that he would throw oxy my way when I asked. He got wise when I wouldn't go to bed with him and cut me off. Still feel like crap sometimes when I remember I use to use people to get some of their scripts.

Everyone else I knew in my lifetime abused the hell out of it except for him.

 

[Squeaky]

Are there ANY people who can take oxy as prescribed?
Just floating that question out there, wondering did everyone on the clinical trials lie about it to the researchers? For the same reason we all manipulate our doctors

The first 3 years I used them less than prescribed. I had a huge stash: 100’s of oxy 30’s, Norco 10/325’s, Lyrica, Baclofen, Ativan. Literally more than 1000 pills and the pile just kept growing every month. If you go back to the beginning of this thread there’s a point when I bragged about how much I had saved for a rainy day.

My troubles began when I returned to work from disability. My first surgeon had screwed up and I was in pain most of the day. Had to do the physical labor and still be a ‘man’ at home. Once my tolerance crossed a certain threshold, I started relying on my stash. When that ran out, my tolerance was so high that I struggled to not run out every month. After that I was screwed.