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  • TDS Moderators: AlphaMethylPhenyl | paranoid android

whats worse depression or opiate addiction?

muvolution said:
fuck you man. If he didn't want opinions on the matter, he shouldn't have asked.

I never said i was an expert, I never said I was a doctor, and I never said I was right. Any logical person would take my statement as an opinion, not fact, as I never indicated that it was fact and I don't feel the need to categorize all my statements with "In my opinion..." because most people are logical and mature enough to accept it for what it is.

Opiate addiction is hard to beat and if you willingly ignore that you have a long road ahead of you, you have very little chance of beating it. There are treatments and drugs available to help manage Post-Acute-Withdrawal Syndrome, and I think it is completely reasonable to expect it to take at least 12 months to transition from opiate use to replacement therapy, to discontinuation of ORT, to the cessation of PAWS. Obviously it isn't one long stretch of feeling like shit, but even for someone with a 1-2 year habit, it takes a significant amount of time, measured in months and years, to feel normal again.
Add to that the fact that a good majority of people are NEVER able to shake their mental addiction, no matter how much time and distance you put between it and yourself, and anyone withdrawing from a habit like that has a long road ahead of them.

Any addiction counselor or doctor would tell him the same thing.

Moreover, this was the final and most important statement in my post, and I truly can't think of anything more singularly dedicated to harm reduction than this: "It sounds like you have convinced yourself that sober and happy is not an option, but trust me, it is."
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I still don't understand how that helps him. And I know you're just giving him your opinion because that is ALL ANYONE can give him as NOTHING is fact when it comes to this shit.

My whole point was if you're going to give him your "opinion" give him an EDUCATED opinion. Like "I don't know and noone has a real clue BECAUSE we are not doctors, and even if we WERE we still wouldn't know".

Why tell him "1-2 years"? Thats what pissed me off.
If you're giving opinions here say "well it could be over in a couple weeks, or it could be over a few years from now, noone knows so DON'T FUCKING THINK ABOUT THAT SHIT. You really think thats helpful for him to be focusing on? So "just being real" is going to save him? GTFOOH.

He needs to be focusing on how he's going to get through today, not 1-2 years from now. Thats probably why I see so many addicts relapsing on this forum is the majority of them think they're going to be outright fucked in the head x years from now. If you can explain to me one logical way that actually helps them, then I apologize, but it does absolutely nothing imo to prepare them for anything. What are you preparing them for? Hell on earth?
Prepare them for the possibility of something different SINCE you don't actually know where they will be x years from now. And SINCE you don't know you might as well give an opinion that may actually leave them feeling better.

Your idea of "helping" people is basically how you said, explaining how utterly fucked up and devastating their situation is. But AGAIN, that is just YOUR opinion. Your opinion of how serious their problem is. Problem is its not your problem, so it doesn't matter one bit what you think about that.

It doesn't even need to be an educated opinion I just don't understand what you think you're accomplishing. Imagine a patient going to a dr for help who is depressed.
And the doctor says "I really want you to know that your situation is very serious, I mean super duper uber serious, and your life is extremely fucked up, and my expert prediction is maybe within the next 1-2 years you might start feeling better... maybe, if you're lucky"

I see that patient walking out of that drs office and blowing their head off. Nice job doc. Pessimism helps a lot of people right? An educated opinion would be that it actually doesn't. And because you don't know either way, it would make much more sense to try being optimistic.

You're basically trying to save people by reiterating to them how badly their life sucks (like they don't already know), and the potential of how much longer it may suck for. If you actually think thats what any doctor would say, I feel very sorry for you. Doctors have ways of informing people of chance and possibility w/out souding so horribly negative in the process. Thats why they are doctors. And why you should not try to be one.

g luck saving the world with pessimism
 
^ I agree with what muv has added to this thread.

Also, depression is usually inherent (inseparable) from opiate addiction.
 
I didn't read most of the posts... just the first couple... but I was depressed most of my life.... never knew it... got into alcohol and drug addiction in my late teens thru mid 20s... well when I got over all my addictions and cleaned up from everything for about a year my depression kinda disappeared... that's when I noticed id had it my whole life beefore... :D
 
The truth is opiate addiction makes depression worse,,, so ontop of depression it comes back worse then you have an opiate addiction... this is what I believe...
 
cire113 said:
The truth is opiate addiction makes depression worse,,, so ontop of depression it comes back worse then you have an opiate addiction... this is what I believe...
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Have you ever suffered from severe depression, because some people might think an opiate addiction is a walk in the park compared to being depressed for unknown reasons.

Sure opiate addiction can be brutal but some would take it to just have some kind of normalcy &/or happiness for a little while in their lives compared to not having any happiness at all ever.
 
^^see thats the problem...id say most opiate users are depressed in some way before taking drugs...some are severely depressed..i at times was very depressed before starting drugs and sure enough, the opiates helped very much when i started taking them..it was like seeing life through a new filter, a good filter at that...years pass and you cant sustain that life forever and i had to quit...well, my depression that i thought was bad before was amplified by 5 during withdrawals and paws...absolutely hopeless and no energy or well being at all..

so yes it sucks being depressed but you add opiates or any drugs to it and they lower your overall baseline mood...that i am finding may be permanent, hard to say...

but man i would rather be very depressed than go back to being addicted to heroin again..dopesickness is worse than clinical depression...
 
belfort said:
^^see thats the problem...id say most opiate users are depressed in some way before taking drugs...some are severely depressed..i at times was very depressed before starting drugs and sure enough, the opiates helped very much when i started taking them..it was like seeing life through a new filter, a good filter at that...years pass and you cant sustain that life forever and i had to quit...well, my depression that i thought was bad before was amplified by 5 during withdrawals and paws...absolutely hopeless and no energy or well being at all..

so yes it sucks being depressed but you add opiates or any drugs to it and they lower your overall baseline mood...that i am finding may be permanent, hard to say...

but man i would rather be very depressed than go back to being addicted to heroin again..dopesickness is worse than clinical depression...
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You did say you had several years of normalcy/happiness when on the drugs at one point. Some people would give a body part to enjoy what you did those years. Also, did your clinical depression come about because you got dope sick because you couldnt afford the drugs anymore, meaning you need money to continue this voyage.

It seems thats the majority of the peoples problem when they cant get anymore drugs, money! They run out of money & cant afford to keep that life style.
 
Well ive been majorly depressed while on opiates and majorly depressed off opiates and i can tell you that both suck. Opiates don't seem to help my depression much if at all. If opiates worked as a wonder drug for the depression side of my bipolar i would have little need for wellbutrin :\
 
paranoid android said:
Well ive been majorly depressed while on opiates and majorly depressed off opiates and i can tell you that both suck. Opiates don't seem to help my depression much if at all. If opiates worked as a wonder drug for the depression side of my bipolar i would have little need for wellbutrin :\
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Everyone has different types of depression. Some have light depression & some have severe depression. There is depression from what has happened/happening in your life & then there is the depression that some people are just born with which I believe. There is just too many different types to think opiates might or will help you in that aspect.
 
well when i was on opiates i wouldnt say i was 'happy' it was just a chemical euphoria..i wasnt depressed either though..i have always had clinical depression inside of me but yes during opiate withdrawal it came out and was amplified...now im sober for the most part and i still dont feel 'good' for the most part whatever the hell that means..lol...but my main point is taking drugs has lowered my overall baseline mood...before i took drugs my baseline mood was better than it is now without a doubt..my energy levels were better before drugs so eventhough the opiates did give me the chemical contentment, they zapped my natural ability to be happy and content...believe it or not before drugs i did have times when i was in a good energetic optimistic mood...
 
I'd have to say opiate addiction. Sure, it's great while it lasts- you feel like you're on the top of the world, you have endless amounts of energy and productivity, and you feel like anything you want to achieve is possible. For instance, when I was riding an opiate high, I could sit there and do math homework (and I HATE math) for hours on end, and it would feel like the most enjoyable thing in the world at the time.

But... that doesn't last forever, and it all comes crashing down eventually. Stay on opiates long enough, the euphoria goes away and you're just doing it to maintain yourself. You start to feel worthless, depressed, hopeless, like a loser, etc. Get off of opiates, and you have a hell of a withdrawal to go through- and the depression that comes with those withdrawals are worse than ANYTHING you could ever imagine. I remember looking at my dog, just petting him, and thinking "he's going to die someday". EVERYTHING... no matter how innocent it was... my brain would associate it with something horrible and it would set me off crying. Add anxiety and tons of irritability and aggression to that, and it's worse than any sort of clinical depression I've experienced, which is mostly just PTSD. But that's just me.

Depression is easily curable... opiate addiction, not so easy. :(
 
I used opiates habitually for seven years, and I can tell you that depression does not persist for long after the initial withdrawal symptoms are gone. Give your mind a month or two to accommodate your recovered level of consciousness.

....

Occasional cravings for opiates may never stop from what I can tell, however.
 
xburtonchic said:
Depression is easily curable... opiate addiction, not so easy. :(
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How is depression easily curable? Atleast half the reason i got into drugs was because they helped my mood. Ive gotten drunk, coked up, fucked on opiates, stoned, spun and everything else all to escape my mood swings.
 
As few have said before I think your depression stems from your opiate addiction. So in the bigger picture wouldn't the opiate addiction be the larger problem since that's what started the depression?

If I'm right then I think that your body's become so used to an outside source providing dopamine and seratonin or whatever that your body stops naturally producing it. However, my belief is that you can reactivate all that by simple exercise, doing something constructive, getting a job, going to school, any thing that can help you feel like a productive member of society.

If you really wanna feel good try volunteering, the oxytocin you get from that can't be beat
 
I can't offer any advice on the addiction, as I've been having a peculiar battle with my own over the past several months, but I can 100% relate to your depression symptoms. Last fall I couldn't so much as motivate myself to get off the couch and wash a couple of dishes, let alone go to class and be productive. I wouldn't eat or sleep for days and I'd only stop watching my repeating loop of the office(I'm not bashing the office here, I still love it, but that's all I did...) to find/do whatever drugs I could get my hands on, which made me feel better a couple hours at a time. I couldn't even taste food. I never knew that was possible.

It took a severe breaking point for me to get my shit together, but I don't wish that experience on anyone. You need to reach out to people around you. Anyone you trust, you just need someone else to help you through it. If you don't have anyone you can talk to, than AA/NA is the place to go. They're definitely mostly Bible thumpers around here, but they're good people and they want to help you. The point is you need to change your scenery if you've just been laying about and you need to voice your problems to someone who can and will help you.

I feel like that was pretty redundant, but I hope it helps. Just a short time ago I was in a very dark place that sounds a lot like where you are now that I've been feeling myself slipping back to recently and I feel sad knowing there are others out there living that hell right now...drop me a PM if you need someone to talk to. If not, I wish you the best of luck. There really is hope!
 
paranoid android said:
How is depression easily curable? Atleast half the reason i got into drugs was because they helped my mood. Ive gotten drunk, coked up, fucked on opiates, stoned, spun and everything else all to escape my mood swings.
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Exactly my point. You're trying to cure your addiction WITH opiates, which just makes depression worse in the long run.

What I meant when I say depression is easily curable is that there are a ton of remedies out there for it, both medicinal, herbal, and natural. Medicinal: Paxil, Wellbutrin, Zoloft, etc. Herbal: St. John's Wort, Valerian Root. Natural: activities that produce endorphins such as exercise, sex, getting out there and socializing with people, counseling, etc.

Whereas opiate addiction does not have any "easy" cure. The only way to cure yourself from opiate addiction is by taking... more opiates. Either methadone or Suboxone, which are both equally as addictive and have withdrawals that are just as bad. And then once you manage to get off... IF you manage to get off... it's a lifelong battle you have to deal with. Just seeing an opiate or even just hearing someone talk about them can trigger you into a relapse. Not to mention, opiate addiction leads to depression much worse than clinical depression. Oh, and you can die from it. It seems pretty straight forward to me.

I'm not speaking from ignorance here. I've suffered from clinical depression and PTSD before, and it was pretty severe. Yet I still managed to get myself out of it through counseling and forcing myself to do things that naturally produce endorphins. So as someone who's had severe depression, PTSD, AND a severe opiate addiction... I'm sorry, but I would choose clinical depression over an opiate addiction any day of the week.
 
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