Heroin why do i get pins and needles and swolen lips after shooting heroin?

[loooveiswhatigot]

I been shooting heroin for about a year now.8( A few days ago I actually started methadone but I am still using as i wait for my methadone dose to be high enough so I do not have to use anymore. Anyway, the past like month or so, everytime I shoot up I get pins and needles so badly! I'm sure a lot of people get this, I know because my girlfriend gets them as well. It didn't always used to happen though. Just recently. But I get it soooo bad. It's like it blocks out the rush I'm supposed to get and I only get pins and needles and it REALLY JUST SUCKS. I know there's no fixing this. But can someone explain why? Also here's another thing... Also the other day after shooting my lips felt very swolen, they didnt look swolen though, it was odd. They just felt abnormally large and swolen but they didn't so much look that way on the outside, I was also twitching and felt like I was about to seize. I'm really unsure why.. I really want some answers!! Thanks

 

[Tommyboy]

It sounds like a histamine reaction. Try taking an antihistamine before you take the heroin.

 

['medicine cabinet']

yea either a strong histamine reaction or your dope could be cut with niacin as B vitamins can be common cuts in dope. turns your skin red and burns like crazy when injected. i know the feeling you are talking about, its almost paainful.

 

[Mongoliandonut]

Hey man I dont know what are of the country you live in but I think its cut like other have said or you are allergic to morphine or similar opiates/opioids. I did heroin for a couple years and I would get this every time in one form or another and I know its the allergic kind because in the hospital they tried morph and I got all flushed and such I felt good though just red. Anyways two things as your tolerance has gotten higher your allergy to it hasnt changed so that will get more intense believe me I tried and I used heavy antihistamines for a while but there effect was very little after a while to stop that really intense pins needles and even swelling in some area.

I found it funny say id shoot up on top of subutex or suboxone
I would get no rush of the Heroin but I would get that other horrible rush so I thought I had used enough to push the bupe out of my receptors. I found much better opiods with higher affinity to bind then bupe and I wasnt allergic haha.

Anyways, I think you need to try to get a different type of h from someone totally different or get some pure morphine and shoot that if you still get the reactions with the pure morphine.

id say you're allergic and you will have to get antihistimines for a while they will stop helping after a while and then you probably will have to switch to pills like Oxymorphone or Hydromorphone. I also found that im not allergic to desomorphone(you know that krauk like the russians it rots you) Well their stuff dose not the pure stuff 80 times morep otent then pure heroin. Wow those were some interesting days but the best bet is to stop now and dont mess with the god chemicals anymore. ive been off them a year now and if a crazy dope fiend like me can clean up from that, you can too. BTW youre gf and you will breakup with 99% likelihood if you continue to use

 

[Swimmingdancer]

A histamine reaction from opioids is not considered an allergy, it is a common effect. Almost all opioids cause direct histamine release as one of their pharmacologic actions. Of course it varies from person to person and drug to drug though. True anaphylactic allergic reactions with an immunologic basis are rare. Non-allergic sensitivities can manifest as itching, flushing, hives, and/or low blood pressure. This is not considered a true drug allergy - which can lead to anaphylaxis and even cardiovascular collapse - it is considered a non-allergic histamine release. Without immunologic involvement, these reactions are termed things like “pharmacologically induced histamine release” or “non-allergic” reactions.

Now I don't know for sure whether or not what the OP described - pins and needles, swollen-feeling lips and twitching - is a histamine reaction or not, I'm just trying to explain that a histamine reaction to opioids is not the same thing as an "allergy". I know for me I would get a strong pins and needles feeling from IV morphine but not from IV heroin. I would occasionally get heroin that had been cut with morphine or something else that would cause the pins and needles feeling. I would be most concerned about the twitching. Maybe try a different supplier/batch?

 

[PinK~cloud]

The pins and needles could be a filler interaction? aka something it's cut with could make you feel like that. The swollen lips, however, I have no idea about. my best guess would be a histamine reaction like others have mentioned.

 

[Swimmingdancer]

Also the other day after shooting my lips felt very swolen, they didnt look swolen though, it was odd. They just felt abnormally large and swolen but they didn't so much look that way on the outside

I do think a little swelling could be part of a histamine reaction, but feeling swollen is not necessarily the same thing as being swollen, if they didn't look at all swollen. Do you mean they felt numb, like after you go to the dentist when the anesthetic makes your lips feel swollen?

 

[OmarLittle]

I agree 100% on the histamine reaction. Pop a few benadryls (sp?) 30min or so before you dope up, Should solve it.
Also, some people are more sensitive to certain opioids, and cuts/impurities are a major wildcard.

Besides narrowing down to that, it's really up in the air with dope. what strange stuff is mixed in there is anyones guess.

 

[Foreigner]

I agree with the above about histamine.

As for the pins and needles, a few possibilities: I) Local swelling at the injection site compressing nerves. II) You injected an artery and not a vein, slightly compromising some blood flow. III) Since heroin can depress breathing and lower blood pressure, if you already have low blood pressure then lowering it more could lead to pins and needles in the extremities. IV) You did slightly too much and maybe it's partially numbing the nerves.

 

[OmarLittle]

^^^Good point about blood pressure Foreigner. Classic signs of a rapid drop in blood pressure: Blue lips, pale skin, weakness, dizzy/lightheaded. This has happened a few times to me, with and without opiates/drugs.

 

[Znegative]

It's strange, I had never, in the five and a half years that I've been shooting heroin and other opiates, experienced the pins and needles sensation (even when I was given IV morphine in a hospital setting, though I had 4mg of Buprenorphine in my system, but I don't know how much of an effect that would have on histamine release..) until about two weeks ago when I started noticing it mildly from a new batch of dope. However, I shot two bags yesterday and I felt it with such intensity that I almost couldn't enjoy the rush at all. Basically, the prickly sensation started near the site of injection (which is in my hand unfortunately), and rode up towards my chest, then my neck, and then what felt like my brain (which was not 'cool' feeling at all). Right before it ended it flared up again in the palms of both of my hands with such severity that it felt as though I was holding my hands over a fucking huge flame. The experience lasted about ten seconds and then went away, leaving me high as all hell.

I've shot heroin that has burned, and I know this had to do with the cut (possibly an antihistamine or something else), but this was entirely different. It made me wonder if my heroin was even heroin at all, or rather just morphine... I know some people do get this from smack, but I NEVER have (even with IV BTH), and the fact that it was so intense makes me think that perhaps the batch of dope I was shooting was actually morphine instead. Does this ever happen? I know that sometimes black tar heroin reverts back to morphine due to being stored in damp conditions, but this is East Coast Powder (a very fine powder at that)..

 

[Swimmingdancer]

^I've had powder "heroin" that I was pretty sure was all or mostly morphine, from the fact that the effects seemed exactly like morphine (which does give me a strong pins and needles effect which I never got from heroin except on those rare occasions). I've heard it's not that uncommon for dealers to substitute or cut the dope with morphine or other opioids - sometimes other opioids happen to be cheaper or more readily available and heroin has a higher profit margin so they will just sell it as heroin. Of course, it's really impossible to know what's in dope. Who knows if there is some other cut that can cause the pins and needles thing too. Stupid war on drugs.

I think it's pretty hard for heroin to heavily degrade to morphine, the chances of that happening are overstated IMO (from the research I've done on the conditions necessary for that to happen, even heroin sitting in water for a long time in published experiments only degraded a small percentage to morphine, plus I have left heroin sitting in water for a few days and not noticed any perceptible difference).

 

[Znegative]

^right, that is what I was thing as well. I just seems like nowadays to cut or even sell pharmaceutical opiates like morphine as heroin would be a stupid decision as the street price (at least around here) would be higher for say, MS Contin, than one bag of heroin. However, as one of those foolish people who have tried IV methadone in the past, I can say with almost absolute certainty, that I have been sold 'heroin' which has either been cut with methadone, or just was methadone.

I sometimes wonder though if certain clandestined laboratories just get lazy and don't bother going the extra mile and call it quits once they've created morphine (I'm no chemist so I'm not so sure this would even make sense)..

 

[Swimmingdancer]

^Yeah, that's my hunch too. Heroin, aka diacetylmorphine is produced by the acetylation of morphine, so it makes sense that if they don't do it properly or figure it's cheaper not to finish the job and just sell people morphine instead of heroin, morphine could end up getting sold as heroin.

Black tar heroin a high percentage of non-heroin morphine derivates than proper powder heroin hcl does other than heroin, such as 6-Monoacetylmorphine (6-MAM), due to the cheaper, easier synth procedure used. I've actually had off-white powder heroin which I believe was tar heroin mixed with lactose or some other cut to make it into a powder and lighter in colour, because it certainly smelled and felt like tar heroin (and was a vein-destroyer).

Although, the fact than an MS Contin may be more valuable in your area than a bag of dope doesn't necessarily mean they wouldn't cut dope with morphine because they might use a small amount of morphine and a bunch of fillers. Who really knows, it's so frustrating that street drugs are so heavily cut. I got some "heroin" that was mostly cocaine once and it caused me to OD on coke

 

[OmarLittle]

I've saw a guy take frozen tar and grind it, then mix it with east coast dope. People loved that shit and it had the same pins and needles effect.
More often than not though I feel like it comes down to something in the cut or possible wierdo formula while in production