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Opioids Suboxone vs Methadone treatment

gentlemansyd

Greenlighter
Joined
Sep 15, 2010
Messages
5
Hey all. Been on Methadone for roughly 4 years. Most I was at was 95mgs. I have tapered down to 25mgs and am looking into switching to Suboxone or Subutex. Weight gain and lethargy have been a problem since I first began to stabilize on the methadone. I have done my research on doctors in the area that can assist in making the switch from the methadone to suboxone/subutex.
What's your experience with one and the other? Pros/cons of one over the other?
Thanks in advance, all.
 
You will have to stay off the methadone for at least 5 days before you will be able to start the Subs. My advice would be to stay clean once you make it that far. Or only use the Subs for 3-5 days max to alleviate some of the pain and help you coast down smoother. Any longer than that, and you will just become addicted to another long acting very potent opioid.

I have also heard from some people that Suboxone withdrawals are worse than methadone ..
 
You will have to stay off the methadone for at least 5 days before you will be able to start the Subs. My advice would be to stay clean once you make it that far. Or only use the Subs for 3-5 days max to alleviate some of the pain and help you coast down smoother. Any longer than that, and you will just become addicted to another long acting very potent opioid.

I have also heard from some people that Suboxone withdrawals are worse than methadone ..

Thanks for the input. I have heard that WD's are worse from meth from some ppl and suboxone from others. I guess it's going to suck regardless. I am working on finding some time this year to get free from my job to be able to successfully detox. If I can get a work week off instead of missing it or coming in looking like a complete wreck then I'm going to step off. Truth is I can't afford the methadone treatment like I can the suboxone treatment. I guess at the moment I am looking for the lesser of two evils.
 
Sub withdrawals are definitely not worse than methadone, that's absurd, Im going to take a stance here because I've been through both multiple times, anyone who makes that argument doesn't know what they're talking about or hasn't been on methadone for that long. Both have pretty bad PAWS, but methadone IME has much more debilitating PAWS.
 
The withdrawls from Suboxone are easier for most because Methodone tends to hang around in your body longer. Toward the end there is still Methodone in your system but not enough to make you comfortable. You feel the withdrawal after 2-3days, it continues until all the Metodone is expelled (3-5 days), then you feel the W/D for another 3-5 days after that. Then PAWS sets in. With Suboxone, once you start to feel W/D, it is just the average 3-5 days, then PAWS, not the long drawn-out hell of M-done. Everyone experiences PAWS differently, some not at all, but the acute W/D is where the real differences lie.
 
Sub withdrawals are definitely not worse than methadone, that's absurd, Im going to take a stance here because I've been through both multiple times, anyone who makes that argument doesn't know what they're talking about or hasn't been on methadone for that long. Both have pretty bad PAWS, but methadone IME has much more debilitating PAWS.

I don't know... After being long term on both and CTing both. I think the "suboxone withdrawal is much easier than methadone WD" is somewhat of a misleading statement. Methadone withdrawal is worse on a mental level because it's more of a classic opiate when it comes to mental effects.

Suboxone is just as powerful, it might not feel "as good" because it's a partial agonist, but it's very powerful. Its half life isn't any shorter than that of methadone.

CTing 8-12mg of a year long suboxone maintenance was pure hell. I'm talking like a month of acute withdrawals. The peak of my WDs came on day 5-7 and I was sitting on the stairs, crying and banging my head into the wall because I didn't know what to do with all the pain anymore. It took a month to sleep but only with the help of 600-1200mg of Gabapentin. It took 2 months to have a restless night of sleep. It took me 4 months to have something resembling a normal bowel movement and to get that "normal" feeling back.

I'm currently on 65mg of methadone because that's what it took to stabilize and I'm thinking of getting down to 45-50mg for a maintenance dose because another long half life opiate withdrawal will kill me.

However, I'm not trying to say that maintenance with either one of these is bad. Just don't try to get high with Methadone. Suboxone is usually worthless in terms of getting high to most opiate experiences people.
 
The withdrawls from Suboxone are easier for most because Methodone tends to hang around in your body longer. Toward the end there is still Methodone in your system but not enough to make you comfortable. You feel the withdrawal after 2-3days, it continues until all the Metodone is expelled (3-5 days), then you feel the W/D for another 3-5 days after that. Then PAWS sets in. With Suboxone, once you start to feel W/D, it is just the average 3-5 days, then PAWS, not the long drawn-out hell of M-done. Everyone experiences PAWS differently, some not at all, but the acute W/D is where the real differences lie.

The half life of suboxone is just as long as the half life of methadone.
 
The half life of suboxone is just as long as the half life of methadone.

The AVERAGE half-life of Suboxone is 37 hrs. The half-life of M-done is 8-56 hrs. That would be why you have to be off M-done for 4-6 days before inducing Suboxone. Half-life is not equal to duration of effects. The "half-life" of a substance is the amount of time it takes for 1/2 of the substance to be eliminated from your body, it has no correlation to effect.
 
The half life of Buprenorphine tends to be higher than Methadone. Taking Sub's average vs Meths' range...

And, can confirm that the withdrawals from Bupe are a horrendous, lingering ordeal. If you've been on it a bit and quit, you're in for a shock because of that. I once went from 16 to 0 mg/day over a month, and thought i was good. Not even close. 24 -36 hours later was when the hell began. I missed work for a week before succumbing and going back.

After that, while i was primarily on subs, whenever I'd think about quitting, the first thing I would do was to switch to something shorter acting (dope, dillaudid when accessible).
 
To add: the last time I went to medical detox, followed by in patient treatment, I was tapered with suboxone over 6 days, the seventh day i was just given xanax and observed. I felt like a champ when I left. Only to then go through W/D at the inpatient place instead, pouring sweat at AA meetings, diarrhea every moment. The whole 9 yards. For over a week. My fellow patients were shocked that I stuck it out.
 
The AVERAGE half-life of Suboxone is 37 hrs. The half-life of M-done is 8-56 hrs. That would be why you have to be off M-done for 4-6 days before inducing Suboxone. Half-life is not equal to duration of effects. The "half-life" of a substance is the amount of time it takes for 1/2 of the substance to be eliminated from your body, it has no correlation to effect.

I'm aware of what half life means.

The numbers you picked are skewed in favor your argument. You could just flip them and the statement wouldn't be wrong.

When you take bupe daily just like methadone, you end with the same problems. The extreme build up occurs in both. They both have similar half lives and duration.

After a year of daily suboxone it will take just as much time to begin withdrawing as it would with methadone, 2-5 days depending on how well you metabolize the substances.

The requirement to wait doesn't prove methadone efficacy levels or duration time, only suboxone's binding affinity.
 
I am somehow in the same situation, i withdrawal from methadone, because my usage escalated with it and i couldn't take the side effects any more. I am on day 6 now (early morning), but i have to admit i relapsed in the night to day 4 with 2 mg buprenorphine , i just couldn't take it any more. It quickly escalated into 2 Heroin shots/1 methadone shot. Now i pushed trough day 5 without anything and it was the worst of all days mentally not to just give up. I was crawling in fetal position most of the days,and had absolute no energy to even move. But today it resembles much more the standard wds that you can quickly get used to, which are just annoying. (bad sleep, diarrea, hot/cold flashes etc.)

I am debating now weather to switch to low dose buprenorphine or just suck up the rest of the WD, which might last at least a one to two weeks, i am sure. The thing is i need to work on monday again, and i hate the job anyway so being there in medium withdrawal is not a nice thought. But i would not excessively dose bupre it doesn't get you high anyway, so 2 mg would be enough.
 
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