Originally Posted by nurseJ.
I guess people think suboxone or methadone is the answer....both highly addicting and miserable to get off of and expensive.
As D.W.I. wisely observed, detox involves different strokes for different folks.
I weaned off a long-term 15 mg. HC habit and then went C/T. I believe that the discomfort I experienced after C/T is going to be a huge motivator in staying sober. During prior attempts, the W/Ds were fairly easy. Then I read about the "kindling effect", where each attempt becomes harder, and experienced it for myself in spades.
I'm coming up on 6 months clean in a couple of days, so perhaps I'm not out of the woods yet, but I have no cravings.
I don't discount your clinical experience. And I know few other addicts personally. But people who post on this forum have been fairly consistent in their skepticism about WD under anesthesia and the propensity for eventual relapse.
Nurse J, since you work in the medical field, do you have access to any longitudinal studies that would compare long-term "success rates" among various withdrawal strategies? (I'm sure there is at least one journal of addictionolgy).
If you do and could post the summaries on this forum, it would be immensely helpful for obvious reasons (i.e. anecdotal experience vs. clinical research).
I've been accused of "living too much in my head" but oddly one of the things I "miss" about my WD experience was the experience of knowing that the next day would be better and to be able to "feel" the difference over period of time. It really helped me to appreciate sobriety. People who experience fast detox don't get that.
I can't imagine that the cost of administering a substitute withdrawal program (e.g. methadone, sub, etc.) would be anywhere close to the cost of fast WD. Please correct me if I am wrong.
Getting off opiates using tapering or W/D methods are uncomfortable, to be sure, but the method doesn't have to be "barbaric" if the treating physician takes an active role in supporting a patient with closely-monitored meds to reduce the discomfort (e.g. anxiolytics, BP meds, anti-depressants, etc.)
Far more barbaric are physicians who lump addicts into a class of unworthy patients and fail to deliver the quality of care required.
Buzz