Finally12

Don't apologize!! You are not a failure. Like someone said above, the fact that you came here and told your story is indicative of someone that really wants to be clean. There was a reason I went on subs in the first place: I couldn't do it alone. You got so much further than I ever did when trying to quit pills, I applaud you for that. If it was that easy to quit we wouldn't need this forum!! Thus is just a bump in the road, just keep trying!! We are here for you!! And yes, if you think you can quit without the subs then I highly suggest you do so. GOOD LUCK!!!

CarrionDoll

@dragon- I am so happy to see this post. I found it while searching for info on weaning of of subs. I have been on suboxone since december of 2011. Like you (we have a few things in common I have found) when I went to the doc, I had already tapered myself down to 15-30mgs of oxy a day. I started with 2 8mg strips a day. Then he added 1 more strip a day. 24mgs/day was WAY too much and made me deathly ill. Vomiting and a horrible migraine, I could not get out of bed for a whole day. I quickly went back down to 16 for a few months, then down to 8mgs. The last 2 months I have been tapering from 4mgs. I can no longer afford my doctors monthly payments and I know the longer I stay on subs, the harder it can be to get off. It has really helped me so far, but it's time to do it on my own.

I am so glad I found this thread. As you guys were talkin g about earlier on, I have read alot of horror stories about how difficult it can be to jump off subs, even at a low dose. I did not realize this. I was planning to jump at 1mg but have now changed my plan. I have 3 strips left, 8mg a piece. I am ready to get down to .25 every other day. Then maybe a few days in between before I jump.

I was also reading your discussion earlier on this thread about mind control and wd's. I have to agree. And I am the worst with this. I always thought that for some reason I seem to have a worse time with wd's than most I know. I am scared to death of them. Even though I have gone through some horrible times with wd's, even severe methadone wd's. But it has been sometime since I have experienced sickness which makes me even more worried. Add to that the fact that I have 4 kids. Like you, my youngest two are 1 and 3 years old and ALOT of work. My husband has to work during the day (for now) so I am on my own with them. I have recently started back to work overnights myself.

My husbands job is coming to an end, as the business he works for is going under. We are not sure of an end date yet but his hours have been cut anyhow. We do know it will probably be in the next month most likely. So I will be the main source of income for awhile. He has a welding shop at home and does some side jobs and we will be advertising for more. But I will be the one bringing in the weekly income. And here I am about to make the leap off subs. I work all night, sleep about 6 hours (sometimes only 3-4hrs a few days if husband has to leave for work early). then I get up and care for the children from about noon til bedtime. Soon after bedtime I log in for work. The only good thing is, I work from home and only have to sit in front of the computer and be on the phone. Nothing too physical. But caring for the kids through wd's in the past has been a horrible experience. There were times my husband had to miss work because I just could not do it. I am very scared and worried and alot is now riding on me. I feel as if I am so screwed.

The one good thing will be if when I jump, if my husbands job is finally done, or his hours so low that he is home alot. I can just curl up in front of the laptop for work and suffer in bed. Work might actually be a good excuse for me to take it easy and not have to run after the kids through the worst of it.

So I guess I have yakked enough and totally hijacked your thread. I just wanted to share my back story and say a big THANK YOU for this thread. It gives me hope that maybe I can do it this time. From the stories I read previously, I thought I was going to be down for weeks and suffering miserably. The lack of energy and sleep does worry me. The malaise and lethargy has been one of my biggest problems with getting clean in the past. And I was so happy for the subs and the energy it gave me. I am sad to give that up and hope it's not hard to get back my natural energy. But thank you again for telling your story. It has helped me believe maybe I can do it and be a little less scared.

@broken- I fully believe (as alot of therapists and rehab "experts" do) that relapse if a necessary part of recovery. It's where you learn your weaknesses and triggers. But it is also where you find your strength and new ways of coping.
EVERYONE makes mistakes, but it is what you do with those mistakes that says what kid of person you are.

dragonfire613

2 Weeks! WTF! When did that happen. Its strange... I was being whiney this afternoon... thoughts like "Ugh, I wish I had more energy", or "Ugh, I don't feel like doing anything." I don't know why, but I went back and read most of this thread from the beginning.

What am I complaining about? Not being all gung-ho and wanting to do a thousand jumping jacks? My a$$ isn't on fire, my head isn't hurting, I slept 7 hours last night, I don't have the leg shivvies, and I actually have the energy to do stuff (maybe not the motivation all the time, but I do have the energy to do it). I'm only sneezing occasionally.

Gonna go do some metaphorical jumping jacks. Will check in with everyone later.

dragonfire613

@broken... get back up on that horse!

@ollie... dude I swear if you can do 5 days like you said, I think you could go all the way. It started looking up for me after 5 days. Good luck!

@CD... you're not threadjacking... I started the thread, but it is here for all. Welcome! Are you still in contact with your doctor? I won't lie, a few days there were touch-and-go for me, but I've been on the upswing for a while now. Would be good if the hubby could handle the kids for you those couple of days while mommy has the flu.

Keep up the good work troops. You are making me proud, all of you.

CarrionDoll

@Dragon, thank you! IDK why but saying I'm making you proud is making me cry. I guess it's having someone who understands. IDK you, but I guess this horrible disease has connected all of us. Hubby will do what he can. If he is still working, he will take them as soon as he gets home and will put going in off as long as possible. If his job has ended then I think he will take them out and keep them occupied while I recover some.

I am glad to hear that the worst doesn't last longer then 4 days really. I had read some things that had me thinking it could be a couple weeks like with the methadone. I can't do that again. That was the worst thing I have ever been through, BAR NONE. The having no motivation or energy scares me a bit. And my fear of wd's is a big problem for me. I am such a baby about it. I birthed two of my four children completely natural but this kicks my ass.

I am still in contact. But I owe him quite a bit of money. He was kind enough to treat me even though I didn't have the money at the time and he was going on the promise of an addict that I would make payments to him when I got back to work. But I cannot keep running up the tab and I think he has reached the limit on what he can allow me to owe. It might be hard for me to even scratch up the $200 for his monthly visit if I did have to go. I was wanting to go back one more month and get a full script so that I could take some more time to wean down properly. I have the feeling it's not enough. I have had to drop kinda quick.

Finally12

Carrion: Everyone is different, but I was at 1 mg when I jumped. Days 1 and 2 were pretty ok actually, days 3 and 4 were rough, but it was all uphill after that. I truely believe that you will do as good or bad as you expect yourself to do. If you think oh, it's gonna be the worst thing ever, it prob will be! Amd vice versa. And after day 4 I found I felt better when I had to do stuff, got me active and stopped me from laying on the couch obsessing. So you might have an advantage having stuff you gotta do, especially since you will have help from the hubs so you won't have to go all day. I'm on day 15 and I feel great. I have never taken dones, but from what I hear the sub w/d are NOTHING like getting off that stuff. I was also scared to get off of the subs because of horror stories I heard, but I am sooooo happy I did. My theory is maybe the reason all you read online is bad things is because a majority of the successful ones didn't take the time to go online and write about it, they just moved on with their lives. Just a thought, my $0.02. You can always pm me if you need to talk! Good luck!

And good luck and great job everyone else!!!!

BrokenLilHorse

I will need to post later when I have more time, but I dont want you all to think I disappeared. Today is day 1. Back to the beginning. I am starting to agree that this relapse may have been necessary. It was awful. I can tell more later but I have to get to work. It is great to see how well everyone else is doing.

Carrion - Welcome!!

I will post more later...

Love to all.

Finally12

Good job Broken, you can do it!! All the best

BrokenLilHorse

@Dragon - Just checking in to say congrats on 2 weeks! Sorry, I meant to say that when I logged in earlier. 1 day down for me. Yesterday was awful. I took WAY to many (30 vics...just trying to get rid of them) and then went for an 8 mile run. It was just too much on my body. I NEVER get sick but I spent the whole night dry heaving. Just another reminder how stupid these pills are. Here I go throwing away 16 days sober for 2 days feeling sick as hell?! Why am I so dumb?! Oh well. Back on the sober train. Hoping this one doesnt have any detours.

Hope everyone is having a lovely Friday! I am going to be out of town for a couple days so I may not be online, but know I will be thinking of each and everyone of you. Lots of love.

Ollie909

Dragon thanks again for this thread. @Carriondoll Thanks for your post. You are a strong person and I'm cheering, praying, everything for you. That's for everyone here. This is a tough situation. I am adamant about becoming clean without much unpleasantness, if possible. The book is out the window.
Quick summary. On pain pills, couldn't handle withdrawals got on suboxone. Repeat. I've had enough. Done gonezo. Big red underlining on that word, but you know what I'm talking about.

Through experience, I have found out for myself personally that low doses of subs are all that is necessary to relieve codone w/d's. I have also found that I no longer have any cravings at all for codones. A big plus. I get offers all the time and I can easily say. Thanks. but I longer need or take pain pill medication.

This has been with 1mg of sub for approx 6 months, with a slow no hurried taper.
They are for maintenance. Have been steadily dropping dosage. Currently have been dosing .25 mgs 5 days while at work and skip 2 days on the weekend. There has been some w/d effects through this process. The bathroom ordeals and for me muscle cramps.
I still have an appetite and can sleep, other than waking up with muscle cramps. Luckily those go away in about 1/2 hour.

Now this week I'm going to skip as many days as I can. I'm interested in day 4 especially.
See how this goes. Best to all. Slowly cut it back. Best to you all. Looking forward to reading your post. Thanks again dragon. I know I'm taking the floor on your thread as comment for the day. Have a good one.

dragonfire613

Hey guys, checking in. My little family will be home today! 16 Days today, and almost all of my detox symptoms are gone. The only things I have left are nagging daily headaches (sometimes ibuprofen or naproxen helps, sometimes not), but they seem to be getting milder and start later in the day every day (last few days they come on in the afternoon). I seem to be having trouble sleeping every other night (last night actually slept 8 hours!).

Otherwise now I have to say I feel almost... normal? I haven't had any anxiety in several days, and I can focus on work or whatever needs my attention, without being whiny about it.

Still haven't made the dentist appointment... my tooth isn't actually hurting at all. I'm not too worried about pills as long as they don't have to pull it... but I plan to just tell them I'm allergic and can only take ibuprofen if they offer. A few days of an achey toof is a cakewalk compared to going through this again.

I have to say, making it through the withdrawals this time has given me a new perspective and confidence in life. Anytime some small hurdle comes up, I find myself thinking "hey, at least its not detox!" Have to run 20 miles in the snow in my underwear? Hey, at least its not detox ;o)

@Ollie... man, you keep impressing me with your sticking with it, and your ability to go days between doses... I've said before I could never do that and was why I ended up jumping @ 1mg. Keep doing what you're doing man. I really hope your jump is as mild as possible... I think the days you are skipping is great exercise for your mind (and probably body too) to prepare for when you go all in... you'll already know what its like to go days without anything, so hopefully it won't be such a shock to your psyche...

Best of luck guys! Routing for us all!

Ollie909

Good to hear your positive post, Dragon.
I haven't dosed anything this weekend. Little w/d effects going, but nothing at all bad.
So I'm going to continue without dosing another day or two depending on how it goes. I will be at work
while doing this and I'm going to try to overcome any psychosomatics or real detox affects.
At this point all I have to do is take some minimal crumbs to be relieved. So I'm hoping to just push my why through without any dosage just to see if can be be done with minimal w/d's. We'll find out. How is it going for you now. Best to all.

dragonfire613

Hey gang... day 18 here (I think? Getting harder to keep track). Still doing well. The remaining symptoms are dissipating slowly. Diarrhea comes and goes... some days are good, some days not as good (but no days as bad as early on). I keep trying to find a correlation between what I am eating and when it happens, but haven't had any luck yet. Seems like my body is just slowly getting itself back in line in that regard. The headaches are still frequent and almost daily, but consistently less severe as time goes on... most of the time some advil knocks them out, sometimes it doesn't help at all. Otherwise I'm good and functional for the most part. Some financial stress has trickled over into some mild cravings (mostly little thoughts of "this was easier to cope with when I was on opiates", followed by "Tough, gotta find new ways to cope with this stuff"). So overall I'd say I'm at about 85-90%... with periods and some days feeling 100% or 110% even at times... its not all roses and sunshine but that's life, and I'm adapting. I feel different than before (understandable), but different is not a bad thing, given where it took me, and I keep having faith that in the long run it will be even better on a consistent basis. Not turning back now.

@Ollie... great to hear man! Keep it up and let us know how its going...

Has everyone else gone away?

Finally12

Yes, I believe we're on day 18. The new school year begins very soon so I've been so busy with meetings and curriculum planning I haven't even had time to think about feeling bad! I feel good for the most part, some residual laziness, although it really helps when I have meetings and things I HAVE to do, being lazy is not an option haha. Headaches here and there, but a couple Aleve really help. Minimal sneezing, thank goodness. My biggest thing is I literally cannot stop eating. It's insane, I've put on 7 lbs!? Not good!! Any insight anyone? I'm thinking maybe I'm using food as stress relief..but I dunno. All I know is it needs to stop!! I have no self control for food anymore!

dragonfire613

Great job twin! Good to hear from ya... I can't really relate to the food thing... I've lost 15lbs through this whole thing, and really haven't gotten my appetite back yet... mostly cuz every time I think about eating something I think about it coming out the other end lol...

But its not unusual I think... I would think its your brain getting back to functioning like it should (food and sex stimulate dopamine & endorphin production), so even though you've put on some lbs... I think its a good sign.

Since you're concerned though maybe some others have better advice than me. I can say that I remember during my sober year back in the day that I developed a vicious little affinity for freeze pops.

Opio

Great to hear folks are hanging in there. Sorry I was away for the past few days.

@Dragon - I hope things are going well now that the kids are back. Also, great to hear that you are having trouble keeping track of the days. It is a good feeling when you don't have to count the days anymore and you can just start living again.

@Broken - Hopefully things are turning around for you. For what it is worth I made it 11 days one time and then fell flat on my face for about 48 hours. I picked myself up and it is a little over 5 months later now.

@Ollie - mad respect for you being able to keep up the taper. I never had the discipline to make it through a taper, and it sounds like it is going well for you.

@Finally - my appetite was terrible in the beginning (if I ate a sandwich all day that was good), but it got better after the first week or so. Once it did start getting better I had an appetite like never before, but it eventually evened out.

BrokenLilHorse

I am so sorry I have been away too. It is great to come back and see how well everyone is doing though!

I have to second everything Opio said!

@Dragon - it is awesome that you have lost count. At some points, I felt like I was counting the seconds. Also, it is great that you feel strong enough to tell the dentist no (even if it is in your own way!) Congrats on 18!

@Ollie - 2nd to Opio. I could never do a taper. I have so much respect for those who can. Unfortunately I am all or nothing. It is a bad way to be. You are doing awesome.

@Finally - I had the exact same problem. It was difficult to eat for 2 days and then it really picked up. Unfortunately since I am starting over with recovery, I cant tell you if it tapered. I think when I quit a year 1/2 ago it did. Congrats on 18 days!! Hopefully the hunger will lessen. I dont know about you - but I didnt really love when it picked up (the weight that is!)

@Opio - Nice to see you again! I am still sober but I feel like I am on really rocky ground. I am in a weird place and I dont know why. I dont know why I am still fighting help. I know that I absolutely need it, but it is so much easier to pretend there isnt a problem. I am taking it easy for now and just not using. I know I need to really deal with my addiction soon.

Again, I am so happy to see everyone is doing so well. Keep strong everyone!

dragonfire613

Well, I passed the first test! I randomly ran into an old dealer of mine that I hadn't seen in 5 years or so at the grocery... she doesn't even live in our town but just happened to be visiting someone. I told her I was clean and done with the opiates... she said she was proud of me, we caught up a few minutes then went our separate ways.

@broken... glad to hear from you! Great job on getting back on the wagon, I know it has to be hard. Keep hanging in there, we are here for ya!

Keep it up troops! I didn't have any symptoms whatsoever yesterday, so I'm hoping that's the beginning of a lasting trend. Even sleeping better the last couple nights.

24hrsatatime

I'm new to this forum as well and I just wanted to say that reading your story gave me hope. I'm currently tapering from Suboxone. I too was on Suboxone before and I tapered myself off and promptly returned to using. The truth is that I wasn't ready to stop and had been on Suboxone only to get through probation and get my children back home, once those things happened I lost my motivation and let the disease win that battle. I've been on Suboxone since June 10, 2011 and this time I have really been working to be ready to be off of the medication and live my life on life's terms. I started on 32mg, I know it's high, and I'm currently on 4mg daily. Reading stories like yours remind me that I'm not the first on this journey and I won't be the last. I will keep you in my thoughts and prayers. Thank you so much for sharing.

dragonfire613

Welcome 24! Nice handle. Welcome to our little band of merry men (or people, to be precise)! Stick around, there is a lot of great support to be found here.

I just wanted to take a minute and send a big THANK YOU to everyone who is sharing in this thread... everyone keeps thanking ME for the thread, but really it is all of you who got me through to this point.

Almost 3 weeks in now... wow! I'd have to check the calendar to be sure what day I'm on... I planned to keep track up to 1 month, but now I just know that August 19th will be the 1 month mark, and the exact day is fuzzy (somewhere close to 20).

@Ollie... waiting for an update... hoping everything is going well... sending good vibes your way.

@Broken. WAY TO FREAKIN' GO!! You make me smile every time you check in.

@everyone else... I'm so proud of our little troupe we have going here. Lets keep it up!