Opiate Withdrawal TIMELINE of Symptoms.

[tayo]

48 hours after last dose. (32mg hydromorphone insufflated. 40mg oxycontin insufflated and 10mg hydrocodone)
friday mid-day

hours
+1
diarhea
+2
tired, urge to take nap, beginning to feel unwell
+3-7
extreme sweating
along with, fatigue, want to lie down
+5-20
curled up in fetal position, fatigue, hot cold sweats, no appetite, stomach cramps begin
+20-36
snotty, watery eyes, fatigue, anxiety, aches begin, stomach cramping, loss of appetite, hot cold sweats, all getting worse
+36-56
snot nose, watery eyes, aches, everything hurts, bones, joints, muscles, everything is painful, cramps, can't eat, hot cold sweats
..+72-4th day
all of above symptoms, diarhea gone because no food passing through gut, shaking violently in fetal position, irritability, feelings of hopelessness, "this will never end. can i die from this? im dying someone help."
also should include day 1-4- insomnia and in and out of consciousness from pain, trying to sleep to make it go away. also blurred, distorted vision and dilated pupils

-at this point SWIM gave in to medical care, as SWIM was intent on not using opiates in hir withdrawl



0.1mg clonidine (3x a day) for most withdrawl symptoms
chloral hydrate for sleep (they shouldve thrown in valium)

clonidine as a blood pressure medication pretty much just kept SWIM in bed. but the shakes went away for the most part, pulse at the hospital was 110, a follow up visit...

2 days later
out of meds, blood pressure and pulse normal, but still irritability and anxiety, clonazepam 1x a day, 0.1mg clonidine

headaches, neck aches 5-7 days later after initial symptoms began, anxiety, irritability...

That is SWIMs timeline, however unclear it may be, SWIM hopes you get the point.

What it's like.

It was like 5 days of a broken leg untreated with pain pills, but all over the body.


Anyone like to contribute their timelines of hell?

Hope this helps people STAY AWAY FROM OPIATE USE, or at least know what you are getting in to. Or maybe the account of SWIMs suffering was amusing to evil people.

[rxbandit]

Swim has a friend with chronic back pain. He has also been using opiates for the past 3 years and only noticed his chronic pain when he tried to quit opiates. He is convinced he has a legitimate disease, his doctors who he has enlisted many have had no luck finding any discearnable cause of his pain. He is quite self righteous and invested in his "illness". He is honestly convinced he needs opiates to combat his illness. He swears its not withdrawal as he has "gone through it many times". He is still taking a low dose of perscribed opiates and insists he would not have withdrawal since he is still taking opiates. He complains of unbearable back and bone pain.

I have suggested that his symptoms could be withdrawal timidely and he took much offense to this suggestion. Is it possible that he has a legitimate nerve disease no doctor can explain or is it likely that his addiction is besting him and he is in denial. Its quite sad for swim to watch this and would like any opinions.

Is it likely that his symptoms are related to withdrawal despite his routine dose of opiates. Is withdrawal possible from taking the same exact dose over long periods of time due to tolerance? your opinions would be valued.

[tayo]

SWIM would say the only true way to find out would be to have the patient detox, given 14-20 days after last use of opiates, and detox with clonidine and maybe benzodiazepines, then at say day 20 or even 30 (depending on the elimination time of opiate), evaluate "back/bone" pain. When stopping opiates, EVERYTHING hurts. After 30 days free of opiates and patient still complains, tell them to take 1000mg tylenol 2 times a day for a week. Sounds like this case has to do with a stubborn outlook on possibilities. SWIM is giving general (rather harsh) medical advice not expertise. But it does sound like the pain is withdrawal, and illegitimate self-manifested illness is causing this 3 year opiation. Hope that helps. Hope it wasn't too mean either, but SWIM figures 3 years of opiates might take 30 days or longer to recover natural endorphins. SWIM just started a new thread as well check it out.... it's interesting. http://www.drugs-forum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=32577

Reputation Comments on this post:

Thankyou for your opinion

[rxbandit]

thankyou, no offense. this is honestly for a friend who will hopefully take the advice of others since he seems to refuse my opinion as being legitimate in any right. This is much appreciated though and hopefully it will help someone in chronic pain and misery.

[Orchid_Suspiria]

When swim goes through opiate withdrawal its hard to gauge the timeline because time becomes well,meaningless.Everything is just a jumbled and confusing mess of pain.The timelines forever really in swims case because even if the physical part is long over mentally and emotionally he is scarred for life.

[tayo]

yes, everything SWIM wrote was rough on the actual hours of things happening, but SWIM thinks the order in which the symptoms happened and lasted was pretty accurate. Yep it's hell.

[coldturkeystop]

I am so grateful to have stopped coldturkey from 20 lorcet 10's per day to NOTHING. and never had any wd's at all. It was a miracle. I kept saying to myself that I can do this, I can do this. I kept a very positive attitude the entire time and breezed thru it, literally. I swear!!!! the mental is by far the worst. I didnt really crave pills at all. I just got really bored and wanted the "feeling"

[tayo]

Mental was easy for SWIM, was set on not getting em anymore never second thoughted that, but opiates are the only thing SWIM had any physical withdrawals from, cold turkeyed alcohol, weed, cigarettes all on the same day about 8 months ago... no problems. swim supposes that the fact that swim was mixing, morphine with oxycodone, with hydrocodone, with hydromorphone and methadone, and crude opium over 2 and a half months probably is the reason withdrawals were so bad. how long was swiy's habit? and it was just hydrocodone? and for severity, swim's last dose before writing this post was 10mg hydrocodone, 40mg oxycontin, and 32mg hydromorphone (all insufflated) in one sitting, about 15-20 minutes....

btw, how long was the habit for... and how long ago did swiy stop? because swiy won't notice withdrawal symptoms until almost exactly three days after stopping. which was wiggity wiggity whack! because swim was at work when they started.

[coldturkeystop]

SWIM's habit was about 5 years, with the last 2 years being every single day , at least 15 but usually 20 lorcet 10's/day. The last day SWIM used 22 at then nothing at all but ibuprofen. Stayed off for 2 weeks and then the boredom set in and SWIM gave in and took one and then over a period of weeks was back up to 10-13 /day

[tayo]

okay just warning in case swiy had just stopped for instance yesterday

[Donmeka]

SWIM has had a hydromorphone habit daily for less than 3 weeks but probably 2. he has 3 10mg methadone he keeps to stop when it becomes an issue. it is not an issue for him but he does want to stop but doesnt have his xanax because SWIMs friends stole some from him so he has to make them last. SWIM will do usually 16-32mg a day but has not experienced any WDs at all.

SWIMs plan was tomorrow to start 10mg methadone then 5mg for 2 days then 2.5mg for 4 days. SWIM just has anxiety and cant use his xanax atm so the hydromorphone helps him with that besides the enjoyment of the euphoria.

SWIM doesnt think 2 weeks isnt so bad but he doesnt want it to turn into 2 months and it wont according to his watch. but SWIM is just curious if anyone has any advice. today he made it till 8pm without any opiate and he almost chopped up 16mg because he was going to start his methadone plan today but believes its too late to take it and he might as well just start tomorrow. SWIM knows he can do it with or w/o the methadone and the only reason he thought up that program was because if SWIMs friends didnt steal his alprazolam prescription that is all he would need and wouldnt need the methadone.

SWIM also knows the dangers of methadone and wont be raising doses or going bananas with it but without his alprazolam he just gets anxious as a withdrawl symptom but cant really call it a WD symptom since its normal anyway

[realfolkblues]

When cravings start, just smoke some ganja. After a week its all good.

Reputation Comments on this post:

Smoking dope is often the worst thing to do, certainly for anyone with a serious addiction.

[madpad]

Swim wouldn't recommend methadone. Swims found it much harder to stop methadone than anything else. Then again swim has had almost 20 years using opioids during which swim has only stopped twice for 5 days or so each time. Before this swim had taken diamorphine for a few months and stopped without too much trouble twice but once swim started on methadone scripts withdrawals became worse.

[JaWill88]

swim is on buprenorphine (suboxone) and on the maintenance program. swim dreams all day of never doing maintenance and just using it to detox for like seven days. buprenorphine withdrawals are really terrible. so is methadone. if swim has one piece of advice it is use these drugs for detox NOT maintenance. they are way harder to get off than the other opiods cause they last so damn long. swim believes they really are great for detox though.

[sarbanes]

Always, ALWAYS try to make sure you have enough for at least a quick taper. Even a very rapid taper (4 days) will be much better than a Thanksgiving turkey in the freezer section of your local supermarket. Measuring/titrating is such a bitch, so what i usually do is just wait until i feel WD symptoms, and wait a bit m ore, and then take enough to feel better, wait again (not as bad the 2nd time), and take a bit less, and you keep repeating this. There truly is real benefit in feeling a little bit of pain and discomfort, but that is all you should have to endure to get clean - a little annoying pain and discomfort, almost like a hangover, and like your in a funk (raw, bad mood). Your results may vary.

[bcubed]

48 hours after last dose. (32mg hydromorphone insufflated. 40mg oxycontin insufflated and 10mg hydrocodone)

Tayo: was this a typical dose for SWIY? And how long/frequent was SWIY's use leading up to this?

[realfolkblues]

Swim has been on poppy tea for about a month. 5pods a day. He really wants to quit. Will using kratom for the first week or two help the withdrawls?

[stoneinfocus]

I hope you guys don´t go out bad-mouthing real pain sufferers for wanting to use opiates as the onyl remedy, because you found out to be the last action hero, managing coming off your selfchosen habit of mixing and pluggin all sorts of opiates.

It´s strange how unbalanced this is: those in pain don´t get nothing while some seem to entertain a pretty outraging and decadent opiate-habit and this with only 25kg opiates/million peeps in the states, if my figures are still correct.