Hydrocodone for the nervous/anxious?

[augentier]

Can hydrocodone be effective in easing nervousness and MILD anxiety? I know that it is a pain killer and not anti-anxiety medicine but are there properties of it that can be useful for this in low doses?

Toonces wants to know because she is taking a public speaking class and while she is generally comfortable, she cannot help the butterflies in the stomach - she is looking for something that will ease this but she has no way to obtain Xanax (which she understands would be best for this?) or anything else for that matter. So do you think this is a good, bad, or useless idea? Thanx

[Tortoise]

Theoretically any opiate could be used to relieve nervous anxiety, but it's not ideal as it's typically short-acting and it'd have to be a low dose so you Swiy doesn't appear "out of it"

Your best bet would be beta-blockers. They would most definitely work for Toonces said purpose but probably won't be easy to get her hands on.

[augentier]

Thanx for the suggestion, Toonces' sister takes Xanax but won't take hers - that's the closest she can get to anything else really..however she will do some research on beta-blockers, never heard of 'em

5 mg hydrocodone sufficiently calms Toonces so she may try that next week and see if it helps.

[Donmeka]

any opiate will calm you down yes but SWIM would think xanax or something more specialized for anxiety would be more beneficial in the long run.

[Shwags]

Xanax is no doubt the absolute best for this, but yea any opiates would help take the edge off. SWIM wouldnt take too much tho, you still wanna be competent and articulate.

[fnord]

swiy should try it and see,everyone has different effects from different things.like my grandmother finds mushrooms or lsd to help with social anxiety while others would say shes crazy for thinking that.

[melsue420]

when swim took her oral communications class in university, she was extremely nervous. swim almost fainted on the first speech, so swim just blatently asked in class if anyone had anything for anxiety...sure enough it worked..someone had the thing swim needed...all other speeches went well, thanks to her new friend. might have been stupid at the time, but oh well...

[fnord]

Originally Posted by melsue420

when swim took her oral communications class in university, she was extremely nervous. swim almost fainted on the first speech, so swim just blatently asked in class if anyone had anything for anxiety...sure enough it worked..someone had the thing swim needed...all other speeches went well, thanks to her new friend. might have been stupid at the time, but oh well...

can you share what worked for your friend?

[tycon69]

Swim uses opiates alot for social anxiety around my friends. When mixed with a little bit of caffeine, it stimulates swim and the euphoria helps him not to be scared to say anything in front of anyone. He also has had promise with neurotin. Some people call swim crazy for using it recreationally , but it works for swim.

[melsue420]

as a reply to fnord's post, i believe swim was given xanax (alprazolam)...

[biggpri]

opiods will help relieve anxiety, but are not recommended because if one gets hooked to the point of developing withdrawals, the withdrawals will aggravate the anxiety.

[eltimmy]

Personally, I actually think opioids are a better choice than benzodiazepines for long-term anxiety relief; nobody ever dies from opioid withdrawal.

Also, IME acute use of benzodiazepines almost always creates hangover-type symptoms in SWIM after the drug wears off; whereas SWIM has taken medicinal opioids at reasonable dosages for over two weeks and discontinued without suffering any withdrawal symptoms.

are not recommended because if one gets hooked to the point of developing withdrawals, the withdrawals will aggravate the anxiety

Benzos do the same. So do SSRIs.

SWIM wouldnt take too much tho, you still wanna be competent and articulate.

Similar cautions with benzodiazepines (and SSRIs). Actually I think benzos become significantly and obviously dulling much more quickly on the dose curve.

Your best bet would be beta-blockers. They would most definitely work for Toonces said purpose

They will ease physical jitters, but plenty of studies have found beta-blocker monotherapy to be INEFFECTIVE in social anxiety at least. Personally they are absolutely not ideal for this purpose in SWIM's case, as they are emotionally dulling and this prevents SWIM from giving a good rousing speech.