GHB for detoxing

[sleepyj]

A long time ago I remember discussion of hope that GHB could significantly mitigate the symptoms of an opiate kick. Unfortunately the discovery that GHB can become addictive with extreme abuse makes searching for this old stuff hard. (That addiction phynomenon is totally not relevant to this).

I am assuming that it's similar intended use to benzos. Versus benzos, there are some tradeoffs. Tolerance won't develop nearly as fast with GHB - huge win. GHB dosage must be carefully measured and not taken "as needed" - although perhaps a knockout dose could be prepared and sipped. Benzos can help you exist in a haze where you remember nothing, so pain doesn't really matter. GHB on the other hand can -force- you to sleep.

I'm thinking about how it could be if the worst 36 hours of the kick could be taken in 5-hour chunks... 4 hours of a GHB nap. An hour to take care of yourself, allow a new dose to hit, and go back to sleep. It would answer many an "i just wish i could sleep through all this" problem. And the extra hour is so tahat you're never redosing, no building up of a possible big GHB hangover at the end.

Are there special concerns about combining GHB with opiate withdrarwal? Especially the extreme sedation of a GHB nap (e.g. 4g dose) .

After that, really to someone who likes it GHB could provide a great deal of comfort for weeks. (and they have to screw up a little worse than with opiods to get physically addicted).

Anyone know if GHB is particularly good for opiod withdrawal simptoms? Or it's just its normal effects and symtomatic?

I wonder what has been learned about the combination of GHB and benzos. Although it sounds really dangerous, in practice it's been commonly done and I'm not aware of any reported incidents.

Reputation Comments on this post:

Welcome to the forum. Decent topic, certainly something to consider, but always be 100% sure of your facts. A search on ...

[runitsthepolice]

Dosing GHB as you stated every few hours throughout the day will quickly lead to physical dependence. GHB withdrawals suck and can last up to a week. Do not dose "24/7" even for a few days.

[sleepyj]

That's why I made it clear to add an extra hour after it wears off so that you aren't "re"dosing.

Dosing every 4 hours avoids the buildup of physical withdrawals in most people. Every 5 was to be conservative..

You can feel it. When the 'buzz' that is the hangover goes away, it's safe to take more. If you take more preventing yourself from feeling this, you'll feel it twice as strong next time.

[davestate]

Originally Posted by sleepyj

That's why I made it clear to add an extra hour after it wears off so that you aren't "re"dosing.

Dosing every 4 hours avoids the buildup of physical withdrawals in most people. Every 5 was to be conservative..

You can feel it. When the 'buzz' that is the hangover goes away, it's safe to take more. If you take more preventing yourself from feeling this, you'll feel it twice as strong next time.

According to who or what? GHB wears off after 4 hours, and dosing every 4 hours WILL lead to dependence very quickly, as the level of GHB in the blood never gets a chance to fall, so the GABA receptors upregulate, tolerance will rise and dependency is likely, especially when one is feeling shit and drained from opiate withdrawl. If you really have evidence to back it up, I'll gladly retract all this, but respect journals are all that count...

Wait till Mr G sees this thread...he strongly believes that the prescribed pharmacological dosing regimen of titrated doses up to 4grams for narcolepsy twice a night doesn't cause addiction or tolerance issues, and he has the documentation to prove it. Dosing every 4 hours more than once in 24 hours will get you into trouble. GHB withdrawl is highly dangerous...

BTW SWIM used GHB for sleeping at night when kicking morphine. It worked brilliantly for sleeping, but required a big dose and even then you needed to focus on sleeping, it was too easy to try and "appriciate" and enjoy the high. And in the morning there was a severe temptation to take more just to spend the day out of hell. Be careful, it's easy to replace one addiction with another (SWIM smoked alot more, but he gave up weed at the same time!)

Reputation Comments on this post:

good explanation behind 'science',helpful advice for readers.thanks

[OhCasey]

While a lot of concrete info on GHB dependency is hard to find on the internet the studies Ive read have stated that in the cases of addiction pretaining to the study the dependence came from ingestion every 3 hours around the clock.
"In our patients, severe GHB dependence followed frequent ingestion every 1 to 3 hours around-the-clock." I took this from an abstract http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/en...Med%20%5BTA%5D

[MrG]

davestate is quite right regarding my stance with chronic dosing of GHB and its, clinically proven, efficacy limited to 2x4.5g sleep doses in any 24hr period but, in relation to a "topical" application for the purposes of facilitating withdrawal from another substance, I can only highlight published studies that have covered opiate withdrawal and advise caution for anybody who may be considering self-medicating, to the degree that it would probably be wiser to print a bunch of these reports and take them to a sympathetic GP who might be able to offer proper medical support.

Gamma-hydroxybutyric acid for treatment of opiate withdrawal syndrome.

In a double-blind placebo-controlled trial, gamma-hydroxybutyric acid (GHB) (25 mg/kg orally) suppressed most of the withdrawal symptomatology in 14 heroin addicts and 13 methadone-maintained subjects. The GHB effect was prompt (within 15 minutes) and persisted for between 2 and 3 hours. Subsequently, the same patients received GHB in an open study every 2 to 4 hours for the first 2 days and 4 to 6 hours for the following 6 days: most abstinence signs and symptoms remained suppressed and patients reported felling well. Urine analysis failed to detect any presence of opiate metabolites. No withdrawal symptomatology recurred after 8 days of treatment when GHB was suspended, and patients were challenged with an intravenous injection of 0.4 mg naloxone. The results indicate that GHB may be useful in the management of opiate withdrawal.

Clinical efficacy of gamma-hydroxybutyric acid in treatment of opiate withdrawal.

This paper describes the role of gamma-hydroxybutyric acid (GHB) in the treatment of opiate withdrawal syndrome. In the two patients described, after having abruptly withdrawn from long-term methadone treatment, GHB was orally administered (each dose given every 4-6 h) for 8-9 days. The GHB showed both a high efficacy (some mild and transient symptoms attributable to opiate withdrawal were observed, but only in the first days of therapy) and a good tolerability (no clinical phenomena interpreted as GHB side effects were found). These results could be of interest in improving the pharmacological treatment of drug addiction.

Reputation Comments on this post:

	Awesome posts answer a lot of questions
	Excellent referenced information. Thank you for contributing here.
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