Their is a med. out there call suboxone. it is replacement therapy for full opiates. It will stop withdrawl dead in its tracks. It is a opiate itself but does not fit completely into opiate receptors in the brain. It is used for a short time to get you off full opiates. you will taper using the suboxone slowly over the course of three to four weeks. It is much easier comeing off of suboxone due to the fact that it only fits partially into opiate receptors. This med is not know by many doctors because it is usually only prescribed by pain specialists and addiction phyc. Doctors. It worked for me.

The pain I had on my tongue is why I increased to the fentanyl, at that time I wasn't thinking far enough ahead, especially about how hard it would be to come off this stuff. I have recently stopped the hydromorphone and that was not that easy. The stool softener is hard to judge. I have bounced back and forth with diarrhea.
I meet with my pain med Dr. on Tuesday to start withdrawal from the patches. I will mention the suboxone also, thanks.

When I met with my team on Tuesday, we spoke about the narcs. They gave me one more script for oxy and a written game plan to wean myself off. Slowly is the key and start replacing the narcs with OTC pain relief. They recommended Ibuprofen. I should be clear of the narcs by September if all goes well. So far so good.

"T"

I am still working on reducing the pain meds. I have reduced from two 25 fentanyl patches down to one 12 patch as of today. I am also on Gabapentin. When I went from two 25's to one 25, I left the 2cd patch on for a couple of days past the 72 hours and then just pulled it off. Looking forward to being off the pain meds.

Never mind withdrawal lol, I can't even get back on oxycodone for tooth pain, It makes me sick, dizzy, vomiting for days now. I guess I was more conditioned for the strong stuff during treatment, and probably worked up the ladder, like you have to work down.

Steve,

I was on 2-75 mg patches for weeks. I extended them to 5 days, down to 1-50 and 1-75 for 5, 2-50, 2-25, 1-25 and continued for 7 days. I had no adverse effects. With methadone the guidelines are 20% or less reduction to avoid violent withdrawal symptoms.

For adverse withdrawal benzodiazepines are sometimes given although atavan or Valium would take the edge off. Probably the most important thing to add in is increased water consumption, healthy diet and as much exercise as you can physically tolerate. Aerobic will clear the narcotics faster as well liver healthy foods. High protein, low-fat, bland vegetables.

Paul I have wondered about needing to have pain meds in the future and if it would require more or stronger than normal. Hopefully I will not need to find out anytime soon. Hope you find relief!

Uptown, thanks for the tips. Did you use Methadone to help with withdrawal? My pain management Dr. says the next step is continue with the Gabapentin and after a week on the 12s then skip 3 days and back on a 12 and then skip again I think. I will see him again before that anyway.

Like coming off is to build down to lower dosage, space more often, use a lesser strength meds, non opiods on the the pain ladder, like WHO. To start again, is the same, except to work up from lower dosage, non opioid, to build up on the ladder as needed to the opioids in strength.

Methadone blocks the NMDA receptors that cause you to feel intense nerve pain. I had a few years of the worst imaginable pain like head to toe toothache. As my muscles atrophied my scapulas started moving all over. The right one came around to the rib cage and I couldn't breathe because the rib cage wouldn't expand. The methadone made it better but ischemia set in and my body started disconnecting from the brain. I started losing all feeling and was diagnosed thoracic paraplegia. The end was in sight but I guess it wasn't time. I had to wean to live.

No pain meds this year!

Great thread. Thanks everyone.

I was on at least 140mg morphine (70mg morning, 70mg night slow release MS ESlon (morphine) + Sevredol short release morphine for break through pain). I'd stopped the Sevredol during the day and was only on the 140mg MS. Dropped the night time one all together last Wednesday at the same time as my daughter started coming down with a temperature. Thought I'd developed the same thing, shivering & chills during the day, then that went away but they continued every night and I just started to feel very tired & old.

On Sunday I dropped the night time meds as well so was on nothing and I've just been feeling very "off" Shivering & chills every night and not sleeping.

Why did it take me this long to realise it could be withdrawal and to not even think about dropping doses slowly like I did when I was on it and slowly increasing.

I've just taken 20mg and will see if that gets rid of the chills. If not, I'll up it a bit more and do this more slowly over the next 2-3 weeks.

STUPID, STUPID, STUPID...