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"The government spent tens of millions of dollars developing Suboxone." Where is this coming from? It was developed by a private company.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you don't mind me asking, do you continue to take it? Or if not, how did you know when to stop?
Yes I still take it and have not lowered my dose since going on it. I've noticed that my mood on it is much higher than it was before I started doing the heroin (which I started in the first place because I was depressed and suicidal), leading me to believe that it has significant anti-depressant potential even in opiate-tolerant individuals. Also, there's some history in the literature of it being an effective anti-…
I started taking suboxone 5 months ago and it (almost literally) saved my life. Before finding out about it, I thought I was going to be stuck in a hell-hole of heroin dependence forever. You wake up one day and realize that you are completely fucked, and that there's nothing in the world to help you. Suboxone changed that. I started taking it, with no/minimal side-effects, and immediately stopped doing heroin, stopp…
So does this mean that the opiate addiction is still present, but satisfied by suboxone? In other words, if you stopped taking suboxone, would the heroin craving come back?
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buprenorphine
In short, users can get "strung out" on suboxone but if used in certain ways (I.e not for the long term "maintenance" that the pharma companies make their money on, but as a short therapy to quiet some of the discomfort experienced during opiate withdrawal, it can be effective and safe and not lead to long term use.
The drug is not something you want to get addicted too.
If you do end up on this drug, try to find a doctor who's not trying to make money off your misery. Might be hard?
There's two forms of bupenorpine. One has a opiate blocker (nalaxone) in it--It is expensive. Try to get your doctor to prescribe generic bupenorpine. Once you get bupenorpine in your brain, your craving for opiates will diminish. If it dosen't you need to do the whole 12 step dance.
The high of bupenorpine wears off after a few months, so it's no panacea. Remember, you will be addicted to another drug, but at least it's legal. Try to take the smallest dose possible. The slight euphoria wears off! People don't understand that? After a few months you will be addicted to another drug. Your Doctor will become your drug dealer. The fun wears off real quick. I have no reason to lie. And yes--I'm just one person. You're not reading the results of a well done double blind study.
There's a lot of misinformation about this drug--even among the MD's who needed to take a special class in order to prescribe it.
Again, don't start it unless you've bathed your brain in opiates for a long time. A while is not a few months. Even if your hooked to the gills on smack, the media makes detox so dramatic. I've seen people scared to death, thinking they will die from withdrawal. Dying s very rare, unless you have the health of Jerry Garcia.(huge addiction, obese, and diabetic, etc). If you are realitively healthy you can taper off. This goes for Alcoholics too. You don't necessarily need to spend your last 40 grand on high priced Promices. Taper, Taper, Taper. Ten percent a day. Doctors won't tell you this because of the small chance you die--liability.
Again, don't start this drug if you can. They don't know the long term effects. If you are one of the unfortunate ones, and use bupenorpine, make the best of the situation. I have heard of peope getting off it, but they taper their dose, and have a fair amount if decipline. If you are trying to get off bupenorpine, stay off the drug recovery websites; everyone exaggerates, and the stories will just scare you.
My honest, blood written advise is Never take opiates. Especially, if you even think you have a slightly addictive personality, or biology? Don't take that free Percocet offered by you friends. I honestly feel long term opiate use, or buprenorpine use damages the pleasure centers of your brain.
Good Luck--and please save any lectures. This is just my opinion.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
So does this mean that the opiate addiction is still present, but satisfied by suboxone? In other words, if you stopped taking suboxone, would the heroin craving come back?
Yes, the addiction is still present. If I stop taking suboxone I will start feeling a little bad (depression, etc) by day 2 and will start withdrawing (feels like a really bad cold) on day 3. By day 4, I would be throwing up and unable to move/function. The only downside of suboxone is that due to its long half-life, the withdrawals last a long, long time. With heroin you are out of the woods by day 4 or 5, but with…
Only take bupenorpine if you are really addicted to heroine. Doctors who prescribe for opiate addiction are allowed only 100 patients. They(Doctors) will drag you in for needless expensive visits. I say only if you are really addicted to opiates, because I see people switching to this drug because they "think" they are addicted. The drug is not something you want to get addicted too. If you do end up on this drug, tr…
Why taper that fast? What's the rush? Most people seem to assume that if a drug has a shorter half life it means you can taper off it faster, but I've never seen any evidence (albeit I'm not an expert) that the speed at which your neural chemistry can reset itself is at all correlated with the half life of the drug.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
So does this mean that the opiate addiction is still present, but satisfied by suboxone? In other words, if you stopped taking suboxone, would the heroin craving come back?
Heroin cravings never leave, it's the physical withdrawal you want to avoid.
For me, (8 years clean) it's like remembering Christmas morning when you were a child. Now that I think about it, it's almost exactly like that. I don't crave it like a cigarette (You don't have an "urge"), instead it's like recalling a happy memory and feeling nostalgic. Why it's misleading is because the same could be said about virtually anything you can feel nostalgic about.
Hell, it has entire religious movements dedicated to it. It's the Lisp of drugs.