Drug Rehab Options Blog

Does anyone have any experience with slow tapering off of Tramadol. I heard that if you cut your dose 1/4 (25mg) each week you can basically avoid withdrawals. It is a very slow taper..but worth it.

However, I have also read people complaining about severe withdrawals as if it made no difference to the amount you cut back? Since Tramadol randomly attaches itself to your receptors and does anti-depressant like actions to the brain...I don't think it is as cut/dry to tapering as a normal opiat. With an oxy or so they attach to all receptors so when you cut back you still have the bulk to support the withdrawals. With random attachment to receptors as Tramadol professes to do..you may be cutting back 25mg but to your brain it is everything if that random 25 has no backup (if that makes sense)

Looking for people with experinece.

I am taking 6 pills a day - 2 pills in morning /around noon /then early evening. Have been on them roughly 2.5 to 3months. Any advice to taper or quit would be greatly appreicated. The only withdrawals I have felt thus far without tapering or quitting is when I get up in morning I feel achey and flu like. Sore all over..as this is the longest time I have gone since my early evening dose the night before..obviously as I was sleeping. Once I take the 2 in morning I slowly feel better.

Anyway, I took these for the anti-depressant side effect, not for pain. My doctor actually allowed me to continue despite I have alchohol addiction in pst (sober now though). He told me it was a "good little drug" and that once I am ready to quit the side effects/withdrawal are minimal.

That is NOT what I am reading and just my morning feeling before I take my first dose after several hours of being away from my last dose (over night) I feel terrible. Can only imagaine what it will be like now to stop.

My husband is on Day 3 of sobriety. He has had 5-8 drinks (mostly wine) a day for many years. I can't think of a single day in 5 years that he hasn't had at least 2-3 drinks, and it is unusual for him to stop at this amount. He very reluctantly went to a meeting on Friday after we had a blowout fight over his behaviour, and hasn't had a drink since (it is Sun). He is incredibly irritable and depressed, no other obvious physical symptoms. I recognize this as withdrawal (he had similar symptoms when he dramatically reduced an anti-depressant). I am not sure if he is aware that his mood is or can be a result of withdrawal. When I just asked him if what was wrong, he said: "I guess I am used to being on my own" (In the course of our argument, I talked about the possibility of a divorce). But after he went to the meeting, we drove with our daughter to our house upstate, I made a beautiful dinner, I've been completely non-confrontational and he has no reason to think that he is "on his own" (except in confronting his own demons).

Long-winded, I apologize, but should I let him know that his feelings may be part of his physical and psychological withdrawal from alcohol? In a more logical moment, he would see the parallel between this and the anti-depressant withdrawal. But I am wondering if it would be of any use for him to know, if he would even listen, if it would seem confrontational.

Any advice?

I'm new here, just wanted to introduce myself...

I have Rheumatoid arthritis as well as Osteoporosis, (thin bones) and Fibro as well. I have been taking pain meds and abusing them from pretty much from the time I was diagnosed 7 years ago.

My addiction has caused all the usual problems for me. Job loss, lost friends, the lying and stealing and well you get the idea.

I have been without the opiate for 13 days now and I am hoping that the physical w/d is pretty much over. I was taking oxycodone 5 mgs and when I finally really understood that I must find a way to stop I was using upwards of 20 pills a day along with Ambien (3-4 a day just to soothe the jittery nervy feelings) and don't get me started on the anti depressant! I have managed this at home, with virtually no help from anyone else.

I have a toddler who is the light of my life. The father sees our son most days, although he and I do not have a relationship beyond our son.

The difficulty is that I have all these reasons to get off these evil little pills and somehow I cannot manage to do it. I went to some NA meetings but those were some scary people let me tell you! I had one woman insist that she was going to be my sponser (aren't we supposed to be choosing them??) but only if I stopped taking all of my meds. Needless to say that didn't last very long! I did go to some AA meetings, but I gotta tell you the nearest one is about 40 miles one way. My son and I live on my disabilty check (SSDI) and I simply cannot afford to drive to the meetings as often as I would like. Besides which it feels deceitful to go to an AA meetings when alcohol isn't really the problem, how do you claim to clean up your act if you begin by lying?

Also I have genune pain. I hurt! This flare has really been miserable, I cannot manage to grasp sheets to make the beds, turn the taps to bathe either one of us, even turning the key in the ignition of my car is just about impossible. Not treating my pain is unrealistic.

So, I am trying to maintain some pain control without resorting to opiates. I am terrified that I will die if I relapse. I have come so very close already... If this pain doesn't get better I'm going to be in deep trouble. I cannot manage opiates, but I can't live like this either.

In short I am alone in this, frightened of the tomorrows, ashamed of my past (My God the people I have hurt!) and in a lot of pain. This will get better, won't it??

I've struggled with alcohol for a while now. A few months ago I got sick with Acute Pancreatitis and spent a grueling week in the hospital. I'm not saying I'm cured by any means but a drink would put me back in the hospital.

With that being said I moved in with my mother while trying to rebuild from the destruction I've caused in my life. My mother has struggled with alcohol for years now. It's effected her kids for years but we're grown now. She's the type of alcoholic that will drink two bottles of wine a day, and that's a guess because she won't drink around me she will hide it in her room but I gauge it when her moods becomes erratic and she slurs her speech, which started today at 2:00 when she started a conversation with me. Every time she goes out with the few friends she has she'll come home tossed. Hence the few friends comment. She also starts fights with her family and she's just not fun to be around when she's been drinking which is most of the time. I worry about her health too as she's overweight and in her early 50's.

To top it off she's was diagnosed with MS sometime back but she seems to be okay. I know she also takes an anti-depressant as well as sleeping pills. I sometimes feel that her diagnosis was done incorrectly and the alcohol and pills are her problem but I could be wrong and I feel bad even thinking that.

So I've tried to talk to her about her drinking and the way it effects other people in her life and it always turns into an attack on me and my past. I try to explain to her that I admit my problems but the scariest thing is she rationalizes her drinking because she pays the bills and is helping me out and that I have nerve. My sibling also confronts her weekly and she will just get mad and go in her room (my sibling doesn't have a problem whatsoever).

What's very alarming to me is the fact that my mom won't admit that she has any problem. I've known that I've had a problem for four years and have struggled with quitting. I'm not doing this because of my sobriety, at all, I just worry that my mom will kill herself from all this drinking. Yes, I do admit it's not a healthy environment for myself for my own sobriety but that's something I have to deal with.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated because I've almost lost hope for her. It's so sad too because throughout my struggles and quitting she's always been there for me and I feel helpless.

Addiction is a muthaf%$%%$.

I have lived (or suffered with) depression for years, diagnosed and started treatment in 2001 but had it for years before that. I've been on a number of anti-depressants but after 6 months they always seemed to fail me. A few years ago I started seeing a new doc who told me I was bipolar II--I said yea, right--I wish I was then I'd have the manic episodes and actually get some stuff done during the day! She started me on a different antidepressant and lamictal. Over the last two years she has changed the anti-depressant several times and kept wanting to add different meds, but I think I was in denial. I have a lot of education in the mental health field, and I really didn't believe I was bipolar.

Anyway, currently I'm on effexor 150mg daily, lamictal 200mg daily, abilify 2mg daily. I'm also dual-diagnosis--bipolar and substance abuse. I recently (this month) went through detox for opiate abuse. For the last year at least I know that my symptoms and frequent depressive episodes were caused by my pill use, so I know that I wasn't appropriately being treated--it was my fault. This week I started seeing a different psychiatrist, and he said I should in no way be on an anti-depressant and he couldn't believe I had been on one in so long. Also, because of the wt gain with abilify, he wants to take me off that as well and start me on Geodon. Is anyone here on Geodon? Has anyone been on abilify and prefer one over the other? The research I've done shows that lamictal is a good drug, so I'm going to stay on that. Unfortunately we can't change my meds around right now because we have to get me stable from the pill use/withdrawal. Any advice or suggestions greatly appreciated. Thanks!

Last night I went to my first Naranon Meeting. Of course I cried from beginning to end, omg ..I JUST CAN'T HELP IT! I've been to an AA & NA meeting with my ABF, cried their too but felt bad, because then his focus shifts from the meeting to comforting me, and i don't want him to lose focus. The NA meeting was bittersweet. Reassuring in some ways,but then again there were friends and family members there that have spent their lifetime on this perpetual rollercoaster with their addicts. My boyfriends mother met me there, and that helped. we have been our own little support system til now. I have begun reading: Codependency no more & The language of letting go, as well as visiting SR daily and getting inspiration from others here, just by reading posts, etc. So now since we started over last friday..today is day 7 for my ABF. As I mentioned in my original post he was clean 53 days before his relapse..which was just a one night slip up, thank god.....and he told us and got back on the right track ...going to therapy 2x's a week......meetings..and looking into a day program til he gets back to work. I think he needs anti-depressant/anti-anxiety, he seems depressed. He's never lived alone...especially not clean. So we are going to see a psych..as well as his pcp...to check out some options, to help his mood as well as cravings. He really is a sweetie, even though I hate the addict in him. I love him!! thanks for letting me share!!!


Denise:praying