Are these symptoms of withdrawl(withdrawal)/recovery?

NEED HELP.  Have best friend who is addicted to vicodin and xanax. There could be others meds also that I'm not aware that she is addicted too.  Went to "Pain Management Clinic" 10-days ago and only stayed for 3-days.  Insurance wouldn't continue to pay, don't know the reason why.  I'm assuming because that isn't the right kind of facility for her addiction.  I believe she took upwards of 20 vicodin and don't know how much Xanax for years (10+). She claims that she is only taking perscriptions(non-narcotic) that pain mgmt clinic provided.  She slurs, falls, can't complete a sentence, is volatile, hates everyone, and doesn't care about anything but screaming and yelling terrible things at family and friends.  Is this normal?  Is she really getting better or does she need inpatient care at a rehab facility?  Please help!!  Don't know what to do to help my friend get better. She is worse than before trying to quit.  Do medicines that they give patients trying to get off meds make you act like this??

[Bubulous]

Most insurance I have seen doesn't pay past the detox stage.  Sometimes you can get lucky and stay up to a week.  I don't know if this is true but there seems to be a way to cheat it.  Many have told me that if you walk out and come back the next day, insurance will pay for it.  Like I said I don't know if that is true because I have never had to do it.  
Also I have never been put on detox medicine that did that to me.  If they didn't know about her abusing Xanax, they may have put her on Klonopin and that could produce these behaviors.   It sounds to me more like she is taking Xanax.  I have seen the symptoms you mentioned in my mom and several other people that I know.  Historically when I got out of treatment for pain pills I would be able to stay off of them for a few days to a couple weeks by taking Xanax but I always went back to the pain pills.  If she was telling the truth and she is not taking pain pills, it is likely a matter of time before she starts taking them again.  As far as helping her all you can do is try to talk her into going into treatment.  This is a problem that you are going to have little to no control over.  We don't recover until we are tired of living an empty life.  Nothing changes until the fear of a change is less than the pain of staying the same.  Be careful not to get yourself caught up in the storm that she is in.  If you find yourself working harder for her recovery than she is, you will exhaust yourself and likely resent her.  If she is taking her recovery seriously you can support her but don't support her if she isn't.

Good Luck and welcome to the forum.

Larry

[confusedincali]

Thank you Larry. I'm so glad someone answered.  I'm so afraid for her and she seems to be in such bad shape mentally and physically.  She told a mutual friend that is 5 months in recovery (yeah!) from vicodin & alcohol addiction that she took Zanax the day after she got home from pain mgmt center because the medicine they gave her for cravings wasn't working. I confronted her and she went crazy screaming that our mutual friend was a liar and if I loved her I would believe her, not the friend in recovery. She promised on our friendship of 25+ years that she isn't taking anything but what the pain mgmt center gave her.  I'm really afraid that she is taking Zanax. She has fallen 3 times in the last couple of days and looks like a truck hit her.  She slurs so bad you can barely understand her and half the stuff she says makes no sense.  When she was taking 20 vicodin a day she was on top of the world, full of energy, never slurred, seemed almost hyper.  I talk to her and see her everyday and she "says" she wants to go to rehab, but then she always tells me later in the conversation that she's too smart to be an addict....whatever that means....and that she's not like those people who are in rehab.  She tells me addicts lay in alleys begging for drugs and she's just taking perscriptions that dr.s want her to have.  I want to pull my hair out because I'm so afraid she will fall and hit her head and really hurt herself.  Do you think that I continue to confront her about the fact that the medicine the pain mgmt clinic gave her wouldn't make her drugged like she is?.....or just continue to encourage to go to rehab?  We work for the same company and have great insurance....inpatient rehab paid 100%, no limit on cost...just have to go to in network provider and there are many in our area.    I appreciate any advice that anyone has regarding this issue.  I just want my friend to be healthy and happy like she use to be before vicodin and Zanax controlled her life.  She will lose her job soon if she doesn't return to work.  

[Bubulous]

I used to consider myself too smart to be an addict.  I am very intelligent but saying that I was too smart to be an addict is one of the things that made my recovery take soooo long to achieve.  She is still not at the first part of recovery.  The first step is to admit you have no power over the addiction.  I know you want her to be happy but until she realizes that her own happiness is going to come from recovery, there is nothing you can do to help her.  All you can do is pray and talk to her about going to recovery.  She will likely admit to you that she has been lying but it may take a while.  When I started using again I couldn't even come to this website because of shame although I had a lot of friends on here.
Keep us posted on what is going on and there are a few more people who come on this forum so you will get some other advice soon but for now you can ask me anything and I will do my best to help.

Larry

[confusedincali]

Thank you Larry for the comments.  They really do help.  She fell last night and spent most of night in ER getting stitched up.  Her husband took the medicine that she received from pain mgmt center and ER told him that all the medicines were heavy sedatives.  He asked ER why would pain mgmt center give her sedatives and they said to keep her mind "calm"...which it doesn't.  She flys into rages one minute then falls down the next.  It seems strange to me that she would be given heavy sedatives when she has addiction to vicodin and Zanax(is Zanex a member of the sedative family?)....does that seem strange to you??....or do I just not understand how the detox/rehab process works??  We are working hard to get her into facility.  Thanks for your time and comments.  Any information is greatly appreciated that will educate me to help my friend get better.  

[Bubulous]

Like I said if she didn't tell them about the xanax and it didn't show up in her drug test they could have prescribe her something in the benzo family and it could have even been xanax.  If I knew what the medicines were I could tell you.

[confusedincali]

I will see if I can find out the names of the medicine the pain mgmt center gave her.  Her husband rattled off 3 or 4 names and I don't remember and didn't write down.  I was worried about her fall and how many stitches she had to have.  I should've paid more attention.  It's all such a mess and everyone has to work and it's scary that she's home alone.  See sounds terrible and isn't thinking right.

[Bubulous]

My mom used to fall all the time when she was on xanax.  I tried to keep an eye on her but it still happened.  She would burn her clothes and blankets with her cigarettes.

[confusedincali]

One of the meds is Clonipin which I looked up and is in the Zanax family....that doesn't seem like a good choice of medicine for her to take.  I will find out the others...I know there are at least 2 others they gave her to take. That is why she should have went to a substance abuse rehab clinic and not pain mgmt clinic.  Narcotics and such aren't off limits at pain mgmt clinic.  My sis-in-law was in an accident years ago and has permanent nerve damage.  She is a pain mgmt patient and had an internal pain pump installed to alleviate her 24/7 pain from the accident.  Thanks for responding and helping.  

[Bubulous]

You are welcome.  I am glad you have a little more insight now.