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Subutex withdrawals

My daughter was a heroin addict for 2 years.She was arrested so she went through withdrawals from that in jail. She had a relapse almost a month afterward, used once, so the doctor prescribed subutex. She has been on those about 4 weeks. S wants to stop taking those too. She tapered down the last week to 8 mg every other day. She took her last strip last night. She has come to stay with me while she goes through this, but I would like to know what I should expect and what can I do to help her get through this. My fear is if it gets bad she will panic and go to the streets for drugs. Her doctors wants 400 upfront to see her for a office call and to get another prescription so tapering to a lower dose is not an option. Plus, it is Saturday and won't be able to see him until next week anyways. If I would have known ahead of time maybe I could have helped, but this was all told to me last night at 8 pm, so now I am scrambling for help. I did find the Thomas recipe, so I will probably go shopping today for those things. I hope someone can give me some advice or help.
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271792 tn?1334979657
Hi & Welcome,

You have every right to be concerned. Helping her get through the physical withdrawal is wonderful and I commend you for it. But, I also suggest that you do as much reading as you can and familiarize yourself with addiction. Addiction is a disease from which there is no known cure. She will be an addict for the rest of her life whether she is using drugs or not. Not using drugs is the least of her issues. She needs to work on the mental part of the disease. She needs help getting to the core of her issues and learning to work through them without the use of mind or mood altering substances. Did her prescribing physician (for the Subutex) suggest any counseling? It should always, without exception, be part of the Subutex program. I can't stress this enough. Like I said, if she doesn't work on her issues she will surely use again. She needs coping skills, life skills and relapse prevention.

Is there any way to get her into treatment? Thirty days would be great, sixty days would be better. Let us know what you think. Hang in there. There is always hope. I am glad you found this community and hope that you stay here with us. there is great support here for both you and your daughter. And that brings me to this...Is there any way to get her to create her own account and talk with us? It would be easier that way to find out what she is feeling about all of this.
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Avatar universal
Its going to be very rough.  4mg/day is way too high a level for a reasonable jump off the medicine.  Has it been done?  Yes.  Readytobefree jumped from that dose and did a good job of chronicling his journy.  Anything over 1mg is too high IMHO.  I think you do have some time if you choose to get more meds.  This drug has a VERY long halflife.  Your daughter may not start feeling real bad until 3 - 4 days after her last dose.  It doesn't mean she will be chipper but tolerable.  Again, this IS doable at the 4mg dose.  There are several folks here that have jumpe off at doses of 4mg and much higher but it is certainly not ideal.  Just gettihg more meds is not the whole answer.  Your daughter needs a counselor, therapist and / or a treatment program as well as a formal taper plan to get off the Suboxone.  My taper from 4mg down to .25mg took 6 months, which was a pretty leisurely pace.  

Best wishes and Good Luck
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