Hey! Hope you are doing well. The clonazepam(klonopin) that you took last night should have helped with the w/d symptoms. Then you took half a vicodin or norco? So you probably eliminated most or all of youe w/d symptoms with that. Clonadine is usually given during opiate detox but it is not a benzodiazepine like klonopin. Often benzodiazepines are helpful in w/d. Klonopin is a little different than most benzos. It is similar in chemical structure to diazepam (valium) but klonopin has much less of a sedative effect and much more of an anti-convulsant effect. It is a very potent benzo. and 1mg is just about equal to 20mg. valium. It is not too common that you can lower your dosage as much as you did and not have w/d symptoms but it happens. When you taper you should just take as much as you need to not w/d and then slowly decrease the dose from there. If you can take one pill or half a pill twice a day and not w/d then you should start there. You might want to keep at that dose for a week or so. Then, if you are taking (for example 10mg per day) then the next week go down to about 8 mg per day for the next week and so on. Pills can be broken into halves, fourths, eighths, etc. They can even be shaved down to very minute amounts so you can take a fraction of a mg. You just want to make sure you taper slowly and very, very slowly toward the end. Just keep in mind that as you are lowering your dose your body is slowly starting to produce its own endorphins again and your body needs time to do this and learn how to regulate them again and this is the point of tapering. You lessen the chance of total degeneration of some of your nerve cells and any other permanent damage that going cold turkey can cause.
To answer your question, no I am not "clean" from opiates. I take tussionex and xanax which I have been prescribed for years. I always take it in the same amount prescribed. The body builds tolerance over time so after 2 years my xanax prescription was changed from a half mg. per day to 1mg. per day and that is what I am taking now. I occassionally take ultram and tylenol4's depending on what type of pain I have. I used to take motrin 800mg during that time of the month and for headaches but after 10 years it began to make me vommit so I have a prescription for vicoprofen(7.5mg hydrocodone and 200mg motrin (ibubrofen) each month in a 7 day supply at a time b/c when I was 16 yrs. old my periods became very excruciating, the pain became so severe that it is debilitating and I am unable to even stand upright, it has landed me in the hospital twice when I was away from home and did not have my motrin or access to any advil. The advil and motrin you get over the counter is the same thing as the prescription just in a lower dose so 4 advil or motrin is exactly equivalent to one motrin 800mg. I used to take ativan when I was 19 for sleep and mild anxiety and tapered off of that to start taking ambien. I also took amitryptilene for a while but it did not help me sleep so I stopped taking it when I was 20. I have tapered off of darvocet, codeine, ultram, and hydrocodone at different times for different things if I had to take them daily for a period of time and I tapered off of the tussionex and xanax when my husband and I decided to have a baby. Xanax and hydrocodone can be taken safely during pregnancy if you are monitored carefully by your doctor (which my husband is one) but I wasn't taking anything I did not ABSOLUTELY HAVE TO take while pregnant.So the tussionex and xanax I take daily and the others I take occassionaly for pain when I need them-maybe once a month or less. The vicoprofen I take once a month for 7 days while on my period and every once in a while for headaches if I can't get relief from ultram or codeine.
Please keep checking in and let us all know how your taper is going, we love to hear from you and your progress, it sounds like you are doing well. I know tapering can be quite a task but you CAN and WILL do it successfully! We are all here for you.
xoxo- D.
thanks for the response..i think maybe what is happening is maybe i am weaning..But from 10 a day to not 2 is that weaning?? Today i took a half, and i have talk to my doctor who called me in some 5mg of hydro..I told him i was scared to go through,wd's but blamed in on all the iv's in the hospital for almost 10 days and the hydro's he put me on..I did not dare tell him it has been 2 yrs..So he gave me the 5 to wean..But how many should i take a day..I hate them being in my face but i am determined..And as long as i have ya'll here i think i can do it..No one knows about it but ya'll.
Still waiting for the worst..the only thing is no energy and chills..
Hey there!
What I think happened is that by taking half a pill twice, you took the ease off the withdrawal. You body has been without the meds, so even the small dose took the edge off. Your w/d symptoms will probably return, but you didn't set yourself back to the beginning. Keep plugging away!! Now that your body has had a rest from w/d symptoms, use this time to rest ALOT before the symptoms come back. Hope that helps some.