Will These Meds REALLY Help My Withdrawals Coming Off 12 mcg of Fentanyl?

HELP!

I was prescribed 37.5 mcg Fentanyl patches (they come in 25 mcg and 12.5 mcg, so I was wearing one of each) when I had an encapsulated kidney stone, my kidney became septic and I nearly lost the kidney; I was on Morphine and other opiods/opiates at home while waiting for a kidney stone to pass that was actually stuck and turning the tissue septic (poisonously filled with infection.)  Even though I was in excruciating pain, I begged my Pain Management Doctor not to put me on Fentanyl, and he gave me a bunch of double talk about it not being a "true addiction" if you're in real pain and it won't give you euphoria, just make the pain go away and make you feel normal.  I kept telling him I was worried about a medication that potent.  I wish I had been mentally and physically stronger and not in so much pain, or I would have stood firm and never been put through this Fentanyl hell!

I decided, on my own, that I was coming off the patches, one way or another.  I titered down to 25 mcg by just dropping the 12.5 mcg patch and had taken either two or three 25 mcg patches by the time I went in to see (a different!) pain management doctor.  He was NOT happy his associate had put me on Fentanyl, even though he tried to keep me from knowing it...just his tone of voice and body language told me he was angry and felt that my request should have been respected and not put on them.  I told him how I had titered down 12.5 mcg to the 25 mcg patches on my own and was having some uncomfortable break-through withdrawal symptoms (shakes, anxiety, muscle jerking/spasms, dizziness, headaches, stomach queasiness, severe diarrhea, getting extremely hot and drenching my clothing and hair with perspiration, then feeling like I was freezing, etc.)

He told me to decrease from 25 mcg when my next patch was due, to 12.5 mcg and to use 5 patches (one every three days) then stop them completely.  I just put on Patch #4 of the 12.5 mcg tonight.  Of course I'm having all of the withdrawal symptoms I listed above, but I am getting by, by taking Darvocet, every four hours (even though that's not good for my liver!)  I have one more patch to go, then it's cold turkey and I'm scared half to DEATH!

I am due to get on a plane Wednesday and fly to where my husband is working on an out-of-state project, so I can be with him over the next two and a half weeks.  I will be putting on my last patch, Patch #5, on Tuesday.  Thank God I will have it in my system to be able to make the flight.  My doctor prescribed Hydroxyzine Pamoate, generic for Vistaril, and Clonidine Hydrochloride, generic for Catapres.  I contacted my pharmacists to find out if these medications were effective and to find out if they would interact with my current medications for other medical problems (I contacted two of them, who, in fact, gave me two different sets of advice which has really thrown me for a loop!)  One young pharmacist, a bored-sounding, slightly arrogant young man, just told me to follow my doctor's orders.  He also said the medications wouldn't interact with my current meds or my pain management doctor would not have prescribed them!  The other pharmacist, an older gentleman who has been in the business a LONG time, told me that the meds WOULD interact with my current medication (Catapres is used for high blood pressure in addition to helping with withdrawals and I'm already on a b/p med...the pharmacist said it could cause a very unsafe and potentially fatal drop in my b/p to take them together!!!  He told me that the Vistaril could interact with my Klonopin, which I take at bedtime to help me sleep, and he said, together, they could be overly sedating and could be dangerous by decreasing my respiration and I could stop breathing! Then, he told me the TRUTH...that none of these medications are going to really take away the withdrawals.  He said that about 50% of how bad the symptoms are or aren't, depend on me staying as calm as possible...that natural anxiety and fear over this whole process, plus the pain levels, can send my withdrawals through the roof!  Also, he said realistically, even on the 12.5 mcg, it could take between one and two WEEKS, even on the SMALLEST dose of Fentanyl that is manufactured, to get through this terrible process and I WILL have withdrawals and they can range from bad to excruciating.  He said another pain medication might help (because there is going to be pain and LOTS of it) but I'm allergic to hydrocodone, codeine and oxycodone, which only leaves me with Darvocet, which I'm taking RIGHT NOW to help with the break-through withdrawals and I'm not even off the Fentanyl yet!

WHAT CAN I DO???  I want OFF these meds and am serious about it.  I have already taken the matter into my own hands, even before seeing the doctor to tell him I want OFF.  NEVER in my life have felt this helpless, afraid and angry that I was put in a dangerous situation...oh, and guess what the older pharmacist told me when I asked him how long it has taken his other patients to go through withdrawals.  He said ALL the other patients he's ever had on Fentanyl were CANCER patients who were terminal and every single one of them only stopped taking the Fentanyl when they died.  

I'm determined to come off of them, but I need advice on how to do it and be able to get on a plane and fly back home to be alone by September 8th (the last patch comes off on August 18th...that gives me a little over two weeks with my husband.)  Oh, and my pain management doctor only approved 21 pills TOTAL.  So there won't even be a week's worth if I take any pills through the night!  His nurse pulled me aside and told me to SAVE all the pills until I pull that last patch off.  She said that's when the symptoms will really take me down.  She also said to drink lots and lots of water and/or fluids...that it helps to flush it out of the body quicker. My doctor was nice, willing to help me and angry that I had been put on Fentanyl in the first place.  All he can do now is help me off of it, but I feel he has been extremely conservative with the medication he has given to help, especially in light of the fact that neither is a strong narcotic or opiod/opiate with little to no chance of addiction.  The older pharmacist didn't think the meds were going to help me as much as I needed help.  And I absolutely cannot cut the patches to titer the dosage down further...the gel would leak out and most likely cause an overdose by releasing too much medication.  There have been a LOT of accidental deaths on Fentanyl.  

Somebody....ANYBODY...please help me.  I need some advice on how to get through this awful scenario ahead of me.  Has anyone taken these two medications to help detox?  Neither are addictive type meds, so my doctor is trying not to trade one addiction for another by prescribing Xanax or Methadone or some such opiod/opiate which can be every bit as addictive.  I've read the horror stories about coming off Fentanyl (my friend, a drug rep and sister to a young man who fell 40 feet from a cherry picker and lay in the hospital broken to bits and hovering between life and death, said he got addicted so badly to Fentanyl they put him in the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MInnesota for between one and two months to detox, but they've got the money for such things) and I'm a pretty tough cookie after all I've been through with my health, but I've never had anything scare me as badly as reading the withdrawals symptoms and severity of discontinuing Fentanyl!  I'm writing now before I get in such bad shape I can't write.  I will get my husband to check for responses when I get bad off. Thank you SO much for any feedback!  (And I want to hear more about that amino acid/whey supplement that is supposed to be helpful with detox!)

Blessings!

Lissy