new to sobaxan, I have a few questions...

[rain380]

Hi I'm new here and to soboxan, unfortunatly I got hooked on roxicodone by a bad pain managemnt dr.  have fibromyalgia and recently developed cysts on both my overies. I was at a point where my pain levels had become so high I was going to have to stop working, I could not sit or stand for 30 minutes. I was just in incrediable pain nd my pcp kept giving me flexeril and naproxin, and telling me i'm " to young to be on narcotics" ( I'm 26) all I wanted was some pain pills for the really bad days, i'd push through and deal with the other days, even though my pain levels were at a 5 or above everyday. I just wanted to b able to work and occasionally have a night out with my H , we got married last december, I just want to be a newly wed, and to be 26 and be able to go out and see my friends. I had no life outside my house, i'd rather be miserable at my house than someone elses. Well a coworker recomended a pain mnagment dr sh had been seeing and told me he was awsome, so I figured i'd give him a try because I had no idea where to start and I needed help.I have no ninsurance so I didn't even have a provider list to pic from. The very first apointment he gaveme rxicodone, at first he I refused, but he was so nice and explained to me that it was safer for me then takeing percocet as it had no tylenol but the exact same narcotic. He started me out on 15mg 3x a day. It was great at first I was able to see my friends again, my work preformance was so much better, I was able to be a newly wed.
I had also started antidepressants through my pcp and klonopin through pain management both to treat my fibro ( raises the bodies natural pain killers) and my depression and anxiety.

Well after 6 mths and being moved up to 60mg daily within 3 mths. The dr was no longer nice infact he had become rude and got nasty with me, so I tried to change to a  new dr and it took me a mth and a lawyer to get m records transfer, the old dr also refused to sign a frm stateing he released me from my care, so the new pain managment dr wouldn't touch me because it's his policy to get that statement signed bcause he may half to  prescribe me narcotics and wanted to make sure he was the only one doing so.

So here I was, with barely anything left in my bottle, pysically dependant. I had been able to skip some doses sleepin late, going to bed early, makeing myself wait till I as in pretty severe pain, but I hadn't been able to save much so I tried t deto myself quickly, instead of half a pill 4  daily, I started takeing a quater of a pill 3-4 times daily, the withdrawels from doing that were so bad I made the first availableapointment wiht a soboxan doc.

That was yesterday, and the soboxan is great as far as withdrawels are concerned however it makes me INCREDIABLY sleepy. I feel very worn out, I know it's only been 2 day but I have 0 sex drive I mean it's almost into negative numbers. Does this get better? will I stop feeling sleepy all the time? Will my sex drive come back? also seem to have some mood swings ( some of that could be due to the fact that I had been out of antidepressants for a couple weeks till yesterday he refilled my anti-depressants and my klonopin).
The doc said 6 mths to a yr was th useual dosage to pevent relapse.
My dr is not from the US and he speaks good english but i'm not sure if he didn't understad or didn;t believe mewhen I said that I didn't have a psycological dependance , just a pysical one, and I asked if I would really need to be on this medication this long if thats the case, because I need to get back to pain management. Hetold me that " in order to prevent relapse 6 mths was the minimum and generally a yr and that yes he thought that I should be on them for that long." He told me the soboxin was also a pain medication so I should be out of pain. I don't think that he understood that I just took medication that my dr gave me, that I wasn't high, or didn't even feel high after about the first week or so, I just wantedoff because after all this mess with the dr I found out I should have been on a coctail of meds tapered to my needs, and that generaly includes some type of narcotic for bad days, but not for everyday and the soboxin blocks those meds.

Well although the generalized body aches are gone and that is nice I am still in a good deal of pain, I go back to work tomorrow and I know from the way my back feels I am not going to be out of pain in that area and their is nothing I can do about it, tylenol does nothing, I don't know if my back pain is from the cysts, some injury or what but when I'm on my feet for any length of time ( like at work) I get a horrible pain thats starts midway down my back goes down and then eventually wraps around my lower torso and it is HORRIBLE.

So is that standard six mths to a yr? even for people just trying to detox safely, that weren't getting high? I really don't want to have to take this for that long because of the side effectsI described above and because I truely do need some kind of pain management help.

I got 8 hrs last night, went to run some errands today came home because I was so exhausted and then took a four hour nap and now 5 hrs later I am feel exhausted like I ran a mrathon and then lifted weights or something, i'm headed back to bed in a few days.

please any help or advice, thanks.

Rain

[seahorse1963]

Soboxine has a drug that blocks opiates (the active ingrediant in roxy's) so pain meds won't help you but it is also a very high for of opiates if that makes sence to you.  If you are feeling sleepy the dose is too high, you need to talk to your doctor asap.
Why won't the other doctor release you?  That doesn't sound right to me but of course I'm not a doctor nor a lawyer but I was always under the impression if you wanted to be released from a doctors care you could...maybe someone here can shed more light on the subject, it's kinda early so hang tight someone may come along with better advice.  God Bless you now and always!!!!!

[salsinator]

Hi Rain,

Suboxone is a very strong opiate.  It works by filling the same opiate receptors on the brain that the roxicodone does and it has a much stronger affinity for these receptors, so if you were to take roxicodone, it would not be able to attach to the brain.  It does have some pain releiving properties, but they are not as good as a full opiate.  I took suboxone for nearly 4 years and was able to adjust to it, but I did find that it would make me incredibly sleepy, more in the afternoons.  I suspect that you are probably on a dose of aroun 16mg?  The lower your dose, the better it will be for the side effects.  You should be able to move down to 8 and even 4 mg within a week or two - you will be detoxed from the roxy in about a week.  talk with your doctor about he side effects you are experiencing and work on lowering your dose.  Try taking some B6 and B12 suppliments, they can give you some additional energy.  Also, you should only be dosing suboxone once per day, some docs prescribe two doses, one in the morning and one at night.  This is not the correct way to take suboxone, so if you are taking more than one dose per day, this could also cause excessive sleepiness.  As for the sexual side effects, this should go away as your dose is adjusted and your body gets used to the medication.  You also asked about how long to take suboxone. Most of us on this site have found that the shortest amount of time is the best - 6 months to a year is too long because you will become dependant on the suboxone and then will need to taper way down when you want to stop taking it.  The withdrawal from suboxone is severe and will last twice as long as roxy - many people don't realize this, including the doctors who prescribe it. Best of luck to you - keep posting and let us know how you are doing, there are others here with experience taking suboxone, we will support you.  Take Care

[rain380]

WOW, thanks for the info. My old dr would not sign release papers because "releasing my chart to a new pain mangement office is releasing me." basically he is a quawk.My lawyer looked him up and apprently he has has several marks on his record for overuse of narcotics and was put on probation at one point for it. Basically he ***** you in, acts all nice like he wants to help you and then gets you hooked so you keep coming back, if you try to leave you get punished by him makeing it hard as hell for you to leave.

The dose the dr gave me of suboxone was 8mg and it is mixed with 2mg of naltrexone, 2x daily. I really think that I shouldn't need it past next week, I never tried to get high on it, I just took the meds the dr gave me and I took my doses as prescribed, I treated it like an antibiotic or any other med a doc would prescribe. Today I was awake for 4 hrs before I took my first dose ( and only dose) and I mainly took it because I was feeling some anxiety and going back to work for the first time since I started the suboxone, i'm a waitress at a gentlemans club and it made my night hell. I was so sleepy I was chugging energy drinks and eating cookies all night trying to stay awake, I felt anxious and I can't really explaine it , my Peripheral vision was very foggy. I started suboxine on monday and hadn't had anything since around 7-8 sunday night, I am really thinking I am pretty well detoxed and going to try and see if I can go without tomorrow. I have a followup apointment on friday and it's going to cost me $125 plus $30 for a urine test, lame.
I really think at the very most I would need this for a mth ( like I said I think I might be ok now), I'm just not sure how to get the good doc to agree, he's very nice but very set that suboxone should be taken a certain way. I want to restart pain management with a real doctor, so I don't want him writing anything on my records like me not following through with his treatment plans or something that would make a new pain management doc afraid to take me on as a patient or refuse to give me any narcotics, work was hell tonight, and eventually I am going to have to do something besides sit on my couch like clean or go to the grocery store, and hopefully I will be able to find non-narcotic solutions, I just don't see any on the horizon, the pain in my back is unbearable, I can only sit or stand for 30 minutes, it hurts to raise a cup to my mouth , even fix my hair. I would not mind being dependant on a lessor medication through a good doc that would actually do his job, not just sit me in front of his desk and print out RX's, I also don't mind haveing just enough pain meds to get through the 16 shifts I work every mth and for the REALLY bad days in general.

What should I do here? I'm really lost, should I try to educate the dr, beg and plead that he not make me take this for 6 mths? Right him a letter with alll my issues with it and explaine that I seriously never used them to get high. Should I just go in on friday take the urine test so it comes up clean and if he won't listen , just explaine I'm done ( that would kinda deoendon how tomorrow goes, if I don't need it tomorrow, even if I do i'm cutting the pill in half, it's just to much.), that the suboxon helped me detox and thats all I needed, and now that I no longer feel a pysical need for it I need to move on to pain management so I can continue to work.

I just really don't know what to do here, it has been great but I really don't think I need to be on this very long at all, like I said I just needed help through the detox, I tried myself and it was 2 much for me.

Please any suggestions about how to deal with the dr so he doesn't screw me out of getting proper treatment because we disagree on the time frame for medication.

thanks for any help,
rain

[seahorse1963]

Sounds to me as if you have a great plan...but I am no doctor so just be open with your new doctor and take his advice.  Good luck :) and God Bless :) roxy's bite!!!

[rain380]

Thanks everyone, please wish me luck tomorrow at the doc, I didn't need it at all today, and although I could have used a vicoden ( prescribed to me he knows Ihave them I showed him the bottle so I could have taken one, I did last night after work my back hurt so bad ) for my back and well everything today as I actually caught the flu from a friend, sore throat and he whole 9. I wanted the drug test to show only the smallest amount, if any of the vicoden ( my body is really fast at cleansing itself from stuff) at all. I just needed the help with detox, I am hoping the fact that I am following through with my apointment and drug test ( those comnied will be $150) , even though I am not going to continue the suboxon, he will hopefully listen to me and understand that I just needed help with detoxing, that I was never on them to get high or anything so I don't see a "relapse" as he put it on the horizon. If a real dr ( and this time I will make sure it's not just a pill dr) puts me back on pain meds well thats fine, because then I would be under the care of a real doctor who would monitor me and such.

I'm really glad I came here suboxin is advertised as a miracle drug and it was for me , atleast for the detox, but I was greatly educated, I had no idea about half the stuff I have been taught here.

thanks again!
rain

[NorcoQueenoftheUniverse]

You have the right to FIRE your MD as you are PAYING them (for their service)..

And.. you also have the RIGHT to ALL of your medical information...You just have to sign a RELEASE OF MEDICAL INFORMATION...
ALL legit MD's have to honor and provide this information

Hope this helps you on your road to recovery.. NOW.. go GET UM!