More About Ibogaine For Opiate Addiction

[jj5577]

I don't know if you remember, but I posted a question here a couple of weeks ago asking you if you knew anything about using ibogaine to treat opiate addiction.  You responded that you were interested by what you had discovered about it and that you would do more research about it.

Your response caused me to research you.  I read about your psychiatric practice, your suboxone treatment center, and the life experiences that you so courageously offer to anyone who is interested.

I realize you are an extremely busy man, so I'm trying to keep this short and sweet!  I just wanted to say that your views on life and your philosophies about addiction/recovery struck a chord within me.

I am extremely interested in what opinion you might form once you learn some more about ibogaine, especially considering your expertise in neurobiology.  Once you find the time, I hope you will try to find out more about the iboga plant.

I have been unsuccessfully trying to follow information about ibogaine for years.  But from what I have been able to learn, I believe that there is a good chance that it may be a blessing for many suffering addicts.

Please read the following article about ibogaine treatment:

http://www.ezinearticles.com/?Ibogaine-Drug-Addiction-Treatment:-Breaking-Through-to-the-Core&id=132130

If you can make the time, I would greatly appreciate your opinion on this subject.  Sorry to take up your time... I wanted to email you, but I couldn't find a personal address for you.

[J T Junig, MD PhD]

Someone wrote to me about ibogaine-- I can't remember if it was someone here, or from a different site where I asked questions about it.  But they said it was a 'schedule I'-- the category that the DEA uses for drugs that it considers to have no medicinal voaalue.  There are other meds listed as schedule I that DO have value, and so the listing is largely political... but from a practical sense, the scheduling as a 'I' virtually eliminates any hope of using or even studying the drug.

I do appreciate your nice comments;  I do have an approach to addiction that seems to me to be the obvious 'truth' about the issue, but that many people do not agree with...  Basically I consider addiction to be a chronic illness, much like many other chronic illnesses.  Opiate addiction in particular tends to relapse over and over and over;  a doc in my local area just relapsed after 7-8 years of sobriety and monitoring by the medical board-- relapsing even while knowing that it would cost him his career, likely permanently this time around.  I have seen similar opiate relapses in many people, including those who have accomplished many great things in life, and demonstrated good character and strong 'will' in other areas of their lives.  This is only some of the evidence that addiction causes a type of 'insanity', or loss of insight, that is beyond their control.  There is a 'tipping point' with sobriety-turned-using where insight drops below a critical level, and relapse is a done deal- and this tipping point can come weeks before the actual relapse.  

Anyway...  I work with recovering addicts to help them see the loss of insight and control, and understand that 'shame' is not appropriate.  Shame leads to using behavior, as in one of the paradoxes of addiction, the most effective way to eliminate shameful feelings is to repeat the shameful behavior.  So I try to get addicts to see their addictions as a chronic, potentially fatal illness-- nothing more, and nothing less.

I think that the disease of addiction can be treated (as of 2009) by either medication that eliminates the desire to use, or by changing the addict's personality through recovery programs.  I personally use the latter;  I was a 'classic case' in that when I stopped meetings after five clean years, relapse followed another three years later.  I have seen the same thing over and over in many other people.  As you know, I treat opiate addicts using Suboxone;  I also am med director of a large residential center that never uses Suboxone.  Whatever works!  But I first became an opiate addict 9 years before Suboxone was available, and before Suboxone opiate addiction was maddening in the lack of treatment options;  yes, sober recovery is a good thing, but it is VERY RARELY long-lasting.  As they say in the 'business', anyone can 'hold his breath' through treatment, and even for a year... but maintaining a recovering lifestyle through decades of life's challenges is rare.  So I'm big on vigilance, remembering one's limitations, and paying close attention when someone says 'you're acting different-- are you OK?'-- particularly if that person is recovering.

Enough rambling for now... thanks again.

[NautyOne]

Whoa......I just hooked into that link.......OMG>>>>that is some chunky_funky stuff  I don't think I would be going on that magic carpet ride.  

I don't see anything in what I read that sounds promising to the treatment of addiction in this country, or nothing in what I read at all.  To many people just fascinated with psychotropic drugs.  

Scary.

nauty...........