Don't label me as an addict
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- Опубліковано 11 лип 2023
- Joan Shepherd, FNP, has helped hundreds of people overcome their physical dependence on opioids, benzodiazepines, or alcohol at the Coleman Institute for Addiction Medicine. Here she shares her perspectives based on a recent conversation with a chronic pain patient who has only ever taken their pain medicine as prescribed. A large percentage of our opioid patients fall into this same situation.
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The Coleman Institute for Addiction Medicine has been a leading outpatient addiction treatment center since 1998. Our innovative withdrawal management programs, often referred to as The Coleman Method, have helped thousands of people free themselves from addiction to Alcohol, Opioids, and Benzodiazepines. Originally founded in Richmond, Virginia, our network has expanded to cover 10 cities across the US.
-3 - 8 Day Opioid Detoxification Process
For short-acting opiates like oxycodone, most patients complete their detox and begin Naltrexone therapy within 5 days. Longer-acting opiates like Suboxone and Methadone typically take 8 days. Our standard package of services in Richmond, VA, include the detox and 6 months of case management and Naltrexone therapy. As a non-addictive opioid blocker, Naltrexone dramatically reduces cravings so that patients can focus on their recovery. We have a 98% success rate for completing detoxification and starting Naltrexone therapy. During the detox, we work with patients and their families to develop an appropriate aftercare plan. We also offer a convenient, 3-day outpatient alcohol detox and an outpatient benzodiazepine Detox.
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Our founder, Dr. Peter Coleman, understands first-hand the challenges our patients are facing due to his own personal struggle with the disease of addiction. He has been in long term recovery since 1984. Dr. Coleman has dedicated his career to treating addiction patients and creating a team and an environment conducive to long term recovery for his patients.
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Thank you so much for addressing this! I am and have been in the exact medication situation for over 15 years and have tapered myself off 80 to 100 mg oxycodone daily down to 30 mg daily over a period of 3 mnths. I have seen multiple pain mngmnt drs and they all want to treat me as an ABUSER and put me on suboxone and the like. I will not trade one addiction for another! I am confident that i will get completely off the oxycodone although withdrawels are really tough at 15mg twice a day. I really think that doctors need to realize that not every person that is taking opiods is an ABUSER , there are a lot of people that have worked hard all there lifes and the pain meds are all that allow them to continue to feed families and be a productive part of society.
This is SUCH an important distinction!! Dependence and addiction are not the same!
Nope they’re the same. If you’re dependant on a drug you’re dependant on a drug slice it anyway you want it’s the same thing. People take opiates because they’re in pain whether it’s mental or physical it’s just a way of coping with that pain. Treat others decently and you have no reason to feel ashamed for this very human flaw
@@j0nnyism we can agree to disagree. I think there’s a huge difference. No judgement either way, but chemical dependency and addiction are two different things. Babies born with opiates in their system are chemically dependent on it, they’re not addicted.
@@j0nnyism I would also disagree with you. If you are addicted then you are also dependent, but if you are dependent it does not nessisarly mean you are addicted. Addiction is a multifaceted issue, with chemical dependency being one of the facets.
I am in active addiction when I am using full agonist opiates/opioids. While using these chemicals I have a physical dependency with them as well.
I am in recovery while having a chemical dependency on buprenorphine.
Addiction is used to describe a disease/problem of destructive behavior that someone has an extremely hard time with stopping or changing the behavior even though they may be well aware of the immediate consequences that their actions are causing.
You can have a chemical dependency without having an active addiction.
What I believe you mean is that it is highly unlikely for someone to have a chemical dependency to full agonist opiates without having an addiction, to which I agree. I find it extremely unlikely that someone who has been taking full agonist opioids to the point where they have developed a physical dependency that they would like assistance with has not also developed an addiction. However this does not mean that Dependency and Addiction are one in the same. Again you will have dependency while in addiction, but you do not need to have an Addiction to have dependency.
I hope this message is accepted and understood.
@@casuallevelexpert3112you get it! ❤️
And then, after a cute withdrawal, you can go into what is known as PAWS postacute withdrawal syndrome, which can lost anything up to 2 to 4 years
I’ve been prescribed pain meds for an accident years ago. I recently called a center to see about getting off. One of the questions she asked was “ when did you first realize you had an addiction problem?” I said I didn’t realize I had an addiction problem as I was being prescribed medication for pain, but I am dependent on them as I have been taking them for awhile. She didn’t say anything as if I was in denial.
I still remember being gas lit for saying this when I went to rehab to come off suboxone and lower dose Klonpin
I had tapered my dose down on my own without any help.
By the way I have autoimmune disease. I didn’t need to be impatient but yet they decided that’s what I needed.
I still had to reinstate and tapered on my own later
How come pain management clinics don't know what they are doing? They have you fill out 12 pages on info and never read it. I was injured on the job for running earth compaction equipment designed for two workers in the fall of 1986. My boss and I had a 20 minute screaming match on the shop floor, where hired to fix cars. He had me run a "Jumping Jack" earth compactor that turned to mud after 3-4 minutes. After dragging it out of viscous suction to a new spot, same thing. He spent 3 months trying to hire me and my tools from another shop, pissed because I had two leave work an hour early twice a week to see a chiropractor. 23 visit later, he sent me to an orthopedic surgeon. Never said he was sorry yet mad I left. I kicked the rented two man machine, jumped out of the 4' deep trench 20' wide and 100' feet long. I locked my tool box and went home to bed with a couple of Tylenol, work up with what felt like the worst sunburn in my life. Since 86, I had 18 lumbar procedures . The Dr died this year in 2023 at age 99.
He came into my room, sat and talked for 45 minutes. He was correct by predicting lumbar muscles from sacrum to L2 was scar tissue & live nerves trapped inside. Lost track of overnight surgeries and outpatient stuff. RFA, 3 more epidurals one with particulate steroids. 100% relief except only 1 1/2 days then gone. I was sent to a pain clinic and they never read the 14 pages required to show where pain was and why / how. Installed spinal cord electrodes with controller out side and was great at 60-70% relief and they placed new electrodes with stimulator inside. It went down into legs to heels? What the F?) Completely dumb founded as I was PO and let the device salesman and Dr know! They waited 5 1/2 months to move new electrodes and couldn't get one out. Now, nothing on one side and the other 2" away. What the hell? They can't even tell you or visit you? I go into clinic and sale Rep is training new guy and second is engineer. She quits after 40 minutes, gets up with no discussion and ask me to show me the door! Then, email saying we can't help, have a nice life! These guys/gals got paid and I am last weeks meat!
And it doesn't work. No elbow replacement because I am Medicare! Finger twisted due to arthritis, the worst they have seen ever, but nothing. And the stimulator is of as well as controller but they run dead every week with no use. Can't walk thru store, mailbox and mow W/$5.10 in bank the last two weeks of each month. Oh, 20 hrs of ketamine. Yea, I am addicted. Addicted to pain, taking chemical compounds that allow a 6'3" man who will be in the mid 60's soon. What happened to the medical community that places labeled on people they have never met!
And it’s not just pain meds. There’s an epidemic of people around the world who are trying to get off their antidepressants and are having a nightmare with the withdrawals. In fact, the Royal College for psychiatrists in England have changed their protocol on how to get off them, but America hasn’t. Go and have a look.
Amen.
3 to 8 days. Do they fast or at least eliminate carbohydrates?
What??
Addiction is when you find yourself lying, cheating, beg borrow and steal to get your fix. Dependence is where you need a drug to stabilize and stay healthy. Are you addicted to insulin, no, you’re dependent upon insulin to stay healthy….and it’s the same with any scenario as such!
Addict or not your brain doesn’t know the difference even if you don’t abuse them but I think it’s horrible the way addicts and non addicts are treated in the medical community and many doctors! If you’re on narcotics specifically and an ER doctor for instance (like what happened to me) does not want to treat your pain it’s absolute nonsense and they should treat the pain regardless! It’s inhumane to add to someone’s suffering bc your doctor is afraid of the DEA! If they haven’t done anything wrong they shouldn’t fear them at all! Narcotics in general can be overridden if given the right way at the right dose for the right person given the right route at the time of really awful acute pain given STAT neither should suffer and neither should be labeled anything but a human being! Everyone has tolerance! Anyone on 100 mg of narcotics a day already has a tolerance for stronger narcotics given in an emergency setting! I am just like the patient this woman described but drug abuse is ancient history for me! 16 yrs no drug abuse bc my conditions are properly treated! This was done with help from fellowship and God don’t try this at home, or alone! Will power doesn’t exist, it’s never about the drugs they are only a symptom! Drugs are available for anyone that wants them! If you’ve abused drugs and someone else didn’t what’s the difference? Go where they welcome you and will tell you “keep coming back” . The disease of addiction is more powerful than your self will and it always gets worse! I’ve never met anyone who beat it alone nor for the first time! Addiction isn’t a dirty word nor is diabetes those of us who are addicts know it! Those of us who are addicts aren’t to blame! No one ever asked for it! Recovery is definitely possible!
sadly not only ER doctors but others as well. in fact some doctors do not get a DEA license simply not to give an rx. The fact is that the DEA approved such medication and they allowed the abuse and people on pain meds or dealing with severe pain should not pay the price because the drs did them wrong and got them addicted. The patients did not do it and did not prescribe it to themselves. To treat patients as criminals is wrong, worse yet the patients that are addicted to the med the doctor prescribed is wrong.
A prescription doesn't absolve you of potential dependance/addiction - and they are the same thing. A physical dependence is a physical addiction. Sad but true.
I've been on prescription pain medication for over 20 years. I stopped taking the extended-release Morphine Sulfate 1.5 weeks ago, and the fast-acting oxycodone 5 days ago. The pharmacy ran out of both at the same time. I'm still waiting to get the withdrawal symptoms and it's driving me crazy wondering when. I'm going to call my pain management doctor today and find out how long out it could take to start. I couldn't agree with you more about it being an addiction, I'm just dreading when the withdrawal starts.
@@joninct I wish you all the best in the oncoming battle as that is likely what it'll end up being. I do hope you end up triumphant however you choose to proceed. 🙂
My name is Zach Bunch, and I have been a patient at the Coleman Institute for several accelerated detox procedures (2014 & 2016) as well as six months of Vivitrol injections during the second half of 2015. Although I never truly achieved any significant time in abstinence-based recovery, I do believe that the Coleman Institute saved my life. For a while, I felt as if the Hamilton Street location was my safe place-my home away from home. Dr. Coleman, as well as NP's Joan Shepherd and April Metzger, were all so very compassionate and understanding-it was a breath of fresh air.
In 2016, I started to see a new psychiatrist for this ongoing anxiety that was beginning to deeply affect my life in a negative manner. I was prescribed Clonazepam, otherwise known as Klonopin. Klonopin is a benzodiazepine medically used to control generalized anxiety disorder (GAD), various panic disorders, and to control seizures in patients with epilepsy; some doctors may even prescribe Klonopin for chronic insomnia, however, this is rare. At any rate, the medicine did precisely what it was supposed to do as far as I was concerned. It didn't lessen my anxiety-it rendered it nonexistent.
At this point, I had already been in a clinic and on methadone (120 mg daily) for almost a year. During my first session with my new psychiatrist, I made it crystal clear that I had struggled with substance abuse, primarily opioids, for most of my adult life. He briefly informed me of the dangers that could occur when combining two central nervous system depressants (methadone and Klonopin) and sent me on my way. It didn't take long for me to realize that the methadone/benzodiazepine combination would illicit intense feelings of euphoria and warmth. Thus began my new addiction!
After roughly two years on 120 mg of methadone, 8 mg of Klonopin, 1,200 mg of Gabapentin and 0.2 mg of clonidine, I decided nodding out in a chair everyday, all day was not the life I had intended for myself and checked into a long-term detox. After 30 days, I was still in terrible withdrawal. I had kicked heroin and other illicit opioids a hundred times-this was entirely different.
To make an extremely long story short, I felt as if the post acute withdrawals were never going to subside and reluctantly checked back into a methadone clinic. Today, my problem lies in the fact that I cannot stop this crippling mental obsession with benzos. It's all I think about. Some days it feels as if I want them so bad that it physically hurts. I just hope the day will come that my first thought when I awake in the morning is NOT benzodiazepines.
ahhhh i was giving adderall and clonazapam since...idk 10? the adderall first then clonazapam but i'm 34 now and still take 3 mgs a day...and that last part hits hard. it sadly is the first thing i think of...other then ahh gotta shit first or i might not today.(thought that was just opaites...nope) i used to take 10 mgs the first day i got my 90 2 mg (the highest i've even done or been on) and i FINALLY see that u can't get high on them. so i just take things as i am told now things are better but i've been told i should either get off now or be ready to take them for life. n u already know i would rather take em for life. but i fear the crack down that maybe coming. or my doctor dies(even tho 5 def docs have givin them to me? still worrie..every month to be honest that one day they just wont fill them n i'll be dead from seizure in a few days) I GET IT THEY DO WORK but WHY the fda n ALOT of ppl know there for like 10 days tops my Temazapam i got long time ago from a doc tryin to get me off(bad idea why he went about it in 10 days) but thats what the paper work said. and i'm sorry but temazapam (restroil) is WAY weaker then clonazapam...they only been around REALLY for 30ish years so i dont fault anyone not even myself. but ...if we just made all drugs legal and REALLY told EVERYONE what could happen if u take said drug. or drugs. i think the goverment would lose to much money from busting "junkies" and we really would be free. I get taxes everyone pay there part but no one can stop u from geting drunk n driving and killing someone or yaself or slowly with a cig. but make it harder n alot more profitable to get drugs that aren't really all that bad for u from policing. I could go on for days about at least u would know whats in it...wouldn't be overdoses left and right.
120mg a day, you're an addict sweetheart..
That is a pretty common dose for someone who has been prescribed for years, your dose has to go up sometimes to account for tolerance. She didnt exhibit any behavior that indicated she was a drug addict. She is dependent on this medication and will go into painful withdrawls if she stopped cold turkey
@jhudson_tiedye yea as long as my dope man showed up every day I was fine and my tolerance went up too. I guess I'm not a addict either..
Yes yes, there is biological dependence and addiction….next❤