sub mantainance: To D or not to D that is the question.

[Russellmeboy]

well anyway, ive been taking aprox 8mgs sub a day for about 2 weeks, i wish to continue mantainance, however i don want to have to heavily detox when the time comes to stop the subs. should i taper myself now or just not worry about it, i havent taken my dose yet today and i still feel decent. PS: its the sublingual strips. how do u guys feel about em.

[smokey]

not much background info, but i would taper. i don't believe in kicking 1 habit for another

[Duckfeet]

First, have you read on this: Wiki/buprenorphene ... I find it's pretty up to date, and every once in a while, when I read it, I learn something new. My own experience on bupe, was, I was trying really hard to get off methadone, and I had had around five years off of all drugs and alcohol, and only had a couple of months on dilaudids, then got on methadone, hated that, and was down to 30mg mdone, and switched to an expensive buprenorphene program, that was designed to detox off of opiates.

The had a fairly--one month--quick taper down to 1mg, then we 'jumped' into full blown detox. I didn't succeed. I ended up going over to heroin-detox.com, where I got lots of support, and got a whole lot more information on bupe, but I don't think mentally I really ever was going to succeed, and never did, but I learned quite a bit--IMO--about bupe. First, I"m a 'less is more' guy, here, just so you know. I never found that the higher doses did anything for me, and it just meant I had further to crawl down, if I wanted to detox. I"d suggest, while you are sorting all this out, that you drop down to 1-2mg daily. I never found it hard to drop down, and didn't notice any difference.

The other thing that article said--and I found that true--is that subs have a long half-life, and I went 3 days, after stopping, before I went into withdrawals. Now, if I wanted to kick bupe. I'd go on 1mg a day, then drop to 1mg every other day, then cut that to 1/2 mg every other day, and go a week or two, and continue until there was nothing left. Most people who used to advocate jumping from 1mg don't anymore: all the people I talked to said bupe was sneaky in that you 'felt' like you weren't doing any, down at lower doses, but you were seriously strung out without realizing it.

Mainly I'd do your own research: I"m like other people, and have some pretty strong opinions on this, but bupe is still fairly new and just like with methadone, we argue all over the place about it.

So I'd cut up some of those doses, and switch to every other day, and also--controversial--maybe drop over to heroin-detox.com: they've helped me in all opiate detox efforts, and I've friends on there who've stacked up years off of heroin/pills and even bupe--they've a whole forum dedicated to experience and knowledge of kicking subs.

[Tylercwxzy]

I've been on and off subs plus methadone now for 2-3 years. I'd say stay on the subs, even though they are not as satisfying as 'done still get the job done and hell if you need to stay on a mait. drug for life or for years there's no issue with that. Currently on 3-4mg a day of generic subutex and I find that it holds me and gives me a mood boost, sometimes euphoria but only when taking dxm and sedatives.

[NJPhile]

SWIM agrees with the less is more philosophy when it comes to subs. SWIM had a pretty heavy OC habit for 2 years (200 mg a day the last few months). Made the switch to subs and was taking 8 mg every 36 hours. But then SWIM had a friend tell him that he could probably get by with 2-4 mg every 36 hours, and that snorting it was more efficient. SWIM quickly tried out this method and found it to be effective. SWIM is not not necessarily advocating diverting the intended administration of medication, but thats what worked for him. Plus, SWIM noticed you're doses are in the form of the strips, so that method wouldn't apply to you anyways.

So SWIM would suggest cutting down your dosage, to 4 mg every 36 hours first, and then possibly drop it even further if you don't feel any adverse effects. Keep in mind that bupe is an extremely powerful drug, and doctors tend to prescribe more than is needed so that they can continue to rake in the cash. SWIM's experience was that he never felt any withdrawal symptoms before the 36 hour mark, being that the half life is so long. Long term maintenance is certainly a good option for some, but not always necessary. But if your intention is not long term maintenance then SWIM would suggest cutting down dosage sooner rather than later. The longer you continue at higher doses the more difficult its going to be to get off. SWIM did a cold turkey kick of subs (was doing 2 mg every 36 hours), took at least 2 weeks for withdrawal symptoms to cease, the worst part was the sleeplessness. SWIM didn't get more than 3-4 hours of sleep a night for nearly 10 days. Hope this helps.

[Tylercwxzy]

SWIM agrees with the less is more philosophy when it comes to subs. SWIM had a pretty heavy OC habit for 2 years (200 mg a day the last few months). Made the switch to subs and was taking 8 mg every 36 hours. But then SWIM had a friend tell him that he could probably get by with 2-4 mg every 36 hours, and that snorting it was more efficient. SWIM quickly tried out this method and found it to be effective. SWIM is not not necessarily advocating diverting the intended administration of medication, but thats what worked for him. Plus, SWIM noticed you're doses are in the form of the strips, so that method wouldn't apply to you anyways.

So SWIM would suggest cutting down your dosage, to 4 mg every 36 hours first, and then possibly drop it even further if you don't feel any adverse effects. Keep in mind that bupe is an extremely powerful drug, and doctors tend to prescribe more than is needed so that they can continue to rake in the cash. SWIM's experience was that he never felt any withdrawal symptoms before the 36 hour mark, being that the half life is so long. Long term maintenance is certainly a good option for some, but not always necessary. But if your intention is not long term maintenance then SWIM would suggest cutting down dosage sooner rather than later. The longer you continue at higher doses the more difficult its going to be to get off. SWIM did a cold turkey kick of subs (was doing 2 mg every 36 hours), took at least 2 weeks for withdrawal symptoms to cease, the worst part was the sleeplessness. SWIM didn't get more than 3-4 hours of sleep a night for nearly 10 days. Hope this helps.

For me bupe only lasts maybe 24-25 hours at best, but I have a fast metabolism. It's different for everyone, whatever dose works best for you then stick with it. 2-6mg is optimum though in my experience I think you get the most agonist effect out of around 4-6mg. Add some cold medicine (DXM, doxylamine which is an antihistamine) and you should get a nice buzz with about 90mg of dxm and 37.5mg of doxy. If you have some muscle relaxers or benzo's they go good to, sorry for going off topic just giving you a few tips on bupe mait. Everyday I get a nice lift from subs and without that I dunno what would do, so its better than placebo and less sedating/constipating than methadone or other full agonist.

[Russellmeboy]

yeah its easy to potentiate, thanks especially to duck, good to talk to yah btw...i just dont wana leave myself hurtin for no reason, i might just try to jump off because its only been a few week try and be clean clean for a few days, even if i use idc, i just dont wana be strung out on subs, ive been on and off sub mantainance since 2008, it normaly didnt work because it just gave me the abbliilty to get high whenever i wanted and take subs when i couldnt, then i could sell the subs and get money for more dope etc etc.

--- auto merge ---

exactlly, ima try and keep it as low as possible.
probably stay @ like 2mgs after i do a detox over the next week.

--- auto merge ---

yeah the irritating detox symptoms are what im trying to avoid, the long term antagonist side effects, i can deal with a week of the shits and missery and all that but the mental depression and sleeplessness etc, but i mean i can allways level my brain out with other shit if i need too

[Tylercwxzy]

Never had subs cause any adverse antagonist effects, in low doses it acts much like a full agonist for me. Intrinsic activity for bupe is 6.7-6.8 out of 10 compared to a full agnst so it has fairly good hold on your receptors and keeps all those symptoms at bay.