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Codeine Withdrawal - Cold Turkey

Posted , 4 users are following.

Monsoon28
Monsoon28

Hi all, 

just want to share my story. Pretty sure with the new rules in Aus with Codeine there will be a lot of people in the same position 

I had a Nurofen + addiction taking at least a pack of 32 a day, sometimes 2 packs for the past 8 years. It was crazy. Of course it started innocently enough but as with most things got out of hand quickly. 

I had tried to quit several times but never managed to make it past day 2. The RLS always sent me over the edge. I’d tried tapering multiple times but nope! If I have em I take em. I have no self control. 

I knew I had to do something so I decided to tough out the withdrawal while on a week break from between Christmas and New Year. And what a week it has been! Absolute hell. I vomited for a day and night, had no sleep for 4 days, had the chills and that damn RLS. I haven’t eaten anything for a week apart from a peice of dry toast and a mango. 

I was so emotional yesterday from no sleep and the RLS that I saw a doctor, who I broke down to. I mean I went to pieces. I was exhausted and my legs were seriously doing my head in. My biggest fear was relapsing because of my legs and I didn’t want to.

This doctor was so lovely about it all. He told me going CT was very hard and that I should be very proud of myself. Well I didn’t feel proud. Anyway he gave me a script for a few days of Valium to enable me to rest and calm my legs down. 

I slept for 10 hours last night and today my head feels great. I’m at day 6 of full on withdrawal. My only problem now is that my legs feel like jelly. I have no energy and simply moving is a chore. 

BUT I’m so proud of myself. I mean really really proud! 

BTW I did see a doctor about a year ago who I asked for help with this addiction. She basically laughed at me and said if I was taking the amount I claimed to take I’d be dead because she couldn’t even take 2. Such an ignorant doctor!

she scared me off seeking help. So I touched it out, and I’m so glad I did. 

Good luck to to anyone else going through this. It is hell, and you will wish you will think you are dying but it’s better being a slave to s**t pills.

Mon xoxo

 

1 like, 2 replies

2 Replies

  • Bro50
    Bro50 Monsoon28

    Posted

    Hi Mon. I have been in the exact same situation for about 3-4 years now. I managed to get off them in march but slowly started taking them again and here I am. I tried going cold turkey before and couldn't take it. I'm going to attempt tapering so I have a journey of hell ahead of me. I'm so scared. I need off this crap. I was hoping to get pregnant this coming year as I'm newly married but I won't be able to if I'm taking this s**t. I can't face the withdrawals.

    You should be so proud of yourself. It's amazing what you have done. I can't wait for the day I don't have to think of what chemist to go to next. I'm destroying my body with the amount of paracetamol and ibuprofen that I'm putting into it.

  • Sezzum
    Sezzum Monsoon28

    Posted

    Monsoon28 my sincerest congratulations on your accomplishments so far!! Nobody can truly know how difficult codeine withdrawal is until they have experienced it personally!

    i promise the rls and insomnia and fatigue will pass. It took me a few weeks to start feeling semi-normal again. I quit cold turkey after I was forced to detox whilst overseas (didn't take enough by half with me) and almost killed myself accidentally when I took an entire prescription of Valium in one hit to try to calm my crawling skin. I was on between 2 and 4 packets of nurofen plus (30s) per day (I dearly hope most people never learn how much of that poison you can ingest in one sitting when you work up to it) and had failed so many times when withdrawal got too much. 

    I have been free and clear for over a year now and never looked back. It can be done and you have already started to clear the worst of it smile

    if it helps, I was drinking a lot of water with dissolvable gastrolyte to help stabilise my body and took magnesium to stave off the rls smile

    good luck and good on you for sharing your progress, people need to hear these success stories so they know they can get through it too xx

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