Codiene Withdrawal issues

Hi sachin,

Good on you for making the decision to quit. Although it's difficult to imagine because detoxing is torture, you won't regret it.

When I detoxed cold turkey after a nine year codeine addiction I nearly lost my mind. I could put up with the digestive issues, sweating profusely, severe insomnia and just generally feeling like I'd been hit by a train, but the restless legs and arms drove me to near insanity. After five days of absolutely no sleep and constant restlessness I went to the doctor to see what I could do. If you can get either lyrica or gabbapentin where u are either one will take the restless leg syndrome away. About an hour after taking my first dose of lyrica my restless legs were gone and I could finally sleep.

If you can't get either of those medications, there are more natural remedies that are reported to work for some although they didn't for me.

To name a few there's high dose magnesium tablets or powder, Epsom salts in a hot bath, valerian, hops, passionflower and potassium (potassium is hard to get though as taking too much can effect your heart)

I wish u luck and hope u can find something to help

Take care

Nikki

You need to slowly taper your codeine intake. .but using the linctus this may be difficult. .speaking to your doctor about moving to codeine tablets would be better, then reducing these by say 10mg every 2 weeks, and continue to use the pregabalin / Lyrica for the restless leg syndrome

You should also consider having your stomach checked as codeine linctus has citric acid as one of its ingredients. .long term this could of affected the stomach lining

Good luck friend

You should seek medical support from your GP they will be able to help you taper down and your more likely to quit with help and support, the withdrawal symptoms are common but going cold turkey is not advised, tapering will lessen these awful pains,

I took gabapentin which helped massively with restless legs but 4 months on I still have it bad everynignt in one leg, however I done it to quick and suffered unecessarily, don't make the same mistakes, good luck I wish you well 😊

Good on you for wanting to get off the meds!

I was taking between 90-120 codeine pills a day for a long time and quitting it was surely not easy, but completely worth it

I went cold turkey which is for some and isn't for others, but i found tapering off was failing me because i didn't have the discipline to cut my amounts down.

Here's my timeline to freedom:

Day 1: not too bad, trouble sleeping that night.

Days 2 - 10: severe anxiety, night sweats, rls, drained of energy yet couldn't sleep and terrible upset stomach.

Day 11 - 3 weeks: energy improving, sleep improving stomach better and night sweats easing up.

Weeks 4 - 5: almost back to normal, slightly lower energy levels and very rare anxiety.

Week 6 +: completely back to normal, back at gym and no anxiety at all.

I won't lie you will need to dig deep and push through that first couple of weeks. But you won't feel like this forever and trust me, once you get clean you will never want to touch it again!

Things that helped me:

- hydralyte (or another country's equivalent) will help keep your nutrients up while your tummy is upset

- cooking healthy meals that will last for days so that you don't have to cook every day while your energy comes back (and healthy food is key during detox)

- things to keep your hands and mind busy. Learn to knit! I took up guitar and found it very therapeutic

- REMEMBER THAT IT WON'T FEEL LIKE THIS FOREVER xxxx

Good luck to you