Tramadol withdrawal journey
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I wanted to write my first post after reading many peoples struggles with tramadol withdrawal. reading some of these posts helped me through my darkest days coming off this awful medication and i want to help others eho may be struggling!
At 28 years old i found myself in an awful mess with codeine addiction. all started by an innocent doctors appointment for an injured back. fast forward 4 years and im finally clean of prescription painkillers.
I decided to use tramadol to help with codeine withdrawals as I had heard using tramadol can be very useful in softening the symptoms of codeine withdrawal (which at the time I thought was the worst I’d ever felt) boy was I wrong. I needed up switching from one to another straight away.
Over time I started to enjoy tramadol and had absolutely no idea of the dangers of the drug, was told it wasn’t addictive and wasn’t even aware it had anti depressant properties. After a year on tramadol I decided enough was enough. I was (and still am) a walking skeleton almost, having lost stones in weight. I was tired of feeling completely numb with no emotion, no laughter. I couldn’t enjoy nights out with friends because I couldn’t have a drink as it didn’t agree with the tramadol and made me feel awful. It literally controlled my life and I was constantly worried about running out. I went cold turkey on December 3rd after taking 6 tramadol a day for a year. Sometimes more depending on what I was doing or feeling. It was the most horrendous time of my life (this im certain!! I would take 100 codeine withdrawals over tramadol withdrawal!) I basically spent 12 days lying in bed in the fetal position, shaking, tremors, restless legs, excessive sweating, brain zaps, anxiety and intrusive thoughts. My partner had absolutely no idea I was going through this. I hid painkiller addiction from him for 4 years (finally came clean after the worst of my withdrawals) he thought I had the severe flu. I had to take a full two weeks off from work and even after the physical pain subsided, the mental pain has been the absolute worst. The no energy, the low feeling, boredom at times. BUT now, almost 7 weeks clean, I can finally say I feel better than I have in n years. I finally have an appetite for life again which I’ve just realised has been missing since starting tramadol. I’ve been feeling laughter, happiness and sadness again which I hadn’t felt in a while. I was emotionless. I don’t know exactly what this drug does to you, but I’m so glad I broke free before things got really bad. Every single day that passes I feel even better. I have my energy back, I’m slowly getting back to my old self (I couldn’t even remember who I was) and things are improving and it feels better on the other side. Any day that I’m not busy at work I try to get out a walk to stop the boredom, as I find this is when I still struggle. I believe this will get better in time also.
To anyone looking to stop tramadol, you absolutely can. ✌️
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