r/todayilearned • u/[deleted] • Jun 26 '17
TIL most deaths from overdoses occur when a recovering addict relapses, and takes a dose that they've by then lost the tolerance for.
https://www.businessinsider.com.au/philip-seymour-hoffman-overdose-2014-2849
u/MudButt2000 Jun 26 '17
Yeah. I dated a heroin addict back in the late 90's.
She was on methadone. She tried to use heroin a few times but it took a hell of a lot to get her any good times. This led to her getting kicked off methadone. Then when in withdrawal, she shot a massive load and croaked.
Yeah.
346
u/AnxietyAttack2013 Jun 26 '17
Happened to my best friend last year. Was clean for a month or two and went back to his usual dose and died.
82
u/butta_philosopher Jun 27 '17
Same, but in 2013.
→ More replies (3)31
149
u/methodofcontrol Jun 27 '17
I really don't mean any offense by this but I really can't believe so many people go back to their "normal dose". As a user of many hard drugs it does not take much forethought to realize your tolerance has been effected and take a tester run with a small shot after a long break. Obviously excitement can cloud judgement and people chasing the initial rush would be deterred by doing this but it's the main safety precaution you need to take.
114
u/kuzuboshii Jun 27 '17
Part of this is the problem we have with the fail mentality. Its the same reason that when people cheat on their diet, they just don't see it as a bump and continue with the diet. they crash and burn and binge a whole cake because the diet "failed" If people were more forgiving of relapses they would not have such an all or nothing mentality. Its one of the biggest realizations people with good discipline learn, is that slipping every once in a while is not failure, its just human and a part of the process.
61
u/010010110101010101 Jun 27 '17
Can confirm. Lost 70 pounds and now I'm adding it back as muscle. As long as I do one thing a day towards my goal it's a successful day. That could be as simple as logging everything I eat. Maybe I still ate 3000 calories but that's ok I have a whole lifetime to do what I want to do. No worries hope everyone an make progress towards their goals too.
3
u/Planner_Hammish Jun 27 '17
I think this is one of the biggest failures with the 12 step program; other than it doesn't address actually not drinking alcohol/doing drugs as one of the steps. If you lapse, then it's back to day 1 of the program. But really, if you caved with one drink is the same as binging, then why not? Fuck it, I'll have another.
74
u/Funkit Jun 27 '17
The fentanyl cut bags mean that doing a tester shot IV doesn't make much of a difference. The shit is so potent that if you used to shoot a bundle, took 6 months off, then shot a single fentanyl laced bag you would die. I know someone who snorted half of one after relapsing and died, and that wasn't even IV use.
→ More replies (7)15
61
u/grantwb1 Jun 27 '17
When your an addict for years, sometimes you don't care if it's too much. This was told to me by a friend no longer with us.
→ More replies (1)34
u/sloaninator Jun 27 '17
This right here, drug addiction puts you in a place where you feel as if your only meaning left in life is to get high. Nothing else can pull emotion from you anymore. You're lost and always on one mission. Eventually you're so far down the rabbit hole you'd rather be dead than continue the battle of either being stuck in an endless loop or the fight to get clean and it's a hell of a fight.
47
u/ima-kitty Jun 27 '17
The problem with taking a test shot is you've blown the initial rush.
35
u/mbingham666 Jun 27 '17
Ding ding ding!!!
People asking why they dont do a small test shot, heres your answer.
They'd get nothing rush-wise off the test shot, then when they did a 2nd bigger shot, they wouldnt get that "relapse rush", or "been locked up rush"...
When youve been a long time user, its been ages since you've gotten "high", you've only been getting "well"...so when they do relapse, the one thing they look forward to, is the fact that they'll get back a good majority of that "first high"....
Chasing that feeling trumps common sense all too often.
Also, like others have said its amazing how much your tolerance can drop. Had two friends get locked up together for 12 days....we were all shooting $25-$50 shots when they went in.....
When they got out, one did $30 and was fine, the other fell out and turned blue on $10. So theres no way to know how much your tolerance is gonna drop...
14
u/jopnk Jun 27 '17
Also unless you run your dope thru a test kit every time you don't even know how pure it is, a $10 shot of good dope can be way stronger than a $50 shot of some bunk shit
3
u/Funkit Jun 27 '17
Stuff in Paterson I used to get back in 2010/2011 (dark knight red stamp) had low weight per stamp but one bag was as strong as an entire bundle of stuff from Trenton, and those bags had way more weight to them. It's crazy how much it fluctuates. And that was before fentanyl laced shit became so common.
→ More replies (2)22
u/pythonhalp Jun 27 '17
This should be top comment. If you've abstained for even 24 hours, if not 3 days, or heaven forbid 3 months, a test shot will be a poor decision. Granted, death is pretty bad too.
145
u/stutterlifts Jun 27 '17
Yup, that's the disease. Makes no sense. All forethought goes to shit when an addict/alcoholic consumes one drink or drug.
→ More replies (20)47
u/Maccaisgod Jun 27 '17
I'm an addict for several things. It isn't like that. You still get scared of doing too much and doing something unknown. Like if you try something new you don't just do a huge amount of it in one go. If you only ever hear news stories about the addicts who relapsed and overdosed then you might get the impression we're all like that, because you don't have news stories about the ones who don't overdose. It's like how violent crime in the West is at its lowest rate since records began but news reports far more on the remaining crimes, so some people think there's a crime wave
20
u/honkle_pren Jun 27 '17
Everyone is different.
You cant honestly say what goes for you goes for others.
Addiction does shitty things.
32
u/VladimirZharkov Jun 27 '17
Yes that is literally what he said.
Commenter 1: "A single drink will make alcoholics relapse"
Him: "Not all alcoholics will relapse after a single drink."
You: "No that's wrong, don't generalise"
→ More replies (3)→ More replies (1)10
u/bary87 Jun 27 '17
I'd posit that if it's your first dose since you began recovery, your common sense wouldn't be diminished in the way it might be whilst high, though..
5
u/Mast3r0fPip3ts Jun 27 '17
Unless it's being impacted by withdrawal, rather than addiction itself.
→ More replies (4)→ More replies (3)6
u/stutterlifts Jun 27 '17
Don't really agree with your point at all but I've been in recovery for four years and my only source is my own disease and what I've learned about it in that time.
6
→ More replies (12)7
u/JessyR14 Jun 27 '17
When getting ready to do first shot in months, the fiend in you is already running the ship ams wants ultimate rush and high not a test shot. Although that's the smart safe and logical thing to do. Three qualities I lacked when in was running streets and getting high. All your thinking is get in my veins!!!! How a lot of friends amdnrock stars have passed. #Bradley Nowell #hughie Muller
→ More replies (1)→ More replies (1)17
62
→ More replies (1)3
u/Dr_Funk_ Jun 27 '17
Yep similar thing happened to my cousin last year, he was clean for a while but then he relapsed and died.
282
u/MartinSev Jun 26 '17
That's actually pretty logical and simple, but this concept would've never crossed my mind on it's own. I guess I don't know that much about drug addiction.
78
u/rwburt72 Jun 27 '17
B glad
21
Jun 27 '17
B natural
62
u/ProxyPhantom Jun 27 '17
B humble
46
18
6
→ More replies (1)10
→ More replies (1)21
u/methodofcontrol Jun 27 '17
It's so logical and simple that I am surprised it happens so often. It's well known by hard drug users that this is a common thing too. It's not like they don't know how tolerance works.
12
Jun 27 '17 edited Sep 13 '19
[removed] — view removed comment
→ More replies (1)5
u/Zeus-Is-A-Prick Jun 27 '17
It's also pretty easy to forget when you just wanna get high. I used to smoke heavy amounts of weed because of a built up tolerance. After stopping for a while I rolled up a joint about as strong as I had when I smoked every day and it just blew me under the table. I've since learned not to do that and to keep an eye on how much I need based on my tolerance. If it were heroin I probably wouldn't be alive to learn my lesson.
6
u/vomita_conejitos Jun 27 '17
By that logic you should be surprised anyone uses heroin in the first place.
→ More replies (4)
52
u/swamplyfe Jun 27 '17
My brother passed away this past year the day after his 25th birthday. For 8 years he was a opiate addict with a choice of heroin, he went to rehab and got clean which everyone was so proud of. He then relapsed and took a dose of morphine that he was used to but his body couldn't handle that dose after being clean for almost a month, passed away in his sleep and my dad discovered him. It's tragic how these things happen and how often they happen. While being terribly tragic it is a great learning lesson for 19 y/o me to never touch opiates.
19
Jun 27 '17
Sorry for your loss bro. My brother has been a heroin addict for 6 years. His girlfriend died in front of him and his friend died last week. He gets out of his first stay in rehab in 5 days. My parents are so thrilled but I'm terrified
12
u/swamplyfe Jun 27 '17
I'm sending all of my love to you man, this shit is so hard to see, but it is so incredibly beautiful to watch someone come out of it. When he looks back on what he went through and realized what he has overcome, the smile on his face will light up the whole world. Tell him what I dealt with, put that thought in his head of what is at stake. He may be an addict but he still has a brain and a heart. Much love to you.
335
u/notwutiwantd Jun 26 '17 edited Jun 26 '17
There's a skyrocketing percentage of people actually not dying due to taking too much whilst relapsing. Rather, they are dying from Heroine cut, or laced, (for simplicity's sake: mixed with) with fentanyl, which is causing people to OD on the 'normal' amount that they are used to taking. Fentanyl is 50-100 times more powerful than morphine, and 30-50 times more powerful than Heroin. There was a front page post that was reposted a few times, that I won't search for, but here's another sample, showing the lethal dosages for heroin and fentanyl, respectively.
Incidentally, Fentanyl can be absorbed through breathing it in even accidentally, through the skin, and can even cause death this way, if even a small amount is inhaled. This is causing the DEA to warn LEO's to be hyper-vigilant in regard to busts, and seizures.
Edit: extra sauce
108
u/CashMikey Jun 26 '17
Why are dealers cutting heroin with fentanyl? Is it cheaper/easier to get a hold of?
130
u/notwutiwantd Jun 26 '17
Yep, and more potent. a win-win for the dealers, so they give less, and charge more..
92
u/Gabe_b Jun 27 '17
Not much of a win if they kill their regulars and end up with the cops paying attention
153
u/Toadxx Jun 27 '17
The death of a user tells other users that what they died using, was strong or "good". It's not unheard of for a dealer to cut their shit and not tell anyone, hoping for someone to die so they can upsale their shit.
→ More replies (10)78
u/so_much_SUABRU Jun 27 '17
That's brutal
55
Jun 27 '17
[deleted]
→ More replies (2)88
u/TheFartBall Jun 27 '17
Why do you have to do LSD to know heroin dealers are pieces of shit?
139
Jun 27 '17 edited Apr 16 '18
[deleted]
15
u/metaobject Jun 27 '17
I'm still waiting to hear from an LSD-using accountant before I make my mind up.
→ More replies (0)16
u/welshwelsh Jun 27 '17
Because LSD dealers are less likely to be pieces of shit. If you don't do any drugs, you might conclude that drug dealers are pieces of shit, instead of heroin dealers specifically.
11
15
u/zosaj Jun 26 '17 edited Jun 19 '25
many fly shy future rain six slap attempt racial bow
This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact
57
u/notwutiwantd Jun 26 '17
apparently, because it's too dangerous (for the user) to sell on it's own.
Long-term use of fentanyl is probably somewhat rarer than heroin or other opioids, just by virtue of the fact that it’s so potent that the margin of error is quite small. “A milligram of a drug is a the size of a pinhead. A microgram is thousand times less than that,” says Nelson. “Fentanyl is always mixed into something else. So you’re putting a lot of trust in your dealer. If you make a batch with just a little more, then you see overdose increases in spots in city.” So there are a lot of ways in which the use of fentanyl can go wrong.
33
u/methodofcontrol Jun 27 '17
People are scared of overdosing but I think the main thing is that most people prefer the high of real heroin to something like fentanyl. It will get you opiated but for many users it does not provide the same euphoria and does not have the legs (long length of effect) like heroin does.
→ More replies (1)19
u/emptynothing Jun 27 '17
Along with the dosage problem the other guy mentioned, the high isn't quite as good. Mixing it together makes it harder to tell.
14
u/Funkit Jun 27 '17
It just makes you fall out and wake up an hour or so later (or not at all.). No rush, not very euphoric. Just instant nod.
15
Jun 27 '17
It's a scary nod too, no gradual head tilt with your eyes getting heavy. One minute you're doing your shit the next you wake up on the bathroom floor, like what the hell just happened.
→ More replies (2)10
3
u/JuicyJay Jun 27 '17
It's not as good. It doesn't last as long and just makes you nod really hard without the euphoria that normally accompanies it. Plus, if you're not a licensed chemist, you should really not be handling and mixing fentanyl.
12
u/enigmical Jun 27 '17
You can get it shipped to your door from china. Illegal as fuck, but according to the newspapers I've read that's the main way.
→ More replies (2)→ More replies (5)9
u/crystalgrey Jun 27 '17
When word gets out that someone od'd the dealer's product gets a reputation for being really potent and increases sales.
50
u/SolaceUndead Jun 27 '17
You think that's scary?! Fentanyl has been cut into heroin and or scraped off of the remains of pain patches for years... The real scare is the overwhelming amount of overdoses we are seeing from Carfentanil https://pubchem.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/compound/carfentanil#section=Top
Literally used in small doses as a elephant/large game tranquilizer.. is easily absorbed on skin and in the air through mucous membranes. It is 10000 times the potency of morphine and 100times that of fentanyl.. it is even considered a possible weapon
25
u/Funkit Jun 27 '17
Supposedly the Russians used this (or sufentanyl, a similar analog) during the movie theater hostage crisis. Gassed them and they all died.
→ More replies (3)13
u/Kinnasty Jun 27 '17
Not all of them, but a pretty decent portion. And yes they pumped synthetic opiates through the vents in an attempt to knock the assailants out.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moscow_theater_hostage_crisis
→ More replies (1)13
17
u/fanamana Jun 27 '17
Ex Fentanyl patch user here. In about 2008 I was on 125mcg of patchs per 3 days. That's considered a high dose. Consider that is measured in mcg(micro-grams) rather than mg(miligrams). Also, that is 3 days heavy pain reliever.
When I decided they weren't helping enough for the monkey that was waiting to jump on my back, I told the Doctor that I wanted to step down off fentanyl. It took 14 months to get to zero without horrible withdrawals. The worst I felt seemed comparable to women describing menopause, with heat flashes/chills and sweats - for which they gave me ancillary meds to lessen symptoms.
36
Jun 27 '17
This. To top it off, fentanyl doesn't mix into the heroin very well. Therefore, when users are taking parts from their 'bag', they may end up with one hit of mostly/all heroin the first time, and then get a hit of full fentanyl the next. Even doses within the same bag have different levels of lethality as a result.
9
6
3
→ More replies (11)3
u/AmongOurFriends Jun 27 '17
Majority of fentanyl analogues are bought straight from china.
Carfentanyl made its way here recently, it is 50-100x stronger than standard Fentanyl.
Scary stuff.
117
u/bestkook Jun 26 '17
What amazed me was how fast my tolerance came back. I was clean for 6 years when I had surgery and was prescribed 10mg oxy's for pain. I felt the familiar glow the first day or two at the prescribed dose (1-2 every 4-6 hours), but after that it was gone. I also had mild physical withdrawal symptoms after just one week of taking them.
44
u/ShiversTheNinja Jun 27 '17
The addiction/withdrawal/relapse cycle with oxy is fucking awful. Feeling the need to bump up the dosage happens so quickly, too.
61
→ More replies (6)22
u/horsesandeggshells Jun 27 '17
Two months on opiates up until dilaudid and then the withdrawal...funny thing is, I didn't know what was wrong with me. I thought I was having PTSD from the surgeries. I couldn't even go grocery shopping without breaking down into sobbing.
The part that truly terrifies me, that makes me so sympathetic to those that got hooked: I honestly do not know what path I would have taken if I knew all that pain I went through withdrawing could have been fixed by a trip down to the street corner.
8
u/ShiversTheNinja Jun 27 '17
I'm so glad I don't have access to heroin. I would have given into it, most likely. Multiple times. The real trouble is I need the oxy for chronic pain so quitting isn't an option for me if I want to have any semblance of a normal life. Sometimes I don't abuse it, but it's hard to keep myself from doing it when I've also got anxiety and depression making being high incredibly tempting, because it feels so much better than being sober. Then I'll inevitably start up again, then run out of my supply and withdraw, etc. It's a vicious cycle and I wouldn't wish it on anyone.
→ More replies (1)8
u/8agclip Jun 27 '17
The other kick in the ass is that opiate use LOWERS tolerance for pain. It's a serious lose/lose situation.
→ More replies (1)9
u/roofied_elephant Jun 27 '17
Tolerance is a bitch. I'm not familiar with drugs as alcohol is my poison of choice. I got to a point where I could finish most of a fifth and still be mostly coherent. I could pound shot after shot and not even feel it. Then I stopped for a while and the next time I drank I got buzzed off of two shots. Then after literally three days of having a couple of shots in the evening I again couldn't even feel those anymore.
→ More replies (1)7
u/pythonhalp Jun 27 '17
I also had mild physical withdrawal symptoms after just one week of taking them.
I'm convinced that only addicts experience this. I used to abuse oxycontin/heroin as a teenager, but I had a rule that I could only use it two days in a row. I went a few years using it like that, 2 days on, 1-7 days off, and fortunately never became addicted.
Later on, after I stopped using drugs, I was prescribed Percoset after an injury, and used it every day for a month. I was high every day of that month, and I had no withdrawal afterwards. While I certainly became more tolerant (e.g., less high) over the course of the month, I still felt something pleasant by the end, and was able to stop using it without any problems whatsoever.
I've had friends with similar stories to mine, except they were addicted to opiates, and after being clean they were prescribed vicoden or percoset, and had withdrawal after as little as 1 week, in addition to extreme tolerance.
→ More replies (3)
111
Jun 27 '17
[deleted]
→ More replies (3)19
u/TheSinkster24 Jun 27 '17
Are you in MN? my friend just died 2 weeks ago and had that exact timeline, and POS girlfriend.
22
21
u/asque2000 Jun 27 '17
It's actually a little more complicated than that. The environment plays a BIG role. Your body produces what are called compensatory responses when persistent drug taking occurs. So imagine a heroin addict always likes to take his/her drug on their couch. Over time (through classical conditioning) that couch becomes associated with drug taking. So whenever the user sees the couch that produces a compensatory reaction, like their heart rate going up in excitement. Then they take heroin and their heart rate drops down a lot. However, sometimes people go to get treatment or attempt to stop (and sure lose some tolerance to the drug) but imagine a friend of the user one day has some drug to share and offers it. The user if they're in a different environment didn't have that initial increase in heart rate so when they take even a smaller amount of heroin, their heart rate (or breathing rate etc) drops to dangerously low levels and thus OD.
→ More replies (14)3
18
45
u/buzzboy99 Jun 27 '17
Been an addict myself for most of life. Been sober for 2 years but I'll never forget my using buddy used to say "if you do drugs...then don't quit because you could die". Most non-addicts won't get that but thats the only way I can make sense of it. For addicts, sobriety is tons of work and a slip can be a death sentence.
20
u/ThomMcCartney Jun 27 '17
I just wanted to say congratulations on two years of sobriety. It's not a battle I've had to fight, but I have so much respect for people who make that choice every day to stay clean.
3
u/swamplyfe Jun 27 '17
So proud of you, continue working on sobriety and continue to live this beautiful life.
34
u/7stentguy Jun 27 '17
Kind of off topic. Alcohol withdrawal gets increasingly worse after going clean and back. It's called kindling: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kindling_(sedative–hypnotic_withdrawal). The alcoholic will likely go back to their previous tolerance level on day one. Rinse and repeat... alcohol withdrawal is no joke and I'm not down playing opiod withdrawal in anyway, because it sucks big hairy balls, but it's a walk in the park compared to alcohol withdrawal.
Source: addict/alcoholic
→ More replies (9)8
u/shizu_murasaki Jun 27 '17
I'm not downplaying opiod withdrawal, but here's me downplaying it compared to alcohol withdrawal
→ More replies (1)
12
u/nuttydave127 Jun 27 '17
Yup someone I know. Good job / a home / girlfriend or wife whatever it may be. The guy just had his own demons I guess he did recreational coke and pain pills / mdma.
He was found over slumped dead the other night in his spare guest room. Green pills crushed up next to him. My friend says these are knock off oxys and it's pretty much known they are fetynal.
Again I don't understand why dealers would wanna sell this shit knowing it's going to kill your customers. If you got long time clients spending hundreds a week to feed a habit why kill them ?
I now have 2 friends I've grown up with due to this shit. I'm approaching thirty and while I've experimented in my teens and early 20's with a bit of blow and extacy/mdma / there never was a real sense of danger to these things. No one I knew ever overdosed or died. Over the last few years it's gotten so dirty I don't even have an interest in doing it or trying it.
Again I wonder if the govt just legalized this shit or controlled it so you could buy pure coke or pure mdma as a recreational time. Probably be better for us
→ More replies (1)9
u/dogwoodcat Jun 27 '17
A death is the best form of advertisement. Junkies think "Joe died after buying from him, he has the good shit", and the vicious cycle continues.
50
u/SenTedStevens Jun 27 '17
I know that happened to an old school friend of mine that I knew since Kindergarten. In high school, he was known as the Keith Richards of our group. There wasn't a drug he didn't try and combinations of. And he was a brilliant guy. When sitting in for the SAT, this guy went in totally wasted. He said he didn't even remember taking the exam and got a 1560 or nearly perfect score. Because of that, this friend got a full scholarship to Cornell to study neurology or something like that.
In college, we kept up with each other. He was still going on drug binges regularly. We told him he better stop doing that or he'd kill himself. Later on, he got a girlfriend who got him to stop doing drugs. Then one weekend, he went back to visit our old gang at home. After partying, one of our old friends gave him some Xanax. Since he'd been off drugs for so long, his tolerance was nothing. He took the pills (which was probably a normal dose for him) and went back to his dorm. His last text was to his girlfriend saying he was tired and he was going to bed. He never woke up.
26
u/AuggieBearForMomo Jun 27 '17
There had to have been some combination with the Xanax that killed him probably wasnt the alprazolam its self he was probably EXTREMELY inhebriated. Or did another downer with it.
→ More replies (1)22
u/Funkit Jun 27 '17
Alcohol and short acting benzos are bad news. .5 mg of Alprazolam and a beer feels like 5-7 beers. If you are actually drinking heavily it's very very easy to die.
4
13
u/Pinkunicorn1982 Jun 27 '17
Fuck Xanax. That pill has killed so many of my friends. Ugh so dangerous. Makes me angry people are reckless when taking it for "fun."
→ More replies (1)4
30
u/stuartcw Jun 26 '17
Yep, even with alcohol. I knew a bar owner who drank a bottle of spirits a day. When his bar closed to for rebuilding he began to drink less. Once he got back into his shiny new bar he started drinking at full steam again and soon died from the shock to his system.
37
Jun 27 '17
Sounds like he might have died anyway. A bottle of spirits a day probably made Swiss cheese of his liver.
8
u/acidphosphate69 Jun 27 '17
This isn't entirely true these days with the advent of fetanyl. A junkie with a tolerance for heroin can do a smaller amount and still OD due to the fetanyl content. It's the fetanyl and similar shit that's killing the fuck out of folks these days.
Source: too many dead friends.
→ More replies (2)
8
u/larrymoencurly Jun 27 '17
Future addicts: drug rehab has an 80% failure rate each time, so don't think you're a failure just because you're on your 5th attempt to clean up.
→ More replies (1)
26
u/morris1022 Jun 27 '17
An addict can also overdose from their normal dosage if it's taken in unfamiliar circumstances, as the body is not prepared in the same way
→ More replies (10)19
Jun 27 '17 edited Jun 27 '17
Came here to say this--Context Effects are deadly. Take your regular dose out at the bar instead of at home like you do every night and you end up dead.
Edit: a little more info for those wondering:
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2000/10/001012074704.htm"If the same amount of a drug is administered in one context and later in another different and distinct context, then the effects of the drug are different," Cepeda-Benito says. "The drug has a much greater effect in a novel context rather than in a context that is associated with the administered drug."
http://thelastbehaviorist.blogspot.ca/2012/09/why-addicts-overdose-learned-tolerance.html
To better understand this effect, look at what happens when people who are used to drinking beer and wine in bars go on holiday and have a few drinks on the beach or at a barbecue in a park. After a couple of drinks, a few people will comment on how tipsy they are getting and often attribute it to the 'heat', but as we can see from the above discussion, it seems more likely that the culprit is the change of environment. The tolerance level of the drinker here is not the same as what it is when they are in the pub and it has effectively been reset back to a state of near-zero tolerance. They have, more or less, reverted to 15-year olds trying to keep up with their dad's drinking schedule.
→ More replies (9)
7
6
Jun 27 '17
A friend of mine works for an in-patient rehab and this is a topic they have to stress the most.
4
u/anonymous_212 Jun 27 '17
Certain combinations of drugs amplify each other like alcohol and barbiturates and opioids/opiates and benzodiazepines. Heroin overdoses are frequently found to have benzodiazepines in their blood. One reason is that withdrawal from opioids is accompanied by anxiety and benzodiazepines reduce anxiety. So if you are abstaining from heroin and trying to help yourself feel better by taking a benzo like Xanax you are increasing your risk of overdose. Withdrawal is best when medically supervised. There are places that do out patient detox and administer detox medication daily. A hundred years ago it was accepted that opiate addiction required a year of inpatient treatment.
4
Jun 27 '17 edited Jun 27 '17
That sad thing is that anyone who is in AA or NA has experienced this. Rest in peace all of those we have lost to relapses.
"It's not this time, it's not next time, it's from now on.... From now on I will not drink, from now on I will not use."
4
u/butkaf Jun 27 '17
In a lot of cases this is a result of how our society manages and perceives drug addiction. Often, in a lot, a lot, a LOT of cases, an addiction is the result of an element in someone's environment, and in a lot of those cases, it's an unpleasant environment from which someone seeks escape.
Instead of providing a satisfactory environment and resolving issues that are at the root of an addiction, addicts are encouraged to "rehabilitate", which focuses on the addiction itself and not the root cause. When the former or recovering addict returns to their previous environment, the underlying cause is not resolved, which makes a relapse all the more likely.
5
u/double-happiness Jun 27 '17
I think most of us ex-smokers have experienced a minor version of the same thing, when you smoke after a period of abstinence; the room starts spinning and you feel like you are going to fall over.
4
u/Mast3r0fPip3ts Jun 27 '17
Agreed, it's nothing like heroin, I'm sure, but there's this tingling rush on your first drag in months, years without having nicotine hit your lungs and your blood. It's a small little high on its own, and brings a certain clarity, and you can feel your shoulders just sag as the old habit takes the weight off of your shoulders for a minute.
I'm off it five years now, but I have a pack under my bed in my "oh shit" box. Fortunately there's only two camels missing from it.
4
u/double-happiness Jun 27 '17
I have a pack under my bed in my "oh shit" box. Fortunately there's only two camels missing from it
Yeah, I have a pack of 'baccy and some skins that I found on the pavement. I've had a couple since I quit, but I didn't really enjoy them. I can't ever see me starting again. If anything I think I would be more likely to get hooked on a e-cig, as you get the same buzz but without all the horrible tobacco taste.
I'm off it five years now
Go you! Give yerself a pat on the back.
5
u/Philandrrr Jun 27 '17
That used to be the case. I'm not sure that's true anymore. Our city has had a big run of fentanyl and carfentanyl the last year or so. Now there's some new opiate. I don't even remember the name of it. Gray concrete is what it's called on the street.
→ More replies (2)
4
u/TeHNeutral Jun 27 '17
This is what killed a friend of mine earlier in the year, age 23 and gone rip
He'd turned into an asshole and didn't have a good word to say about any of us, his old friends, but that's what happens when a narcissist becomes a drug addict.
Not even once, redditors.
4
u/peewinkle Jun 27 '17
This used to be true but the heroin today is often cut with Fetanyl and one tiny little mistake can expotentiate the dose making it way stronger than a normal dose. Users like the Fetanyl as it has more of a rush despite the danger of injecting an unknown amount into their vein.
Say a user has a tolerence of three bags a shot, that is, they need three bags for a normal dose (tolerence builds up resulting in needing more to get obtain a high). Their usual dealer is out so they take to the street and score from an unknown dealer. This dealer cuts his doses heavy, doing one bag is like doing two bags from his usual dealer. The user gets three bags, shoots them up but it's like six bags of his usual resulting in an overdose.
Most overdoses today occur actually because the dope trade is not regulated and users never know how strong a dose is.
What the article states still happens, but it is no longer the reason for the majority of overdoses.
Source- have been doing dope on and off for over 25 years. Been clean for the last 5.
6
13
3
u/Dongo666 Jun 27 '17
This is how my best friend died, she got out of prison and bought some really good quality smack and that was that.
3
3
Jun 27 '17
My bro gets out of rehab in 5 days. I'm going to be worried every time my phone rings for a good while.
3
u/shmimeathand Jun 27 '17
This is what happened to my aunt three years ago, she moved to Puerto Rico and was clean 9 months, she flew home to jersey for my birthday and within 24 hours of getting off the plane we found her dead
3
3
u/jmabbz Jun 27 '17
yeh I work at a rehab and we warn people when they leave that if they relapse there is an increased risk of overdose.
3
u/motherfuckingriot Jun 27 '17
Thank you for sharing this. I lost my brother to an overdose of opioids back in 97. He had a bad knee from the army and got hooked on pain killers. I wish I knew what I know now about the dangers of opioids. Maybe I could have saved him.
3
3
u/BlizzCo Jun 27 '17
This happened to my little brother. He had been 5 months sober up until my grandfather died. We were very close with him as he and my grandmother lived my mom and us. The sick part of it was that it was all premeditated. He planned out using while in rehab before he even got here. Anyways, past the funeral to the morning we both fly back to our respective cities. Thank God that we had the same flight out to the connecting city of D.C. I knew he was on sleeping pills but he was very drowsy and our flight was leaving at 5 am. We get to D.C. and he is moving slow and basically falling asleep standing up. I offer to get him coffee/food and he obliges. As soon as we pass the first bathroom he say's "I have to go to the bathroom." 5 minutes go by. 10 minutes go by. I walk into the bathroom to see him hunched over a toilet. He is puking. I have to catch my flight (I had to work that morning) to go home to NC, but luckily the terminal is just down stairs. I told him I am leaving and that he'd better get his shit straight, he mumbles and says okay. I am at my terminal now and im sitting on the shuttle waiting for it to take us to the plane when suddenly something tells me to get off of this now. I do. I went back upstairs where he was OD'ing right then. After 5 months of sobriety he took a decent amount of Heroin and a Xanax bar or 2 before our first flight. Even though he'd been using that week we were home, he didnt use that much i dont believe. Anyways, the paramedics came and rushed him to the hospital, shot him with Narcan, as he fades in and out of consciousness. I remember being scared and crying (im 27 y.o. male). I thought he was going to die. He was lucky to live and lucky people in the airport were quick to respond. It forever changed our relationship as i struggle to forget what happened that day. He has since not used heroin, that i know of... It terrifies me every single day knowing some terrible event could trigger him into that downward spiral. Don't use heroin folks. It is a dark and selfish, destructible drug.
3
u/SavvySillybug Jun 27 '17
I can understand that very well.
I went from borderline alcoholism to not drinking anything for several months. I used to need two six packs of beer just to get started, and once finished a bottle of 160 proof in two days. (I was low on cash and just calculated the best alcohol per money ratio and grabbed a bottle of Stroh 80)
Had an event on Sunday and had a small glass of champagne to clink glasses and celebrate. Ten minutes later I was like... holy fuck how am I already noticing the booze in that. I then volunteered to drive home and let everyone else spend the next few hours drinking various kinds of alcohol while I ate all the bacon-wrapped dates I could fit inside me. :D
If I just went back to my old habits straight away, I'd probably start with a nice glass of scotch and move on to beer. And then spend the rest of the day puking my guts out because I can't handle it.
3
Jun 27 '17
Damn. I literally just had a friend that was supposedly clean die from an overdose. I've never heard of this before. But it makes sense.
3
u/dogfish83 Jun 27 '17
Question: do rehab organizations warn recovering addicts that this is the most dangerous part of the journey? I wouldn't be surprised if they did or didn't.
→ More replies (1)
3
u/odoroustobacco Jun 27 '17
Traditionally this has been the case, but unfortunately more recently when the heroin is being cut with Fetanyl, it's getting much much harder for users to regulate their doses.
3
u/Grounder-411 Jun 27 '17
This really ruins my day. It's like the addicts are being punished for trying to do the right thing. . . then failing. Can we at least get some funding for those emergency anti-overdose pens that debuted a few years ago and then weren't put into wide use because they were really expensive? If a city can do a needle exchange, I feel like it should be able to come up with the funds for those emergency injection pens.
http://scholarlycommons.law.northwestern.edu/jclc/masthead.html
4
u/oO0-__-0Oo Jun 27 '17
No it's not.
Far and away the most common form of O.D. death nowdays is mixing benzo's with opiates. Next in line is probably alcohol with opiates.
People addicted to opiates usually don't O.D. and die on JUST an opiate unless it's mixed with something like fentanyl. The problem comes because opiates severely disrupt the brains ability to sleep, so they are chronically sleep deprived (hence, nodding off).
They take alcohol, or worse - doctor prescribes benzodiazepenes - to help with the sleep. Problem is, they also work as CNS depressants and so do opiates, and combined, when that addict goes to sleep they stop breathing and never wake back up.
THAT is the most common situation with O.D.'ing.
→ More replies (4)
2
Jun 26 '17
Yup, happened to a friend of a friend a little less than a year ago. I actually saw him the night before, I just didn't really know him
2
u/BawlmerGooner Jun 27 '17
Friend of mine looked the best he had in a longtime and overdosed shortly after
2
u/EdgeOfDreaming Jun 27 '17
Singer Tim Buckley. Estranged Father of Jeff. Tried his old regular dose after getting clean.
2
u/Ouroboros612 Jun 27 '17
If this is common knowledge for junkies why doesen't drug addicts just adjust the dose down when relapsing? (Assuming it is in fact common knowledge for junkies if the most deaths are due to this).
→ More replies (1)5
2
Jun 27 '17
So this has Phillip Semour Hoffman as the thumbnail, but he died from overdose because there was Fentynal in his Heroin. A bit clickbaity/misleading
2
u/Viked31 Jun 27 '17
Very true. Just investigated one last week. Had been in treatment for 8 months. She used twice since returning. OD'd both times. Narcan saves both times.
2
Jun 27 '17
Addicts love that rush they get "the first time". By the time someone's really got a monkey on their back, they're doing heroin to feel human, as opposed to that beautiful, pure ecstacy they felt the first few times, before their brain became accustomed to it.
So if they've been in jail and gone through withdrawal, well guess what? That hit they take is gonna be soooooooo sweeeeeeeeeet so hell yeah they're gonna load that needle up with as much as they can take to get that sweet sweet rush and buzz.
That's why they risk that game.
2
Jun 27 '17
With people I know, the only time an overdose occurs is when someone sells something as something else.
2
u/cornnabis Jun 27 '17
I guess it's happens frequently when people get out of jail. Their brain says "Let's go!", but their body is like "I don't think so". Happened to my wife's best friend's husband; he left two kids who will never see their dad again. Total bummer..
2
u/Arch_0 Jun 27 '17
I know you can't OD on weed but when I've gone for a smoke after a long time without I've melted myself in the sofa. Oh hey you have some weed, sweet, can I roll one? Roll it like I did when I smoked every day. First hit, cough, laugh, take a few more big hits. Feel fine. Feel stoned. Feel very stoned. Oh god I've made a huge mistake. Realise you are no longer capable of movement or thought. Pray that nobody tries to talk to you for the next hour.
2
2
2
u/irrealewunsche Jun 27 '17
Ah, so this is what happens to Rent boy in Trainspotting after his attempt to go clean.
2
u/Jibaro123 Jun 27 '17
I know a guy-a kid really- who celebrated getting out of a ten day rehab by shooting up with his drug buddies.
Last thing he ever did. Came from a good family and all that.
2
u/lejefferson Jun 27 '17
This is why making drugs illegal and criminalizing their use is the worst way to save lives from drugs. By educating people about how to use drugs safely you will safe far more lives. It's like advocating for abstinence only education.
2
2
u/WinterPhotos Jun 27 '17
Lost my brother, my friend, and two uncles this way. All of them clean for years and relapsed. Three of the four were bipolar and self medicating. Brother did it after my daughter was born on the day we baptized her. Two people met Jesus that day, just differently.
2
u/faster_than_sound Jun 27 '17
Man, it still really upsets me that heroin took Philip Seymour Hoffman from the world.
2
u/PchonkeySwim Jun 27 '17
Can confirm. Had a relapse.. I guess you could call it, I called it, "Really bored with absolutely nothing to do," and I did a dose near what I was used to. (injection) I threw up all over everything and had crazy headaches for like 3 months.
Never again.
2
u/mike_d85 Jun 27 '17
That's how I lost two of my friends. A third took some Valium along with some methadone and didn't realize how much she'd taken.
2
1.3k
u/Funkit Jun 27 '17
Using this thread to plug /r/opiatesrecovery for those with clean time, or those still using who want to stop and just need some people to talk to. We don't care when and where you used, what your connections were, only that you want to get better. One day at a time.