22 year chronic pain patient tested and failed opiate test beacuse of marijuana

i have a friend on here that is going through the same exact situation.. he's in a non med state, going to a pain clinic due to back issues, and tested positive for thc and now they're threatening to kick him off of the clinic... he's all fucked up over it, as i'm sure you were / are...

opiates can be a real bitch to kick, and i wish you well op...

I'd either figure something out myself, or consult a therapist then.. Lack of motion after an injury is very bad.. Physical recovery work is tougher than withdrawal, but it's wise to endure it..

gioua said:

From what I have read the exercise does help.. but this can also aggravate my issues... (hard to do much exercise when you have 2 eff up shoulders, effd knee's that have had 3 surgeries a 6'' plate in the forearm Disc issues in the spine.) but I know what ya mean.. Have been told to tense up my leg muscles and then relax and then repeating this.. told this helps the acid in the muscle to start moving or something.. works to a point

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Swimming and any type of light resistance exercise in a swimming pool would work. The water helps protect joints and the medium itself provides for light resistance. Just get in the pool and walk and stretch if you can.

At 23 years old I have degenerative disc disorder, a ton of arthritis and a couple torn ligaments in my shoulder. The first thing that doctors did was load me up on pain pills and trust me, the best thing that I ever did was quit taking them. I took them whenever i was first diagnosed for a month. Then, i got sick of the couch lock and feeling sorry for myself and went into over drive working out. What was the worst that was going to happen? I was going to injure myself again? please . . . lol Staying away from meds and staying active was probably the best decision ever though. Seriously. It's been about a year and although I still have pain, it is not frequent at all and tolerable with a lil' R&R. Stay strong and do not let them turn you into a pharmaceutical guinea pig!

Just an update as of 6-16-12 at 8:30 pm was the last time I had any of the pills I have been given and only took 1/8th at that time the w.d were very very light.. thank GOD! and yes I prayed daily to have an easy time getting off of the meds took me just under 20 days or so to go from 3x60mg to 0mg
there were some mild issues such as sweats/cold-hot not severe (baths helped!!) had mild jimmy legs (these suck!) walking helped with the legs (cant exercise too much but walking and tensing the muscles helped) had mild nausea some diarrhea ** sorry to get kinda gross but this is one of the 1st symptoms of w.d
I had gone cold turkey off the meds once and holy hell... I lived in the bathroom that day!

At this point the most difficult part is the psychological effect of missing taking a pill or looking for the bottle seems to get a bit easier every day.

sweet! welcome back to the land of the living bro! look into Tai Chi, its zero impact and reallly helps my flexibility and tendon pain, once you get past all the metaphysical humbug about "energies" and your faulun rotation...

when you do it slow smooth and easy, you can work up a surprising sweat without ever jumping running or hoisting weights. if you can stand, walk and reach for the cookie jar, thats all you need. check the interwebs for tai chi instruction videos, like the one with david carradine. the shit really works.

Dr Kynes said:

sweet! welcome back to the land of the living bro! look into Tai Chi, its zero impact and reallly helps my flexibility and tendon pain, once you get past all the metaphysical humbug about "energies" and your faulun rotation...

when you do it slow smooth and easy, you can work up a surprising sweat without ever jumping running or hoisting weights. if you can stand, walk and reach for the cookie jar, thats all you need. check the interwebs for tai chi instruction videos, like the one with david carradine. the shit really works.

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Took GoJu Ryu Karate for about 3 years still able to fully recall all the kata's.
Tai Chi has always interested me however there is a ton of shoulder movement with sever impingement in both shoulders I would look like someone with no bones flailing around lol..




anyone on the narco's for pain and wanting to quit watch out for the emotion flow which happens after stopping... has been bad tearing up when I watch just about anything (even stupid adds!!) yeah I know that the rx suppressed my emotions or numbed them so they are flooding back in.. and well... thank God I dont leave the house much!

gioua- Congrats! "The journey of a thousand miles begins with the first step." ~Laozi

Best thing I ever did was put the pills down and walk away. The Government should be held accountable for allowing such horrible, addicting crap to be sold.

Opioids are the shit. I won't get into all the problems and meds I've taken but suffice to say that MJ has saved my life. I still have pain and 95% of the time I can get enough relief with MJ to bare it, not get rid of it but bare it. Nothing that you get in a pharmacy in an opiate, to my knowledge, is all synthetic based or opioids. Doctors will say there is no difference but the level of addition we see among all people with these new drugs surpasses anything ever seen before. I know opiates are addictive and will kill but I don't trust the pharmaceutical companies at all. Anyway I'm glad to not take that shit in a few years.

gioua said:

Took GoJu Ryu Karate for about 3 years still able to fully recall all the kata's.Tai Chi has always interested me however there is a ton of shoulder movement with sever impingement in both shoulders I would look like someone with no bones flailing around lol..anyone on the narco's for pain and wanting to quit watch out for the emotion flow which happens after stopping... has been bad tearing up when I watch just about anything (even stupid adds!!) yeah I know that the rx suppressed my emotions or numbed them so they are flooding back in.. and well... thank God I dont leave the house much!

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Ppl typically think they're more disabled than they are.. Almost any activity can be toned down to a manageable level.. Consult your doctor or therapist if you think it's necessary, but don't let your perceived condition be an excuse to wither into physical patheticness.. It's good you're doing something, focus on maximizing it while keeping an eye on the line you shouldn't cross..

gioua said:

I DID IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


HOLY HELL!!!!!!!!!!!!! I so far have gone 40 hours w.o ANY opiates!! After 22 years of usage and about 3 weeks of tapering down from 180mg of morphine per day.
Days 1....
What I did was go from day 1 using 180mg per day to 60-90mg usually trying to stretch a 60 mg by breaking in half and going for 14-18 hours on that dosage

I did exp some mild sweats-coldspells-nausea (thank you mmj for making this so much easier!!) Had some more mental issues with the desire to pop a pill being the worse part of the week really... WOW never thought I would literally think about taking a pill. Exp some major insomnia mainly the "jimmy legs" those sucks!!
Day2-4 sleeping issues here and there pretty severe again the mental part was the worst for me... I kept eying the bottle of pills also had some intestinal issues but not as bad as I have had in the past
day5-6 very easy at this point to go a good 10 hours without w.d sypmtoms..
day 7 took a 30mg pill at 10:30 pm on 5-6-12 this was my last pill have not had any symptoms yet and hope I dont.

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This was the post that did it for me and gioua and cn have backed me every step of the way. He and Cannabineer have been my backbone for this journey.

I had begun researching cannabis for pain control and in 2011 decided it was time. I came here and began looking about. As of June 1 I would have been a pain control patient on Morphine for 22 years. Morphine was handling less of my pain as the years went by because acute pain is mostly somatic while chronic pain changes over time to mostly neuropathic. Morphine doesn't do well for neuropathic pain. So it was time to come off. My PC physician wrote me for Marinol so I was lucky in that I wasn't forced like gioua to come off my all time high. I spent 2 years in a very comfortable taper.

Finally after 2 years of tapering I fell below the therapeutic level of the drug. So on Monday evening at 7 PM I swallowed my last MS Contin (15mg.). I am currently just 51 hours into my detox. It is NOT pleasant but I've been tapering for a couple years (unless you have a titanium spine like gioua you don't cold turkey a 200 mg/day habit). My problems with Morphine were what started me with Cannabis. So now I'm not feeling great but I am determined to stop and best of all sometime in the night the worms left my muscles! Thank god for that. That was the worst symptom.

So please be patient with some of my more silly posts. I like you guys a lot and wouldn't hurt you but my posts may not be exactly right since my usually odd way of thinking is currently MUCH odder. But being here helps pass the time.

.....and gioua, god bless you for helping me follow your footsteps It's so much easier when there's a path and a friend holding a lantern beside you.

CN I miss you.... it was such a warm and comforting just feeling you about and the emptiness hurts (and yes I'm crying oh this emotional lability).

Do not.. I repeat...do not immediately stop taking your pain meds !

You will go insane...trust me. Opiate withdrawal is not fun.

After 20 years of being spoon fed narcotics, I'm also trying to wean off them.

Tried getting off Valium last year...went nuts..even though I weaned off them slowly. ( 2 months )

I'm going to try it again this summer, 6 month wean this time.

Dreading getting off opiates due to withdrawals.

I am taking a lot less of both thanks to weed, maybe down to 1/4 dosage now.

But if your under one of those highly controlled med plans ( Insurance, Medicaid etc ) you may not have much choice as far as smoking goes.

I'd wean off them...have a small emergency supply saved up...then tell them to kiss my ass.

I have spinal cord damage due to a failed spinal fusion.

ogreb said:

Do not.. I repeat...do not immediately stop taking your pain meds !

You will go insane...trust me. Opiate withdrawal is not fun.

After 20 years of being spoon fed narcotics, I'm also trying to wean off them.

Tried getting off Valium last year...went nuts..even though I weaned off them slowly. ( 2 months )

I'm going to try it again this summer, 6 month wean this time.

Dreading getting off opiates due to withdrawals.

I am taking a lot less of both thanks to weed, maybe down to 1/4 dosage now.

But if your under one of those highly controlled med plans ( Insurance, Medicaid etc ) you may not have much choice as far as smoking goes.

I'd wean off them...have a small emergency supply saved up...then tell them to kiss my ass.

I have spinal cord damage due to a failed spinal fusion.

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ogreb thank you so much for your concern. Opiate withdrawals usually don't kill you depending on the state of health you are in prior to entering. Further I took 2 years comfortably tapering. I only hopped off a 15 mg/day habit at the time I quit. Benzodiazepine withdrawals can kill and should only happen in house. Never attempt your own benzo withdrawal.

Currently I'm at 92.5 hours since my last dose and I'm feeling better every moment. THANK GOD for cannabis. I have no ill will feelings toward my medical providors. They are my friends who I worked with prior to the accident. They covered me better and even cautioned me about not stopping opiates and covered me in so many other ways. I came off because I wanted to and Cannabis made me realize I could.

Cannabis did something to my head. But I really can't talk about that until I'm further away from the opiates. As my feelings are untrustworthy at the moment.

curious2garden said:

ogreb thank you so much for your concern. Opiate withdrawals usually don't kill you depending on the state of health you are in prior to entering. Further I took 2 years comfortably tapering. I only hopped off a 15 mg/day habit at the time I quit. Benzodiazepine withdrawals can kill and should only happen in house. Never attempt your own benzo withdrawal.

Currently I'm at 92.5 hours since my last dose and I'm feeling better every moment. THANK GOD for cannabis. I have no ill will feelings toward my medical providors. They are my friends who I worked with prior to the accident. They covered me better and even cautioned me about not stopping opiates and covered me in so many other ways. I came off because I wanted to and Cannabis made me realize I could.

Cannabis did something to my head. But I really can't talk about that until I'm further away from the opiates. As my feelings are untrustworthy at the moment.

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if you notice the date It's not even been a year and I have no plans on going back and I will help anyone who needs to be talked thru this process..

Congrats Curious be proud of getting off that crap!

gioua said:

if you notice the date It's not even been a year and I have no plans on going back and I will help anyone who needs to be talked thru this process..

Congrats Curious be proud of getting off that crap!

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gioua, you held my hand every step. I would not have made it if you hadn't been there assuring me this would be over soon. Previously I'd been counting in hours. Now I'm at day 9. I see my PC physician the end of this month. Boy are they going to be surprised (although I imagine there will be much flak given). I feel alive like I haven't in decades.
Thank you,

This thread is so full of success and win. Cannabis helped me get through heroin withdraw... the worst experience i have ever gone through. i know, i brought it onto myself. But the point is cannabis got me through it. my spinal chord swelled up during withdraw, my back hurt SO FUCKING BAD. chills, sweats, fever, couldnt keep food down... then i'd take a few tokes and everything was at least 40% better. Natures way of healing is the best way of healing, IMO.

One of my many BEST days.. was telling my pain dr.. I no longer needed his services.. and explained why..

I forgot all about this thread... and have had a few folks here PM me and get a bit of help off the rx's... so glad I posted it now..

Curious.. I am glad to have helped but remember all I did was talk you thru the horrid parts via pm.. you yourself did the real work..

SensiHerb said:

This thread is so full of success and win. Cannabis helped me get through heroin withdraw... the worst experience i have ever gone through. i know, i brought it onto myself. But the point is cannabis got me through it. my spinal chord swelled up during withdraw, my back hurt SO FUCKING BAD. chills, sweats, fever, couldnt keep food down... then i'd take a few tokes and everything was at least 40% better. Natures way of healing is the best way of healing, IMO.

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That is terrific. I'm looking at day 14 tomorrow. Mother's day was my lucky day 13 I'm exercising and feeling soooooooooooooooo good.

curious2garden said:

That is terrific. I'm looking at day 14 tomorrow. Mother's day was my lucky day 13 I'm exercising and feeling soooooooooooooooo good.

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HA I noticed that post about exercising knew you were a bit better... by day 4-5 or so?

gioua said:

gonna fess up the jimmy legs got bad.. had to take 1/4th pill it went away within 30 mins then I went 44 hours w.o any and have been at this time going with 1/4th a pill 24-40 hours not to stave off jimmy legs but the back pain is not any better. I am ok at this point using this little compare to what I have been using for 22 years I understand I need to remove this crap from my system 100% and not rely on it as a daily go to.
I am ordering 2000 00- caps today. I did some more research on how THC is and has been used VERY successfully to wean off opiates I have a wedding at the end of this month and have to shoot the ceremony not looking forward to all the work but hopefully all goes well. I retired from Wedding Photography about 4-5 years ago when it became more of a job then the ACTUAL real job I was doing.. wish I used pot back then!!

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Been a full year since my last RX pill...
Thank GOD!