Anyone who has been addicted to opiate drug before knows how difficult it can be to get off of them. Examples of opiates would be painkillers such as prescription medications like Vicodin or Oxycontin, but also street drugs such as opium and heroin. One of the reasons that it can be so difficult to break away from an opiate addiction is because the pain and discomfort that a person will feel during withdrawal can be very intense. Because of this, the potential strategies that we might use in order to get off of opiates mostly deal with ways of getting through this physical withdrawal.
The first strategy you might try is to check into a drug rehab center and detox there. This is generally the most accepted strategy for a few different reasons. First of all, you are going to get the highest level of support and possible resources from such an inpatient treatment center, whereas other strategies might not have this full level of support. Another reason that this is a good option is because the medical staff at a drug rehab can properly treat your physical withdrawal, making it more comfortable for you than it might have been otherwise. In addition to all this, going to a drug rehab has the greatest potential for aftercare options, and can probably provide a person with the most choices when it comes to continuing care. Of course, going to a treatment center is expensive, and many struggling addicts cannot afford it. If you can get it, go.
Another tactic for overcoming an addiction to opiates is to go to a physician and ask for some sort of drug therapy medication. This would include taking some medications on a continual basis such as Methadone or Suboxone. To be specific, Suboxone is a man made opiate drug that can take away cravings for opiates when taken every day as maintenance, and can thus increase a person's chances of staying clean. One issue with this technique for staying clean is that it does not really mandate any sort of therapy or program involvement on the part of the addict. These things could be utilized, but since the are not required, many people will simply rely on the medication to solve all their problems. Studies have shown that this generally does not work well in the long run unless people take a more active approach to changing their life.
A final strategy is to go cold turkey, quit all opiates, and hope for the best. As you can imagine, this is a recipe for disaster, and will likely result in a relapse very quickly for just about any opiate addict. But amazingly enough, some people have quit cold turkey and made it stick.
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