How to treat an addiction to painkillers

June 23, 2015

How to treat an addiction to painkillers: Addiction is not a weakness

How to treat an addiction to painkillers is not self medicated but getting the professionals involved would be helpful

The power behind drug addiction is not something that you can under estimate by all standards. We have mentioned time and again that drug addiction has and does not have boundaries everybody can be affected anytime and anywhere. And when it comes, it carries with it a host of other serious problems that are life threatening. It is therefore necessary that when talking about this problem, we must shun a way from diversionary remarks and face the problem head on. I am trying to say that opioid addiction is not a moral or mental weakness. It’s a chronic medical condition that results from changes in the brain in susceptible people. Once narcotic addiction has developed, escaping the cycle of detox and relapse is typically a long-term process. With that explanation we must ask questions to find answers to those questions. Like for instance will knowing how to treat an addiction to painkillers help? This is what we want to find out from the experts at AWAREmed Health and Wellness Resource Center.

This facility was established by doctor Dalal Akoury primarily to transform each individual’s life through increasing awareness about health and wellness and by empowering individuals to find their own inner healing power. It will interest you to know that Dr. Akoury’s practice focuses on personalized medicine through healthy lifestyle choices that deal with primary prevention and underlying causes instead of patching up symptoms. Getting into the discussion, doctor Akoury says that breaking away from prescription drug abuse takes much more than willpower. However, the application of medications and counseling can improve the chances of success she says. With the advent of newer drugs like buprenorphine (sometimes combined with naloxone) and naltrexone and traditional therapies like methadone and 12-step programs, many people are able to stay on the road to recovery and get their lives back on truck.

How to treat an addiction to painkillers: Physical dependence and detoxification

Narcotic addiction is not friendly to human health and causes real changes in certain areas of the brain. When treating this it is important to note that prescription drug addiction alters the circuits responsible for mood and “reward” behaviors. And in addition to that, long-term prescription drug abuse affects virtually all the systems in the body. Besides that, cutting off the supply abruptly will lead to opioid withdrawal symptoms. The following are some of the symptoms of opioid withdrawal:

Chills and goose bumps (the origin of the phrase “cold turkey”)
Nausea and vomiting
Craving for drugs
Yawning
Diarrhea
Large pupils
Abdominal pain
Body aches
Agitation and severe negative moods

How to treat an addiction to painkillers: Medications for Opioid Withdrawal

Opioid withdrawal is difficult to endure, and is a major reason for relapse and continued prescription drug abuse. Medications are used to prevent symptoms of opioid withdrawal during detox, easing the person out of physical dependence:

Methadone – this is a long-acting opioid drug. It activates the same opioid receptors as narcotics, effectively eliminating withdrawal symptoms. Providing the correct dose of methadone prevents opioid withdrawal symptoms and eases drug craving but it does not provide the euphoria. The dose can be slowly tapered off, freeing the person from physical dependence without withdrawal symptoms. Methadone is the most effective known treatment for narcotic addiction.

Buprenorphine and Naloxone (Suboxone) – this is a newer combination drug that helps for detox from prescription opioid addiction. Buprenorphine activates opioid receptors, reducing drug craving and preventing withdrawal. Naloxone helps prevent misuse of the medication.

Clonidine – this is a blood pressure medicine that acts on the brain. Clonidine reduces the effects of the “fight or flight” response, which is over-activated during opioid withdrawal. However, clonidine does nothing to reduce drug craving, and is mostly ineffective when used alone.

Rapid detox programs – claim to accelerate the process of detox and opioid withdrawal by giving large doses of opioid blocking drugs. Some programs place an addict under general anesthesia during the detox process. These programs have not proven to be more effective than traditional methods of detox, and may be more dangerous.

How to treat an addiction to painkillers: Maintenance therapy after detox

The reason why detoxification is very important is because detox subdues and neutralizes the physical effects of narcotic addiction and opioid withdrawal. Experts are saying that even though detoxification is the first step mainly for the subduing the physical effects, it has very little to do with the psychological and social factors which are the main drivers that push addicts back and succumb to relapse. All stressful and other situations that remind the brain of the drug’s pleasure are also common triggers.

When drug cravings strike, they can be impossible to resist. Most people who go through detox and short-term counseling will relapse to prescription drug abuse.

Methadone is the best-studied, most effective method of recovery from narcotic addiction. Suboxone, while newer, has gained wide acceptance as maintenance therapy.

Some people have a high rate of relapse when maintenance therapy is stopped, and so they remain on the medicines for decades. In others, maintenance therapy is tapered off over months to years.

How to treat an addiction to painkillers: Counseling and 12-Step Programs

Narcotics Anonymous (NA) is an international network of community-based meetings for those recovering from drug addiction. Modeled after Alcoholics Anonymous (AA), NA is a 12-step program with a defined process for overcoming narcotic addiction.

NA is an abstinence-based program. In principle, NA is opposed to the use of maintenance therapy. Methadone Anonymous is a 12-step program that acknowledges the value of methadone or Suboxone in recovery from narcotic addiction. Most experts and treatment centers recommend participation in a 12-step program or other form of counseling. Therapy can take place as an outpatient, or in a residential facility. Alternatives to 12-step programs may include cognitive behavioral therapy, family and couples therapy and motivational interviewing. Finally you must be ready for this financially because recovery from prescription drug addiction can be costly. However, it is far less costly in comparison with the cost of addiction and continuous use of drugs. Therefore embracing the principal of prevention should be very ideal but because of the environment we live in, this may be very difficult to achieve effectively. But even if this is the case, all is not lost because there is still hope in the professional treatment offered by experts at AWAREmed Health and Wellness Resource Center under the able leadership of doctor Dalal Akoury. you can schedule for an appointment with her today for the commencement of your treatment.

How to treat an addiction to painkillers: Addiction is not a weakness

The benefits of extending drug recovery programs

June 19, 2015

The benefits of extending drug recovery programs: Drug recovery aftercare

The benefits of extending drug recovery programs. This ensures that unnecessary relapses is avoided.

In the struggle of defeating the scourge of drug addiction, we are often faced with challenges some are expected while others may come unexpectedly. However irrespective of those challenges, the fight must never be relented on and that is why treatment should be done immediately. Over the past few weeks we have been discussing topics torching on the solutions to drug addiction and we realized that treatment is very instrumental. We also looked at several methods of treatment including admission in rehab centers. In this article we want to further on that by looking at what can be done to patients after going through the rigorous treatment procedures. We are aware that many people suffer relapse and sink back into their old habits further complicating the problem. To avoid this draw back we want to look at the benefits of extending drug recover programs beyond the stipulated recovery period.

Speaking to the experts at AWAREmed Health and Wellness Resource Center which is one of the leading pioneers in natural and holistic addiction treatment, doctor Dalal Akoury MD and also the founder of the facility says that drug rehabilitation programs does not end on discharging the patient but should include any program intended to treat drug dependency even after the designed recovery time. Many extended drug recovery programs are available today and they may include medical and psychotherapeutic methods of treatment. Ideally many types of psychotherapy are similar for different drugs, while medical treatment tends to be more specific to a particular group of drugs. Ordinarily a standard drug rehabilitation program has a fixed length of 30 to 90 days in most cases. However an extended drug recovery program generally does not have a set duration and is intended to help a patient maintain sobriety and that is what we want to focus on.

We are aware that opiates are also a common source of drug addiction and include drugs such as cocaine, heroin and oxycodone. Many different drugs are subject to abuse, although they can be grouped into a small number of categories. And alcohol on the other hand is one of the most commonly abused psychoactive substances because it is easy to manufacture and is readily available. Opiates are also a common source of drug addiction and include drugs such as cocaine, heroin and oxycodone. Additional types of addictive drugs include amphetamines and barbiturates.

An addict may have many reasons for seeking rehabilitation and recovery treatment. Prolonged, heavy drug use typically has severe consequences affecting our daily lives financially, socially, physically and psychologically. With this couple with the fact that many drugs are illegal; this therefore further complicates this in the sense that their use incurs the additional problem of criminal penalties. Drug rehabilitation programs are typically designed to stop a patient’s drug use as quickly as is medically safe. Drug addicts typically have a high risk for relapse, especially opiate users and that is why there is need to appreciate the benefits of extending drug recovery programs beyond the designed time. Now let us look at some of the elements of extension of recovery process.

The benefits of extending drug recovery programs: Counseling

Drug recovery aftercare programs generally view moderation as unsustainable in the long term, and these programs promote complete abstinence. Counseling forms the primary basis of treatment in extended drug recovery programs. However, counseling can be a challenge more so when the individual drug addiction was as a result of chemical imbalance in the brain. Another thing is that counselors vary greatly in their spiritual beliefs. Counselors who adhere to the disease model of drug addiction have high spiritual beliefs, while those who follow the freewill model of drug addiction have low spiritual beliefs. Doctor Akoury says that the primary objective of counseling and drug recovery program is to help patients identify the reasons for their addictions. This is typically done in a group setting, where patients can share common experiences during the counseling sessions. Nevertheless it is important to appreciate that group therapy also reduces the cost of counseling, although individual sessions may be required when patients have unusual psychological issues related to their drug addictions.

The majority of drug counseling sessions take place on a regular schedule. An extended drug recovery program typically begins with a high frequency of counseling sessions, often on a daily basis. The frequency of these sessions will typically decrease over time as the patient progress in their recovery. Some programs provide drop-in counseling when the patient feels the need for counseling but can’t until the next scheduled session. Emergency counseling, otherwise known as crisis counseling, may also be required when the patient is at a particular risk of relapse. It is therefore very necessary that a counselor must strive to understand the way in which drug addiction affects patients and the people surrounding them. Counselors in drug recovery programs often work closely with people other than the patient. This can include family members who have been affected by the patient’s drug addiction. It can also involve community work, where the counselor’s goal is to educate the general public about drug addiction.

The benefits of extending drug recovery programs: Relapse Prevention

Relapse is a sudden deterioration in someone’s state of health after a temporary improvement. In other words if you were undergoing treatment of drug addiction and you were improving the something triggers you back to the addiction that is relapse. For several decades now an approach developed by Alan Marlatt to relapse prevention is still applicable in the drug recovery programs even to date. This is a cognitive-behavioral treatment recognizes four types of psychosocial processes that affect drug addiction and relapse. These psychosocial processes include the following:

Attributions of causality
Decision-making processes
Outcome expectancies
Self-efficacy

Attributions of causality are beliefs that a relapse is due to internal causes. They may include the belief that exceptions to sobriety are permissible circumstances that the patient considers to be unusual. A decision-making process consists of the multiple individual decisions that result in the intake of drugs. The Marlatt approach emphasizes the concept that some of these decisions may initially seem inconsequential while having a significant impact on a patient’s eventual decision to use drugs.

Self-efficacy is the patient’s ability to deal effectively with situations that carry a high risk of relapse. Outcome expectancies are the patient’s expectations regarding an addictive substance’s psychoactive effects.

The benefits of extending drug recovery programs: Cognitive Therapy

This approach relies on the patient’s core beliefs, which may not be consciously known. These core beliefs develop addictive beliefs that taking drugs will result in desirable consequences. They also create permissive beliefs that allow the patient to justify continued drug use, even when this does not achieve the desired result. The therapist’s job here is to discover the patient’s main beliefs and demonstrate the dysfunctions of those beliefs to the patient. The therapist will also prescribe behavioral exercises and assign homework, as is common with cognitive therapy.

The benefits of extending drug recovery programs: Emotion Regulation

Extended drug recovery programs are beginning to recognize the importance of helping patients regulate their emotions. These programs encourage the patient to identify negative emotional states and prevent the compulsive behaviors that result in drug use. An approach to drug recovery that uses emotional regulation can be used to treat addiction to a variety of psychoactive substances says doctor Akoury. And like we had stated ours is to offer the best we can to help you overcome the problems of addiction. You can schedule for an appointment with doctor Akoury for professional treatment of any form of addiction you may be struggling with.

The benefits of extending drug recovery programs: Drug recovery aftercare

Elaborate information about Heroin addiction

June 5, 2015

Elaborate information about Heroin addiction: What is heroin?

Elaborate information about Heroin addiction is very necessary for the proper administration of treatment

Have you ever imagine life free of any kind of substance abuse? The benefits of that will be overwhelmingly very healthy and productive. That is the kind of life that we are championing for you and your family as experts from AWAREmed Health and Wellness Resource Center under the able leadership of doctor Dalal Akoury who is also the founder of the facility. In her over two decades of practice in medicine and in matters addiction in particular, doctor Akoury has over the years been a champion of addiction solutions to many victims globally. She says that for anyone to effectively deal with drug addiction, every individual needs to be well equipped with elaborate information about heroin addiction and all other substance of abuse including alcohol miss use. Because many people are suffering because of lack of knowledge doctor Akoury founded this facility and she has been using it as a plat form of creating awareness to the societies on matters relating to the protection of their health. In this article, our focus is going to be on the elaborate information about heroin addiction. Therefore what is this drug heroin?

In simple terms, heroin is an illegal and highly addictive drug. It is one of the most abused and also most rapidly acting of the opiates. Heroin is typically sold as a white or brownish powder or as the black sticky substance known on the streets as “black tar heroin.” Doctor Akoury says that although these days purer heroin is becoming more common, most street heroin is “cut” with other drugs or with substances such as sugar, starch, powdered milk, or quinine. Street heroin can also be cut with strychnine or other poisons. Because heroin abusers do not know the actual strength of the drug or its true contents, they are at risk of overdose or death. Heroin also poses special problems because of the transmission of HIV and other diseases that can occur from sharing needles or other injection equipment.

It is believed that originally heroin is processed from morphine, a naturally occurring substance extracted from the seed pod of the Asian poppy plant. Heroin usually appears as a white or brown powder and it is associated with several street names including “smack”, “H”, “skag”, and “junk”. Other names may refer to types of heroin produced in a specific geographical area, such as “Mexican black tar”.

Elaborate information about Heroin addiction: What is the Scope of Heroin use in our societies?

The available statistics is worrying and according to the 1996 National Household Survey on Drug Abuse, which may actually underestimate illicit opiate (heroin) use, an estimated 2.4 million people use heroin at some time in their lives, and nearly 216,000 of them reported using it within the month preceding the survey. The survey report estimates that there were 141,000 new heroin users about two decades ago and that there has been an increasing trend in new heroin use since that time. A large proportion of these new users were smoking, snorting, or sniffing heroin with majority of them being under the age of 26. The report also indicated that the estimates of use for other age groups also increased, particularly among youths age 12 to 17 and the incidence of first-time heroin users among this age group also increased fourfold subsequently from the 1980s to 1995.

Yet in another study the 1996 Drug Abuse Warning Network (DAWN), which collected data on drug- related hospital emergency department (ED) episodes from 21 metropolitan areas, estimates that 14 percent of all drug-related ED episodes involved heroin. Even more alarming was the fact that between 1988 and 1994, heroin-related ED episodes increased by 64 percent that is from 39,063 to 64,013.

NIDA’s Community Epidemiology Work Group (CEWG), which provides information about the nature and patterns of drug use in 20 cities, reported in its December 1996 publication that heroin was the primary drug of abuse related to drug abuse treatment admissions in most cities including Newark, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Boston, and it ranked a close second to cocaine in New York and Seattle. These statistics clearly shows that heroin addiction is with us and it is time to step forward progressively to root it out from our systems says doctor Akoury. Before we get into how heroin is used, let us further look at another set of studies conducted by NHSDA for more clarity about heroin abuse.

Elaborate information about Heroin addiction: National Household Survey on Drug Abuse (NHSDA)

The 1996 NHSDA shows a significant increase from 1993 in the estimated number of current (once in the past month) heroin users. The estimates have risen from 68,000 in 1993 to whooping 216,000 in 1996. Among individuals who had ever used heroin in their lives, the proportion that had ever smoked sniffed or snorted heroin increased from 55 percent in 1994 to 82 percent in 1996. During the same period, the proportion of users who injected heroin remained about the same, at about 50 percent. With these data it is evident that the prevalence of heroin addiction cannot be ignored any longer. People are literally suffering both in public and in private and it is now time for action. We have able experts at AWAREmed Health and Wellness Resource Center who are well trained and are of high standards of experience to help you go through this problem of heroin addiction. Take that step of faith right now and schedule for an appointment with doctor Dalal Akoury for the commencement of your addiction recovery treatment.

Elaborate information about Heroin addiction: How is Heroin Used?

Now in conclusion of this article let us consider some of the modes of usage of this drug heroin. There are three major ways of administering heroin which usually include injection, sniffing or snorting or through smoking. Typically, a heroin abuser may inject up to four times a day. Available facts indicate that intravenous injection provides the greatest intensity and most rapid onset of euphoria (7 to 8 seconds), while intramuscular injection produces a relatively slow onset of euphoria (5 to 8 minutes). However when heroin is sniffed or smoked, peak effects are usually felt within 10 to 15 minutes. Although smoking and sniffing of heroin do not produce a “rush” as quickly or as intensely as intravenous injection, NIDA researchers have confirmed that all three forms of heroin administration are addictive.

From our observation at AWAREmed Health and Wellness Resource Center, it is becoming clearer that of the three administration applications, injection continues to be the predominant method of heroin use among addicted users seeking treatment not just from our facility but across the board globally. Nonetheless specific studies have also perceived a shift in heroin use patterns, from injection to sniffing and smoking. In fact, sniffing or snorting heroin is now a widely reported means of taking heroin among users admitted for drug treatment in most rehabilitation centers across the globe. Finally it may not matter which method is commonly used, the bottom line is that people are being addicted to the drug and lasting solution must be sought timely. If you are enclosed in this bracket of suffering, talk to us today and we will be more than willing to help you get your life back.

Elaborate information about Heroin addiction: What is heroin?

Drug Addiction Recovery process is never easy

May 14, 2015

Drug Addiction Recovery process is never easy: Parents Love to their addicted children

Drug Addiction Recovery process is never easy and the sooner treatment is sought the better for you

We have been following up on a story about the rough road of quitting heroin addiction in the previous article and for sure life as an addict is not everyone cup of tea. There is no peace in drug addiction and even during treatment you will still experience very strange things as has been the case with this recovering patient whose story forms the basis of our discussion. In more than two decades of her medical practice in the line of addiction, doctor Dalal Akoury met this client and who recovered from heroin addiction the hard way. In her introduction in the previous article we show how she become homeless from time to time, running out of cash and wasting her life in less valuable activities. We want to further the discussion with a view of using this story to impact positively in the lives of many young people and also to seek for lasting solutions.

Drug Addiction Recovery process is never easy: Being Homeless

At one point during the stay with my friend, I got word that my parents were coming for a vacation in the neighboring country and this trip could not have come at the right time. After being accommodated all this while, my friend had just given me notice that her roommate needed the couch for her guests who were visiting with her soon. This would have meant that I was going to be homeless again. The good news to me is that my parents were not just coming for me to have a roof over my head, but also at a time when the addiction healing process was picking up well. And so to play safe, I told my parents that I will be joining them for the vacation but am down with a very bad flu and needed a place to crush for sometimes.

Even though I was making this lie, my parents actually knew the truth because they had seen me go through it several times in the past even though they never commented about it. And with the assurance of getting accommodation and the love of my parents, I threw away all my bags and needles and headed to joining them. I spent the next few weeks there shacked up in their bedroom, sleeping on an air mattress and refusing to leave the room. By and by the physical pain started to recede paving the way for mental anguish to hit like a train and this time I couldn’t move. I cried a lot struggling to hide the real thing from my parents but it was pointless and I just didn’t care.

Realizing that I’ve been diagnosed with bipolar, I figured what is the difference between this and a depressive episode, anyway? So I rode it out like anyone else. So many things crossed my mind including suicide but I just didn’t have the strength to follow through with any of my half assed plans. I thought about trying to find dope in this city however hard could it be but I was so depressed that the idea of trying to get out of bed was exhausting enough, let alone getting dressed and leaving the house. Besides, I had no money and I knew my parents didn’t trust me so what was I going to do? Steal money? Forget it. I didn’t have the strength.

Drug Addiction Recovery process is never easy: Struggling with relapse

The next thing that came in my mind now that am that weak is to go online hoping to connect with people who might be able to help but no luck there. I ended up reaching out to the guy whom I had dated shortly for like a week before I move to another town. As fate would have it, he had also been kicked out of his house around the same time and had left the state. But he missed me a lot and wanted to come back. Because I needed company of a friend, I requested my mother if my “boyfriend” could stay with us for a while and like a loving mother to her only daughter she agreed. So he hopped the first plane over here. And that’s how my real life started, I suppose.

I ended up marrying that guy and having a child and then divorcing him almost immediately and now we are working things out or whatever. But the most important thing is that we don’t do heroin any more. And we don’t use needles. We are both well aware of the pain and the consequences of the drug. Still we seem to have different views. I feel like there is a junkie living in my head and she will never go away. For this reason, I think of myself as forever an addict and I don’t trust that I will turn down a shot if offered. He claims to feel no desire for the drug at all but he was not as hard into it as I was. He didn’t even know how to shoot up on his own; I remember at some point I had shot him up a few times and clearly he wasn’t as much an addict as I was. That may be good for him but I will never rid myself of that voice in my head, my inner junkie. She is locked away in the back of my mind but she is always screaming and begging to be let out. There’s always that suggestion of just one time. Just one hit for fun this time. I’m in control because I have chosen to.

Finally, if you ask me what cold turkey heroin withdrawal does to a person, I will tell you that it searches deep within the reaches of your mind for any shred of hope and joy or anything resembling such and destroys it completely, killing it brutally and mercilessly. It leaves you as just a shadow of your former self. And for some, it never ends. In some form or another, it stays with you for life. That is why doctor Dalal Akoury founded AWAREmed Health and Wellness Resource Center to help you cope with all these withdrawal challenges. You can call doctor Akoury today to book for an appointment with her for a more professional recovery treatment process.

Drug Addiction Recovery process is never easy: Parents Love to their addicted children

The rough Road of Quitting Heroin Addiction

May 14, 2015

The rough Road of Quitting Heroin Addiction: The Experiences of Heroin addicts when the quit cold turkey

The rough Road of Quitting Heroin Addiction begin with the victim acknowledging that there is a problem which needs to be fixed

We are at it again and I long for that day when we will in unison change to the tune of victory that we have both collectively and individually defeated the problems of drug addiction. Our sons and daughters, parents, relatives and friends are all suffering the scourge of this problem. This is one of the biggest reasons why doctor Dalal Akoury decided to form AWAREmed Health and Wellness Resource Center, a facility whose main objective is to transform each individual’s life through increasing awareness about health and wellness and by empowering individuals to find their own inner healing power. It therefore means that when we acknowledge that we have a problem on our own will without any threats or undue influence, then and only then will start the rough road of quitting heroin addiction and other addictions as well. Remember that when you have made up your mind, you can schedule for an appointment with doctor Akoury for professional help. Even as you consider doing that, it may interest you to know that doctor Akoury’s practice focuses on personalized medicine through healthy lifestyle choices that deal with primary prevention and underlying causes instead of patching up symptoms. I encourage you to make that lifesaving call today and escape the agony of addiction today.

The rough Road of Quitting Heroin Addiction: The agony of Heroin Addiction

The rough road of quitting heroin addiction is one that you need to take and do not be scare with the used adjectives. This is just to prepare your for the healing process because the truth is, it will not be an easy one. Let us listen to the story one former addict and her experiences with heroin addiction. She says that the last time she quit heroin, she went cold turkey on a friends couch. This was not really planned but all the same it happened something like this. At that time she was living with some junkie in her parent’s house. Her parents were both coke heads and they knew she was an addict to heroin. Her stay here did not last long since this family had a strong policy in their house that no needles’ shall be used in their home. What that meant is that her welcome was no longer needed there and she was requested politely to leave.

At this time I was again becoming homeless and with no money I had to do something she says. This is the rough road of quitting heroin addiction she wondered. In that state of confusion, she thought of an old friend and as fate will have it this friend agreed to accommodate her on her couch as long as she wanted. Immediately I bought a bus ticket headed to my friend’s place which was quite a distance of about 10 hours’ drive. To keep me going I chose to take with me some ten bags of dope and ten needles and by the time I got to my friend’s place only one dope and one needle was left, this was the beginning of my gradual reduction technique.

The rough Road of Quitting Heroin Addiction: Fighting Craving

It was the middle of the night at my friend’s house and I could not hold it no matter the efforts I made and as it is accustom, I took a small shot before going to bed. I finished it off the following morning in her bathroom and this time round committed to going cold turkey. The new environment was very hostile to me and since I knew nobody in the area there was very little I could do to get another shot no matter the intensity of craving. Things happened very first and this one thing I’ll never forget. The first morning, I was very nervous as I sat and waited for the unforeseeable. I and my friend we sat together chatting trying to catch up with the lost time and believe you me, I tried all I could not to let her notice my struggle but deep inside I was not myself.

As the hours went by, I kept running into her bathroom to do what the people I knew called “cotton shots” and “scrape bags” (keeping empty bags and used cottons to try to get a tiny bit of dope just to take the edge off). I thought doing this would help or delay the withdrawal or something (because this is what I had been brought up during my introduction moments into drugs). But in reality, it was just like a nervous tic. The demands of my body said something else and it kept pushing and reminding me that “it’s time for a shot” so I did whatever I could to comply. It will be my pleasure if my story can help you in this journey we are calling the rough road of quitting heroin addiction. Remember that it is not just about heroin addiction but this is applicable even to other substance abuse. But in the meantime the very first thing I noticed was that I was shaking violently as I tried to shoot up what was basically just dirty water. It was not a very good seen because I was struggling to locate the veins on my arms and in the process jabbing randomly and bleeding furiously everywhere. Besides that I was also sweating profusely. Or what some junkies may call the cold sweats because it was freezing cold and burning hot at the same time.

For a couple of days a week or more this was the order of the day and my friend’s bathroom was like my second home. While at the bathroom all I could do was to shooting up water, vomiting constantly in her toilet and soaking my achy body in a hot bath. Dear readers she posse, the pain of addiction is indescribable and to be honest I won’t even try to describe it. Suffice it to say that I hurt in places I didn’t know I had. Every inch and every cell of my very being screamed out in endless agony for days on end. And when I could not cope any longer it had to come out in the open and I begged my friend to help me find something just anything that could “get me through this.” Like a good friend she was she tried (or claimed to) but she didn’t have a clue. One day she came to me with some prescription strength ibuprofen and I almost strangled her. But after all she was letting me stay in her house and puke in her toilet so I couldn’t afford to be a bad house guest and the story continues in our next article … but in the meantime, from the narrations above, it is obvious that addiction harts and treatment also come with its own challenges. To help you overcome those challenges or at least reduce them, visiting AWAREmed Health and Wellness Resource Center would be the starting point. At this facility, doctor Akoury and her team of experts will help you in the most professional way to get your life back because you deserve to live and enjoy life to the fullest.

The rough Road of Quitting Heroin Addiction: The Experiences of Heroin addicts when the quit cold turkey

Tag Archives: Heroin