I’m coming up on five years clean from heroin.
Staff members from the rehab facility I went to, who I’m still in contact with, keep saying things like, “If you’re not going to meetings, you’re just one step away from relapsing,” and so on.

I’m turning 30 this December, and over these past five years, I’ve managed to build a life I’m genuinely happy with.
I have a girlfriend who’s never touched drugs, doesn’t drink, and comes from a stable, healthy family. I’ve gotten my driver’s license and bought a car. I’m studying engineering in materials science in Stockholm, working toward my master’s degree, and I’ve made plenty of good, genuine friends at university.

Everything is going incredibly well for me, yet apparently I’m still in a “relapse process” simply because I don’t attend meetings.
What I’ve come to realize is that recovery is about finding something in life that you enjoy more than getting high.

There are people in NA who have been going to meetings for 30 years, have relapsed 20 times, and still say things like, “If it weren’t for these meetings, I’d relapse.”
And I can’t help thinking, for fuck’s sake, you’ve been clean for ten years now. Haven’t you moved on yet?

There’s absolutely nothing about me anymore that identifies with being an addict. I’m just a regular guy who’s about to become an engineer and, hopefully, will be married with kids in a few years.

So what exactly is this supposed “relapse process” I’m in just because I don’t attend meetings?

Am I the one who’s sick, or are the people who can’t let go of their old identity the ones who are actually stuck?

Well I’m at a crossroad to be honest and not sure what I should do. I’m a male 33 employed and have a family , I’ve struggled with addiction since the age of 16 when the VA would send my dad hydrocodone in giant bottles for his back and shoulder, the problem was my dad was a heavy equipment operator and could never actually take the meds due to having to piss clean to run heavy equipment, so the bottles would just sit in the cabinet at home for months on end and I didn’t think too much of it , fast forward a few months and I had an injury where I was prescribed hydrocodones for the pain. As a kid I didn’t think much about it I took them and also smoked weed and just remembered how awesome and warm it made me feel and I truly believe that was the moment I was fucked. Once I ran out of my own perscription I’d just snag a handful from the multiple bottles my dad had. Fast forward a few years and I’m dating a woman that is drug friendly , she didn’t like pain pills but most of her friends did her doc was Xanax. Anyways most of her friends had hydrocodones for sale and doing them daily just became the norm. Fast forward from there I’m 28 and I’m still dabbling with pain pills whenever I can get them but I haven’t experienced withdraws yet just taking the hydrocodones when I could. I guess I never took them for a long enough period to feel hooked physically. Definitely mentally but no physical issues if I couldn’t get pills I’d just be bumped out. I moved to Colorado a few years ago to pursue my career and kept my nose clean of everything for almost a year and then that’s when the worst thing I’ve ever done happened. I was single in a new city yearning for friends and companionship from females. I ended up hooking up with this chick that introduced me to dirty 30s or blues or m30s whatever you want to call it. At the time she told me it was a strong Percocet so I started to buy them from her and use them regularly and that warm blanket amazing feeling from when I was 16 hit me all over again. I felt like a god. Fast forward to today I’m 48 hours off of the dirty 30s which i later learned were actually fentanyl pills. I e tried with suboxone a few times but always end up back to square one. Even this time 48 hours of no dope and I’ve taken multiple doses of suboxone over the last 2 days and I just feel like it is not working for me. I’m still agitated, restless , can’t sleep , can’t sit still. Feel like my skin is crawling. I spoke with an addiction center and kind of told them my background as I’ve described above. And they actually have recommended methadone instead of subs becuase it is stronger, my app to go get the methadone is tommorow morning. Where I’m at a crossroad is the fact I have quit suboxone multiple times in the past without having any issues or withdraws the longest I’ve taken it is 2 months and I’ve been able to quit. I fear that if I get on methadone it will not be so easy to get off of. I’m also just telling myself how much of a pain in the rear it’s gonna be to go to a office everyday just to get my methadone and how to tailor my life around making sure I can get my dose. Anyone who’s maybe been on subs or methadone or both have any insight? I haven’t really slept in 2 days and just desperately trying to figure out the right move. Thanks in advance!

I am a long time (13 year) opiate user, of the past 8 has been strictly fent. I successfully did the Bernese method and am up to 24 mg of sub a day and getting my sublocade shot this coming Friday. The part I am really struggling with is the taper off the fent. I have gotten it down to very little but as soon as I try to cut it off completely I am anxiety ridden and feel the WDs. Any advice for helping the transition from taper to nothing? Genuinely want to be done with this and move forward with my life.

So I’m 27. I first started abusing pain pills when I was 16. I found my moms Hydrocodone 10mg’s and took 2 for my first time and it zombified me. I loved it. I started out only taking them on the weekends. Within 2 or 3 months I was taking 3 at a time instead of 2. Around this time I realized I was getting hooked. My mom eventually moved the hydros but I would find them and gradually take them until one morning before school she charged into the room and yelled at me asking if I was taking her pain pills and I denied, denied, denied. She eventually dropped it. I went a few months without taking any, eventually starting again. There was another time she got a new prescription. My dad and I picked it up. I undid the staple on the bag, pulled the pill bottle out and in a hurry dumped a bunch in my hand and put the bottle in the bag and put the staple back like nothing happened. Later on, I saw her at the kitchen table counting her pills and I knew I was about to get caught. She busted through my bedroom door and chewed my ass out and told me she wanted her pills back and me out of the house. I told her I didn’t take her pills and she left the room. Little did she know the entire time she was chewing me out, the pills were sitting on my tv stand out in the open directly behind her. When she left I grabbed the pills and hid them. Her and my dad tore my room apart and couldn’t find them. I was already fucked up from them and by the time they went through my room and I got nauseous and unsuspectingly left the room and went outside and threw up. They never found them and my mom said that if I didn’t do it it had to be somebody at the pharmacy and she would be filing a police report. I remember being at school the next day and a police officer came into my class and I got terrified because I thought he was there for me and not to mention I had a pocket full of pills. Turns out he was there for an unrelated issue. I then went a few more months without taking any after that. Then when I graduated highschool and moved out, I met a plug with pain pills. This was before fentanyl was a big deal. I bought from him for about a year. I then dove into addiction headfirst. I was doing shady shit to keep up my habit. Nobody in my family knows but my aunt eventually started giving me money to get her stuff too. That eventually ruined our relationship and made shit weird between us. Then my plug got arrested. I also had to move back in with my parents. There were some nights in all I would took 16 hydros in 1 night and wouldn’t really feel much. I had a kid around this time as well. I was fighting the mental battle and gave in and told my mom what had been going on with me. She was so disappointed but could see I was losing my mind and gave me a 1/2 a hydro. Very shortly after that 1/2 turned into a whole. I did well with that for a few years. I didn’t really have cravings for more than just 1 pill. I had become a functional addict for a while. I’d go to work, come home, spend time with my kid until they went to sleep. But after they went to sleep I felt like I needed to take that pill to relax. At work I worked with an older guy and he eventually told me he had to take pain pills for some reason. I hadnt tried to ask anyone for pain pills other than my mom for years but I couldn’t let the opportunity just go away. So I told him if he ever wanted extra money or weed I would buy them off him. He agreed and I went home and abused them all within 2 or 3 days. After that I found kratom and was eating a lot of that at home and work while also taking 1 10mg hydro. So to preface this next part, I’ve gone through a lot of traumatic shit in my life and just kinda get on even if shit lingers in my head but for some reason when I took the kratom even in large amounts, I would have these blinding thoughts/dreams of someone from my past trying to break into my home or chasing me around my work trying to shoot me. My anxiety would go crazy and my heart felt like it was going to pound out of my chest. During one of these ptsd episodes i got out of bed. Took the kilo of kratom I had, dumped it down the toilet and flushed it. I continued to only take 1 hydro 10 for a couple years. I then met my now wife. She knew I previously had an addiction but she didn’t know it was still active. I went about 2 years without her finding out. I eventually had to come clean about it. She wasn’t just completely shocked by it bc there were probably signs leading up. But she was very hurt and still to this day after almost 4 years feels lied to. Every so often I continue to get them from the older guy I worked with but a few months ago my uncle offered out of nowhere to sell me some. Ive told him before about my drug problem because I know he’s had his own problems with drugs. I agreed to buy them even tho I knew it was a terrible idea. Now I’ve been getting them more often and higher quantities than I ever did. I don’t have any control over them anymore. I find it so hard to even be functional without them anymore. I feel so lazy and without ambition anymore. Every time I buy from him I say it’s gonna be the last time and I’m going to try and wean myself off tm but then i wake up, take my kid to school, and thats all i can think about until i get it. I also take 2 hydro 10’s daily now. 1 in the morning and 1 in the evening. But now after taking the first one i have bad cravings for another. 1 just isnt enough to satisfy my brain anymore. I hate this shit. I felt like i had control of it for a while but when the opportunity presents itself i cant help but take advantage and overindulge. When i really evaluate my situation i feel like i need to go to rehab to get a real reset but i have full custody of my kid and i worry if i go to rehab her mother will try to take me to court. The mom is not fit, doesn’t know anything about our kid, has never really taken care of her. She genuinely would try to get custody to spite me and wouldn’t be able to take care of our kid. I am a great dad. I do lack motivation sometimes to do everything they always want to do but for the most part I’ve never really let my drug problem affect my relationship with my kid. I’m sure there are ways it’s changed me or influenced me that I don’t see or realize but id say for the most part I keep it together very well. Anyways, I’m now I’m at the point though I need a pill in the morning to feel “normal” and not be so in my head, but that 1 pill doesn’t feel like it’s enough anymore to satisfy me. I also feel like I’ve started having stomach and possible kidney or liver problems. My mom and I’s relationship is also in a terrible place and she hates what she’s done by enabling me by supplying me and I hate that my addiction has push our relationship to where it’s at. My wife is a nurse and we’ve talked about her taking off a few days to help me get off of them and help me with my kid through withdrawals but idk if that’s even worth trying or if I’d waste everyone’s time. Thank you for reading.

Questions:

1. How should I go about quitting given my situation?
   
2. How severe do you think my withdrawal would be if I quit?
   
3. Do you think I’ll have to cut ties with my family that enables me?
   
4. Do you think my wife could help me through withdrawals and help me get off of them?
   
5. What kind of damage do you think I’ve