Well, that was fun, not

[davidgillon]

So Friday I picked up my repeat prescription of Butrans*, leaving it to the last minute as usual**, as I needed to change the patch on Saturday at the latest and then went shopping. I got home and unloaded the car, and haven't been out since.

Monday was finally hot enough to sit out in the sun, so I got myself nicely arranged, had my lunch, and started to read my book, at which point the chain of  thought went:

"Why am I shivering?"

"Aargh, idiot! You forgot to change the patch, you're in withdrawal. Again!"

"Where did I put the patches?"

Cue 10 minutes of dashing around the house, looking for the patches. During this time the shivering escalates to a pounding heart rate, and my pain levels spike to about an 8, which I haven't felt in ages.

"OMG, they're probably still in the car."

Dash out to the car, there they are sitting on the passenger seat.

"Oh, crap, WTF are the car keys?"

Cue 5 more minutes dashing around the house looking for the car keys, which I finally found lying on the spare bed. It's as well I found them because I was being seriously tempted to use the screwdriver lying around downstairs to smash in the passenger-side window (it's just possible I wasn't entirely thinking straight by this point).

Open car doors, grab patches, come inside, install patch, collapse on seat. Thankfully I got almost as quick relief as I did onset; it looks like I have a real knife-edge between enough butrans in my system and not enough butrans in my system, let's all panic now. The whole episode probably didn't last more than half an hour, but that was particularly unpleasant.
 

I do this regularly, though withdrawal isn't usually quite as spectacular. I'm an idiot.

 

* Slow release opiod painkiller, administered in one week patches.

** The repeat system actually semi-enforces this, they won't do a repeat until the last week of the prescription, and they want 48 hours to produce one.

Comments

[hamletta]

Wow! That mush have been stressful. Good you got it in the end!

[davidgillon]

Annoying mainly, but quickly done with.

Great icon! That double landing was fantastic.

[yhlee]

Yai, sympathies.

[davidgillon]

Meh, my fault. Maybe I'll remember next time. Maybe.

[sovay]

The whole episode probably didn't last more than half an hour, but that was particularly unpleasant.

I am glad you are all right now. Blech.

[davidgillon]

Thanks. Call it the rewards of incompetence ;)

[jesse_the_k]

That sounds entirely terrifying.

I'm glad the patches work so well.


Is the patch over a particularly painful spot or is it just a mechanism to deliver it to your bloodstream without annoying the GI system?

[davidgillon]

It's a controlled-release gel, so it maintains a continuous dosage in the bloodstream - that turns out to work better, and at lower dosages, than pill type analgesics where you get a spike of the drug level and then a decline until the next dosage. All it needs is skin contact, where you put it is irrelevant, though it tends to cause minor skin irritation and the advice is to alternate where you put it - I use my upper arms.

I've had the onset of withdrawal a bunch of times - good at remembering to change them I'm not, but normal it's just minor flu-like symptoms, that's the first time I've had a pounding heart rate.