Nelda, addictions of all stripes are tough to recover from. Your son’s willingness to be free of morphine and all other narcotics is key. If he truly wants to be clean, that goes a long way. But I don’t know how anyone can judge that desire.

I myself personally am not a big fan of substituting one narcotic for another, but any program is better than none. After this program has run it’s course, I would suggest that he find a narcotics anonymous meeting and start attending. He will be encouraged to work the 12 steps there. I am a big fan of that. That truly is long term treatment.

One other thought, the program of alcoholics anonymous has a sister organization called alanon. I believe narcotics anonymous has a similar program. You might want to look into it. It is designed for people like you. People who love an addict. There you will find a great deal of experience, strength and hope.

Richard

Thanks a million for the info.I am just so worried about him.He`s 28 years old and has been on the morphine for about a year. He has tried various times to get off of it without the help of methadone etc. But has now realised that he can`t do it on his own.I will mention the narcotics anonymous to him when I see him on the week-end.He starts the methadone program in 4 days so i`m hoping that it will help him.He has been so depressed and discouraged lately. Thanks again.

If ii was of any help to you, good. We try to give back what was so freely given us.
Depression and discouragement may be of some use to him, if it helps convince him that he is in way over his head. Desperation was a great motivator for me.

Keep us posted on how things are going,
richard

I was addicted to heroin and got off of it by starting the methadone program. It has worked good for me. it's not for everybody. You have to want to get off. Once he's on methadone the doc can wean him off slowly so that withdrawl will be minimal if at all. I believe the program can and does work. Good luck!

Nelda, the most effective remedy is still your son's desire to get treated.
___________________
samantha
Dual Disorder --Know more about dual disorder

Hitler had it developed. Need I say more?

some may say one year is not very long to be taking the drug, and some may say that most folks will try other means of treatment as there 1st attemt however i am in the methadone maintainance program and it has saved my life. i was on opiates for many years and have been to many rehabs, detoxes, halfway houses, AA/NA, and none of them stuck for me personally. i am not a fan of 12 steps. dont get me wrong i have seen them work for many people, however it didnt work for me. i am not going to go into why, that's not the issue. its good your son is taking a step at getting clean, is he planning on maintanance or just doing it for a detox plan. either way i wish him the best of luck. he is lucky to have a mom to be there for his support, and i do agree that you should get some help for yourself so you can be more educated on methadone and drug addiction, there is lots of myths and much stigma involved with methadone, please dont let the anti-methadone train get a hold of you they will lead you down the wrong path. there are made up of a group of folks who have lost love one due to overdose and the person would have had methadone in there system so they are tryiong to blame methadone for it when that was not the problem alone, there is always otherissues like mixing other drugs or the person had no tolerance and took some methadone. or they may have got it from a under educated dr. trust me there are some of them out there. But i have never seen anyone get hurt who was taking there methadone like they were suppose to take it. and 99% of the folks at my clinic will tell ya it saved there life.

Whatever works for an individual I'm all for. I don't happen to be a big fan of Morphine. The addiction is one of the very worst. The fact remains that whatever keeps someone off the streets is better than nothing. I've been addicted to Heroin on two occasions and I guess I never got bad enough to need Morphine. Maybe I was just one of the lucky ones. I don't know. As long as this guy's getting help I'm on his side.

you say you were hooked on herion 2 times thats weird, maybe you are hooked on herion if you take it. you took herion for a period in your life then you stopped then you took it again. chances aqre if you took it again you would be hooked again. i call that addiction. and i think you meant to say methadone where you were saying morphine in your post, imm not sure but i think. but hey if someone can stop herion and never go back to it without methadone then all the power to them. for me i tried to stop drugs many many times and did so for periods up to 2 years at the time. but i always went back. now with methadone i can honestly say as long as i am taking methadone i dont think i will ever do a drug.

Sustitute the word methodone for morphine.