When you’re undergoing an outpatient treatment using Suboxone or methadone, it’s important that you find your resources for support wherever you can. One of the most common ways people choose to do that is to take advantage of the many 12-step support groups like Narcotics Anonymous. Free of charge with meetings every day of the week and, in many towns, many times a day, there really isn’t a more convenient or cheaper way to get the help you need.

Unfortunately, it’s not the most exciting way to spend your time. A friend of mine recently told me:

“Look, I hate meetings. I can’t stand the whining, the gossip and the fact that I lose hours of my life with my ass falling asleep in a metal chair. But I go and I’m going to keep going, because it’s keeping me clean.”

It’s true: meetings are not fun. Newcomers and chronic relapsers can get on your nerves as can the superiority of those who have been clean for years. The coffee is bad, and the snacks are cheap. Metal folding chairs will become the bane of your existence as will the sleazy 13th steppers.

So how do you save yourself from an NA or AA meeting when you really just have to go?

1. Bring your hobby. For many, just spending time in the meeting is the important thing, and you don’t have to have idle hands to listen to the speaker. I’ve seen people in meetings do everything from knit to carve clay figurines. Drawing, hand sewing, artist trading cards…whatever it takes to keep you from clawing your (or someone else’s) eyes out as long as it doesn’t smell, make a mess or take up a ton of space.
2. Get involved. What’s the opposite of dropping out of NA? Taking over. Speak up in meetings, introduce yourself to newcomers, talk to people after the meeting. Volunteer to clean up after the meeting or get yourself voted into a position of authority. Maybe if you have a larger hand in your regular meetings, you’ll be able to choose topics that interest you.
3. Change meetings. If you live in a city or any metropolitan area, you have a large schedule of meetings to choose from. Though you most likely choose according to the time of the meeting or where it’s located, it could be worth it for you to get up a little bit earlier, stay out later or drive a little bit further in order to explore the different meetings available. If you live in a smaller town and don’t have a ton of meetings to choose from, then start your own. Why not? That’s the beauty of NA. Pick a name, find a location, choose the first topic and advertise. Keep showing up and so will more and more people.

Whatever you have to do to make meetings more interesting or sufferable, do it. It’s worth it to build a strong support system that will long outlast the buprenorphine or methadone and carry you through a lifetime of sobriety.

What do you do to make it through an NA meeting when you’d rather be anywhere but there?

Part three in our interview series checks in with a  mother who’s on methadone. A heroin-free addict, our methadone mama went through pregnancy on the juice. She talks about what it was like and gives some advice to other methadone mamas.

When did you start taking methadone? How long have you been on it?

1999. I started maintenance in December of 2000, and I’ve been on it ever since.

Were you already taking methadone when you got pregnant?

Yes.

What did the doctors tell you to expect as far as your pregnancy and the effects of methadone on the baby? Did they warn against anything in particular?

I don’t think my doctors ever told me anything about what to expect. They said that the baby was going to have to be in observation for up to three weeks after birth, and that she could suffer from any range of withdrawal symptoms. Like anything that was common with an adult could happen to her, too. They were basically watching out for seizures, low key stuff like tremors.

I was breastfeeding, and they thought that was great because that meant she could get a little bit of methadone through the breast milk.

But really, they didn’t really prepare me for anything. I didn’t know what to expect.

Was your baby born addicted to methadone or have to undergo a detox when she was born?

Yes, but she had a very easy time. They usually hold [babies born on methadone] for 21 days for observation, but they let her go 10 days early. They watched her for 10 days and she was asymptomatic. She started having little weird gagging reflex and sneezing. She was gagging and sneezing and her tremors got a little worse and they gave her a very minute dose of like .02 milligrams or something, it was just like three drops of a dropper of the DTO (diluted tincture of opium), and it was just for a couple days and then she was weaned off. I never went over 130 milligrams in my pregnancy, and I weighed 235 pounds, so it wasn’t considered too high, which is probably why it was so easy for her.

Since the baby was born, have you felt like being on methadone imposed itself at all or gotten in the way of parenting? Do you feel like it has helped you?

I question whether it has any effect on my energy level. I’m on 75 milligrams now. Especially at higher levels, you know, like when I was on 100 milligrams, I was tired all the time, but I found that even when I reduced my dose, I was still tired.

My husband seems to think that methadone is this horrible substance. He says it’s poison, toxic, you know, “What can you expect from something manufactured for Hitler?” He seems to think that my whole life would just turn around if I got off it. You know, my health would improve, I’d have more energy. He thinks it’s just all bad. He doesn’t recognize that there’s any benefits.

And you think there is?

I think I’m stuck right now, because now it’s like, I need to get off, but I can’t just quit today. I can’t say, “I’m tired of taking it,” and not take it anymore. So I have to weigh the benefits.

It did help me get clean, though. I mean, it’s not a miracle drug; I was at the point where I was ready to quit, and [methadone] made it that much easier. And I’m pretty solid on my feet these days; I’m not worried about having a relapse. I just wish there was an easier way to detox off of methadone.

Have you considered Suboxone?

I have, but I’d have to be at a much lower dose to switch over.

I actually was on it a long time ago, long before it was legal. I had a doctor in LA—I was in the music industry, and I had a lot of money—and he would go to Mexico for it and bring it back. It was Buprenex that I used then, intramuscularly, and he ended up going to prison for it. I pretty much abused that, but that wasn’t the one with the naloxone in it. I’ve never tried the sublingual tabs they have now.

Is there anything you want to pass along to women who are expecting and on methadone?

I guess just try to take it easy on yourself. Don’t beat yourself up over it. There’s nothing you can do about it now. At least you can be clean and sober with your child, and take it one day at a time.

I previously interviewed a methadone addict and a buprenorphine study participant. Check it out!

Personal stories are really important when it comes to drug withdrawal and addiction treatment. Each individual’s circumstance is affected by and affects his or her drug use and recovery. Here’s an interview with someone who started experimenting with heroin in his teens and became an addict in his early 20s. He’s now 40 years old, a heroin-free junky on methadone. Here’s what he has to say:

What can people expect when they experience methadone withdrawal?

They can expect to be—at the very least—very, very uncomfortable for at least 30 days.

Define “uncomfortable.”

No sleep. You’re not going to sleep for 30 days. You’re not going to eat. You’re going to feel like you’re going to die. You’re going to hallucinate. You’re going to, really pretty much feel like you’re about to die at any moment.

How many times have you gone through a methadone withdrawal?

One, two, three…four…. Four times.

Have you ever done a medical detox off of methadone?

No.

So you kicked “cold turkey”?

Uh-huh. Two times. But the dose was really low. The dose was like down to 8, 8 milligrams, and even that felt like, you know, something harder than I ever did before because I didn’t sleep for like three weeks straight off of that alone, 8 mg. But I didn’t feel the, you know, the flu-like symptoms but I suffered from the insomnia and anxiety part of it, where your legs are twitching.

If you detoxed four times and twice “cold turkey,” how did you detox the other two times?

I went right back. I’m talking about, I got arrested for a parole violation, and it took six working days to get let out, and I went five of those six days off of an incredibly high dose because they don’t give you methadone in San Quentin. That happened twice. The first time I was on 220 milligrams and the second time I was on 110 milligrams.

Why do you take methadone?

I take…. Well, at that time, I took 120mg a day at the clinic, on maintenance and I have a prescription for 100mg a day from my doctor for pain. The second time I got violated, arrested for a parole violation, was only two months after the first time, and it was so bad the first time that I had started to go down on my maintenance dose at the clinic. On my own, I had cut down my pain prescription so I was already kind of sick when I got arrested.

Did you get arrested for drugs? Were you trying to buy something because you were sick?

No. I got arrested because I’m on high control parole. I had a chain on my wallet and they call that a “dangerous weapon.” Plus I tend to talk loud when I get excited about something and he [the cop] took it as I was yelling at him. He had a rookie cop with him who said, “You’re going to let him talk to you like that?” He later told me that if I hadn’t done that he would have let me go.

Bad day.

Yeah, I was sick and I didn’t feel like getting f*cked with when I was just walking to the corner store. But I mean, I’ve been in San Francisco for 20 years and the cop stopped me because he knows me. We’re not, you know, exactly friends. I wasn’t doing anything wrong but “high control” means they can come in your house, stop you anywhere, anytime, search you, whatever. Not to say I deserved it that day but being on parole, you know, your rights are limited.

Sounds like it’s a precarious situation. You could get picked up anytime.

Yeah.

Do you ever think about getting off methadone completely so that you won’t have such a hard time in withdrawal if it happens again?

No.

Why not?

Because…I don’t know. I’m more or less gambling with it.

So being on methadone is worth the risk of a nasty withdrawal?

Yeah. If the end result of the methadone is to stay out of prison, yeah. The reason I’m taking methadone is so I’m not using heroin. And if I was using heroin, I’d have to pay for it and I would more than likely be committing crimes to pay for that heroin and I’d be back in jail regardless. So by being on methadone, it’s satisfying that part of my head that needs to take something but it gives me room to function and maintain a normal, somewhat normal lifestyle.

Have you ever considered Suboxone?

I have. I have to be on a much lower dose of methadone to do that and right now I need to stay at least at a blocking dose. I’m not going to rush it. Methadone has given me a chance to get off heroin, off the street, out of prison. I’ve got a family, a wife and kid, a job. I’m not going to risk losing that by going too fast or detoxing too quickly off methadone before I’m ready. I’ve seen Suboxone work really well for some people, and maybe one day I’ll be one of those people. Getting away from the methadone clinic is a big step for someone like me. You go down there, you see all these people you know. People offer you free this and that, pills, heroin, speed, whatever. You hear about who’s doing what, you know, what’s going on. Suboxone lets you get out of that world, fully commit to making a new life. So it’s good. But one step at a time….