What to Expect After Completing Suboxone Detox Treatment
Suboxone treatment offers people struggling with chronic opiate addiction a means for breaking addiction’s hold on their lives. As effective as Suboxone can be, it’s still an opiate-based drug, so it does carry a risk for abuse and addiction.
More often than not, when addiction problem develops, Suboxone detox is a necessary first step towards breaking the drug’s hold on a person’s life. As stopping drug use altogether is the overall goal of Suboxone detox, a person must learn to cope without the drug’s treatment effects as well as the effects of abuse.
For these reasons, it’s a good idea to have an idea of what to expect after completing Suboxone detox so you can take the necessary steps to ensure needed treatment supports are in place.
The Suboxone Detox Process
Depression symptoms are common after Suboxone detox.
Suboxone detox employs many of the same treatment interventions as other opiate detox processes. According to the National Center for Biotechnology Information, relieving opiate withdrawal effects become the focus of the detox stage as withdrawal can quickly drive a person back to old drug abusing behaviors.
Once the detox stage ends, the aftereffects of Suboxone abuse bring on a whole new level of withdrawal effects, also know as post-acute withdrawal, that can last anywhere from two to six months in duration.
For information on available Suboxone treatment support options, call our toll-free helpline at 888-646-0865 (Who Answers?) .
Post-Acute Withdrawal Effects
Depression
As an opiate addiction treatment, Suboxone not only provides relief from withdrawal and drug cravings, but also helps relieve feelings of depression, especially for people struggling with co-occurring depression disorders. This means someone who successfully completes Suboxone detox may well experience moderate to severe depression symptoms for weeks or months at a time.
Inability to Experience Emotion
As opiate addiction in general wreaks havoc on a person’s emotional state, the effects of chronic opiate abuse coupled with stopping Suboxone treatment can leave him or her unable to experience any form of emotion or contentment in daily life. This condition can be nerve-wracking in terms of the overall sense of “dis-ease” it creates in a person’s everyday life.
In effect, the long-term depression and inability to “feel” anything can place a person at considerable risk of returning to old drug-using behaviors.
Physical Problems
According to the Substance Abuse & Mental Health Services Administration, it’s not uncommon for a person to experience a range of physical problems during the post-acute withdrawal stage. Physical problems may take the form of:
- Fatigue
- Difficulty falling asleep, staying asleep or sleeping restfully
- Mental confusion
- Low sex drive
- Body aches
- Irritability
- Hypersensitivity or agitation
These aftereffects can actually make depression symptoms worse, which further aggravates addiction-based urges and behaviors.
The Need for Treatment Help
The key to ensuring ongoing abstinence after Suboxone detox ends is obtaining whatever level of treatment is needed to prevent relapse from occurring. For some people this may mean weekly psychotherapy sessions, while others may actually require a residential treatment setting.
Ultimately, ensuring needed treatment supports are in place enables you to build on the progress you’ve made in recovery rather than risk falling back into the addiction lifestyle.
If you need help finding a treatment program that meets your current needs, call our toll-free helpline at 888-646-0865 (Who Answers?) to speak with one of our addiction specialists.
