Vivitrol injections

worried sick mother

Active Member
My son is coming home from rehab next Monday and the doctor is recommending Vivitrol injections for 6 months to a year. They will give him the first injection before he leaves rehab then he follows up with a doctor in his town for monthly injections. I would be surprised if he will even make it to the doctor to get the injections. They say he needs to do this on his own that if I'm involved making sure he goes that would be enabling. That it is his journey. I've read about Vivitrol and it scares me about some of the side effects. It's suppose to help stop opioids cravings and if you use block the effects of getting high. The rehab says they have had great success with addicts who receive the injections. Has anyone here have a child who has received these injections or know anything about it??
 

GoingNorth

Crazy Cat Lady
Do some research on the medication first. Unless the addict is 100% ready to quit, it can be a cruel medication.

1 shot can last up to 60days.
 

Kathy813

Well-Known Member
Staff member
I read that the shots last 30 days. Some people even need to take Vivitrol pills the last week leading up to the next shot.

I have been researching this for a while. There can be side effects so they need to be taken under medical supervision. However, it is the newest protocol for opiate addiction. I read that opiate addiction has the highest relapse rate and it seems to me that anything that helps prevent that is worth trying.

I would love my daughter to take the shots once she leaves her halfway house. She always struggles the most when she it working and out on her own. They are very expensive, though, unless you have insurance.

~Kathy
 

worried sick mother

Active Member
He doesn't live in my home, he lives with his girlfriend about 45 minutes away. She did not go to treatment and I'm not so sure she is clean. Says she just detoxed herself off heroin and quit. Don't think I believe that though. I ask to be put down at the doctors where he would receive injections to be allowed to discuss his care and make sure he got the injections but my son said no and the counselor said that she agreed that it's his journey and that would be enabling on my part. She said I need to let him do adult things and stop treating him like a child.
 

worried sick mother

Active Member
I was reading about how expensive but I've met my deductible for the year after this rehab visit so my insurance is suppose to cover in full. This is the first time my son has gone to rehab and I pray the last. I have no idea what will happen when he is back in the real world, if he will be able to stay clean. My biggest fear is that he will relapse , try to use the same amount he was using and overdose. I've read so many stories of that happening and that most people don't stay clean after one trip to rehab. I wish my son would do a half way home so it would be a gradual process back to reality. He won't go because of his girlfriend.
 

BusynMember

Well-Known Member
Until he lets go of the girlfriend...his mindset is not sober. An addict can not hang around with a using addict and continue his own path to sobriety. Do his therapists know about her? Can they talk to him? He truly needs to be with sober people to remain sober. Going right back to a heroin addict is very bad...
I know nothing about this drug that stops the high feeling or if there are other drugs he can take to get around it. Research, research,research before you pay.
Sending good vibes to all of you who love each other and want to heal.
 

DarkwingPsyduck

Active Member
My son is coming home from rehab next Monday and the doctor is recommending Vivitrol injections for 6 months to a year. They will give him the first injection before he leaves rehab then he follows up with a doctor in his town for monthly injections. I would be surprised if he will even make it to the doctor to get the injections. They say he needs to do this on his own that if I'm involved making sure he goes that would be enabling. That it is his journey. I've read about Vivitrol and it scares me about some of the side effects. It's suppose to help stop opioids cravings and if you use block the effects of getting high. The rehab says they have had great success with addicts who receive the injections. Has anyone here have a child who has received these injections or know anything about it??

Vivitrol acts like a long-term Suboxone program. It will fill his mu receptors, and then close them off. Which is why it affects cravings. Cravings occur when the receptors are empty. Vivitrol is designed to be a replacement, allowing the addict to pick up the pieces of their broken lives without dealing with withdrawal, cravings, and drug seeking behavior. It is an INCREDIBLY useful tool. It is designed to be long term. Even permanent. Though I wouldn't recommend he stay on it forever. Just until he has a real solid footing on recovery.
 

DarkwingPsyduck

Active Member
I read that the shots last 30 days. Some people even need to take Vivitrol pills the last week leading up to the next shot.

I have been researching this for a while. There can be side effects so they need to be taken under medical supervision. However, it is the newest protocol for opiate addiction. I read that opiate addiction has the highest relapse rate and it seems to me that anything that helps prevent that is worth trying.

I would love my daughter to take the shots once she leaves her halfway house. She always struggles the most when she it working and out on her own. They are very expensive, though, unless you have insurance.

~Kathy

The relapse rate is due to the severity of the physical withdrawal process, and the much longer lasting effects. Until the brain recovers, it stops producing endorpins. Endorphins are crucial for a lot of things. The good feelings when you accomplish something, the desire to do anything (even things you love doing), the fatigue, and the sleep issues. Trust me, it is NOT an easy thing to do. It is downright terrifying for anybody who has ever been through it. And I really do mean terrifying, in every sense of the word. Imagine the worst flu you have ever experienced. Multiple that by 10, and add in the inability to sleep for 3-5 days straight. Then you are close to how it feels for us. It is literally the most unpleasant experience of my short life, which is saying quite a bit. And lack of sleep doesn't help matters.
 

worried sick mother

Active Member
I really don't know if he thinks she has stopped but yes his counselor knows because I told her but my son denies that she uses. When he first got to rehab he denied that she used drugs at all, said that she doesn't even drink then a week later he said she smokes marjuana then a week after that he told his counselor that she has used heroin a few times. She reached out for help one day after he left , it was late at night and she said she was in withdrawal so bad she thought she would die, I tried to take her to the ER and offered to come stay with her but she declined. The next morning I found her a detox and rehab center and offered to take her but she was with her sister and said that her sister was helping her to detox and refused to go. The day after that I was still encouraging rehab and she said she didn't need it that she detoxed herself and was fine. She finally told me to leave her alone and I have. I don't know if my son really thinks she is clean or if he thinks that he can save her or if he is going to come back and start using again. I haven't read any stories of anyone stopping heroin on their own without some type of support system. I'm so scared for what the future holds.
 

BusynMember

Well-Known Member
Stay strong.aybe she IS doing better. Although tare c you CAN quit without rehab. My daughter would not go to rehab but she did quit. Maybe your son will encourage her.

Drug use is so unpredoctable. People quit every day. Honestly I thought my daughter, who looked so sick, would end up in prison or dead. Have faith.
 

DarkwingPsyduck

Active Member
Stay strong.aybe she IS doing better. Although tare c you CAN quit without rehab. My daughter would not go to rehab but she did quit. Maybe your son will encourage her.

Drug use is so unpredoctable. People quit every day. Honestly I thought my daughter, who looked so sick, would end up in prison or dead. Have faith.

While you are right about rehab not ALWAYS being necessary, treatment of some kind almost always is. Stopping the use is only the first step. Correcting slanted ways of thinking and behaving is where the real work comes in. You can get clean by doing literally nothing. Sit in a dark room for a few weeks, without drugs, and there you are. But that isn't recovery. It is superficial. Unless we deal with the underlying causes of our substance abuse, our likelihood of true recovery is very, very low. It is more about the psychological, than about the physical.
 

LauraH

Well-Known Member
My son just started it today. It was actually his idea. He was in a 10-day detox, then a 30 day rehab and has been in sober living for 2 - 3 weeks now. (Just got his 60 day chip Monday, yay!) I don't know if he's been suffering with cravings and wanting to use, because he really doesn't talk about it much. But after learning he's now on Vivitrol I wonder if it's been harder on him than he's been letting on. Anyway several people in my Facebook support group for addicts and their loved ones, several people said that it saved either their life or the life of a loved one. I don't really know much about it but I'll be interested to see what kind of effect, good or bad, it has on my son.
 
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