Dane’s Story

Dane had been in recovery from opioid use disorder for over seven years when he tried kratom and then 7OH. He’d worked hard in a 12-step program and had put together a rewarding career. Within a short span of time, he realized that his relationship with 7OH felt too similar to his destructive and traumatic time in active addiction. Suboxone has helped him stop using 7OH.

I tried kratom and didn’t like it much because it messed with my stomach. But then I tried 7OH and I got that warmth I associated with dope. I thought, “This feels like morphine. This is crazy. How is this available over the counter?”

I used 7OH for probably a month and a half straight and I didn’t even think about it and then I suddenly realized, “Oh shit, what am I doing?” I said, “I’m going to stop, I’m going to stop right now.” And then came that feeling I remembered of being dopesick. And so I went and got more.

I thought, “What am I going to do? It’s crazy that this has gone so far in such a short amount of time.” I didn’t feel like I had anybody to tell. I thought if I told someone from my 12-step program, they would immediately tell me to go to rehab, and I didn’t want that–I had already recovered my life.

Luckily, I have a friend who is very open-minded and I reached out to her and said “Hey, look, I’m struggling, I’m addicted to this drug” and she said, “What the hell is that?” because a lot of people don’t know about 7OH. And after I told her, she said, “What about Suboxone?”

My 12-step brain came out and I had all these worries, all these stigmas that I attached to it.

So I called my doctor and asked about a Suboxone taper, something temporary. I started a month-long Suboxone taper and it worked. And not only did it work, it actually made me feel better mentally.

At first, I thought, “Well, it makes me feel better and that’s wrong. I shouldn’t feel better.” But then I thought about it and remembered that during all of my time in 12-step, nobody said anything about my psych meds and they were helping me feel better. How was this any different?

Well, the very day I was done with my taper, I was back at the convenience store buying more 7OH. And I said to myself, “All right, it’s time to do what I need to do because I cannot go back to living that lifestyle. I can’t go through that again. I can’t be that person I was an active addiction.”

I think that I am living proof that people really can change, and I like being that proof, you know? A lot of the trauma of being in active addiction has started to hit me lately–stuff that I went through and stuff that I did–and I said to myself, “I’ve just got to suck it up, I’ve got to be on this medication for as long as I need to be on it because I can’t go back.”

So, I’m on Suboxone. And it’s still tough to think about sometimes because I do get stuck in the mindset I picked up in 12-step. But I try to view Suboxone like just another psych med. It’s what I need right now. Maybe someday it’ll be time to get off of it, but now is not that time. I don’t want to risk it.

And I’m grateful that the stepwork I’ve done has helped me get to know more about myself. Because of that, I know what I need right now.