On pain meds for some bad burns on the left side of my body & leg. Haven't had to take any until today. It's 1206 am and been trying to get to sleep for an hour but no dice. I've taken these and other opiate based pain meds in the past and it's always the same story...can't sleep.

Very sorry you were burned.... that is a nasty kind of pain. You might want to go drink a LARGE glass of prune juice to avoid another kind of "discomfort" later.

Best wishes for a full and rapid recovery.

I have the same problem. There is about a 15 minute window after I take some that I can fall asleep, but after that I am up for the next 4-6 hours.

The incident happened Monday evening. My leg is the worst, a mix of 1st & 2nd degree burns. The skin is dark red, bubbled and loosening up. I've been good until today. It was a struggle to make it to the bathroom around 9pm. That's when I decided to pop the pill knowing I'd be awake for awhile.

A little antihistamine e.q. Benadryl, Unisom, Nyquil, etc.
might help.

Calling Dr. Daniels, Dr. Jack Daniels...

Prescription filled.

Two other Docs you forgot...

Dr. Jim Beam me up Scotty and Dr. Jose Cuervo'd you go.

Tramadol does the same to me. It claims it should make an individual drowsy, but I get the opposite effect, including a "jittery" feeling as though I'd had far too much caffeine. And when I finally can sleep, I usually have weird dreams or even hallucinations. I hate taking it and only do so when I just can't stand the pain anymore.

Doeslayer-I'm sending prayers your way for a speedy, painless and complete recovery.

Hydrocodone and tramadol make me itch furiously; big doses of benedryl help some, but it's still like full body poison ivy! My neurologist put me on Nucenta, which is tapentadol, and it works fairly well to relieve some pain without me clawing my hide bloody. The hydro is also a bowel plugger upper as already mentioned, best take some laxative with it, straining to go with burnt skin would be hellish. It was pretty bad after back surgery a few years ago.

I pray you don't wind up like me.
I had my toe fused to my foot 2 weeks ago. Took deladen (sp?), days 3-4, had a terrible trip. Felt like the room was closing in on me, had respitory depression, absolutely freaked out 3 weekends ago. Haven't been able to sleep properly since.
Last saturday, wife and I got out to the lake. I get to throwing a bumper for my Trap, being active, etc., took 1 hydrocodone (norco) pill around 2 pm., get home, dinner, tv, go to bed around midnight. Foot really hurting, take a norco around 2 am., by 3, when it kicked in, I started freaking out again.
Sunday morning, wife and I read the side effects of these drugs.
WOW !
I have like everyone. She takes me to immediate care.
Doc gives me 2 MG of vallium, to calm me and allow me to sleep.

Long story....

I'm off every hard drug now since 2 am last Sunday. Still have anxiety attacks and fast heart rate, and breathing issue's when ever I lay down. I can not sleep in my own bed.
I am terrified of it, and get some sleep, thanks to a melatonin based sleep aid, in our spare room.

I am afraid the side effects of these pain mess may have caused me permanent mental issues with sleeping.
I'm up now.... took a pill, fell asleep around 9:30, and wake every 2 hours. Sitting in the recliner on here now..
(Evident)...
I am hoping after the drugs completely clear my system, I can go back to normal sleep cycle. If not, I don't know what to do??
I have another surgery, Monday.
I pray the freaking out cycle doesn't start over.

Stay away from these things guys... they will mess your life up.

Surely there is a sub forum here for the hypochondriacs to have a cry

Doesn't the bit up the top say hunting and shooting ?

We're talking around a fire, pard. Life hurts sometimes and you ain't helping. Have a care...

OK.... you've dropped enough hints for us to know you are "British".

You ain't gonna find ANYTHING here that suits you.

Yes, feel asleep around 0330 and the crazy dreams ensued. Don't remember the details, but they were always changing, no rhyme or reason. Now up at 0630, let the dogs out, and will make an attempt at a shower and the drive to work.

Another hot day ahead. We have no AC, live in a log home built in the early 70's. I'll open up at night to cool the house down and trap some cool air for the following day. Only got down to 80 and still pretty humid out. I'll empty the dehumidifiers, get all the windows closed, and when I get home tonight stay in the basement which is 6-8 cooler than upstairs.

This whole deal was my fault. Did something stupid, thought I'd be OK. I must have called myself a dumb-ass 20 times after. The ER doctor was a babe. Pretty greenish-blue eyes and it looked like she kept in shape. Once they put the morphine in my IV, I started telling her how pretty she was. She just ignored me and turned me over to the nurse .

I've always found sleep to be a better thing than a little pain relief.

I'd pop 2 Benadryl and call it a night. A window AC can be had for cheap, enough for the bedroom.

Good luck with all this.
Maybe buy a window a/c unit.

Doesn't matter now, what you did. Just heal up, and try to stay away from the hydro's.

I gotta start moving around, and get out, do something, exercise, or whatever to make myself physically tired.
I want to sleep soooo bad...

I had to have a molar pulled on Monday and the dentist wrote me a script for hydrocodone.

Took one about every 4 hours and felt good but they made me stay awake as well. Been leaving the house everyday at 5 AM to go move cows(pills and 4-wheelers/horses is not recommended for weekend warriors...), and staying up too late at night...

After 4 days it finally caught up with me yesterday. Literally couldn't stay awake and slept for 4 hours after lunch.

Slacker!

Fuuck dude, I hit the couch about 1:30 and didn't get up until after 5, looked at the clock and about chit myself!


Weirdness for sure.

My wife works for a dentist who won't prescribe pain meds, only antibiotics. My wife says that she has worked for him for 18 years and he is still on the same prescription pad that he was using when she started there. He tells patients to take three 200 mg Ibuprofen and one 500 mg Tylenol together. It works. I told a friend of men about it two days ago. He was having the same issues as the OP. Yesterday he called and told me he had the best nights sleep he had had in weeks.

Drinking either Beam or Cuervo -- vs -- Third degree burn.
How do you tell the difference?

Epic nap.

another useless POS with nothing to offer. Adios MF, it's off to ignore for ya.

It is hitting me hard too.
Was on a pontoon boat with family yesterday.
Kids playing in the water, lots of activity, etc.
Had my foot elevated and fell asleep sitting up for an hour.

Been trying to sleep now, in the recliner, but the respitory depression, hits about the time I slip off, and I'm right awake.

Best wishes for a speedy recovery. Hydrocodone makes me sleepy.....I was on it for over 4 years though because of my lower back. Long story short, I quit cold turkey....that my friend is a whole 'mother story.

Hope you find what works for you. Burns are a nasty deal.

Keeps me awake too and doesn't relieve the pain enough to make up for the severe constipation that follows.

That's where Miralax, or Costco's Laxaclear (polyethylene glycol 3350) come in. I take enough stuff to cure concrete; sometimes I even mix the Miralax with Metamucil for that orange flavor and a bit of bulk to ease the process.

Then again, too much Miralax will strip the electrolytes right out of my bowel, leaving me crampy, so I add a packet of Electro Mix from Alacer Corp (www.emergenc.com) to replace the electrolytes. That's why the laxative they give you, the same polyethylene glycol 3350, before a colonoscopy tastes salty - the extra electrolytes.

Hydrocodone (or Norco) is a friend after they do four laminectomies on your cervical spine and tease a tumor from the spinal cord, and to moderate the pain from degenerative join disease in the spine. Sleep on the other hand has become rare and short, something to be treasured when it cooperates.

They don't let me sleep either but pump me up and make me get on Guns America and buy rifles I don't need.

I've never had a bad burn so I have no experience with that kind of pain, though I would believe myself fortunate, as my guess is it's nasty and makes finding a comfortable position to sleep in difficult. I hope you're getting good medical attention and keeping it dressed correctly.

Hydrocodone has always helped me sleep, as I believe it does most, but sometimes meds can have opposite effects for some people in some circumstances. Sorry this finds you there. Hydrocodone does have a tendency to slow bodily functions, so 2nd Wind's recommendation of prune juice should not be ignored if you notice infrequency in that area.

You should probably visit with your doctor about pain management and sleep, and buy an air conditioner.

FAMOUS GROUSE will work better!

No, mensan, it doesn't.

Doe Slayer, sorry to hear about the burns.
Hoping for a speedy recovery for you.

This might be the excuse you need to put an AC unit in the window!

You seem to have the same tolerance for fools that I do. I off'd him too!!!

I have an autoimmune disorder that attacks my peripheral nervous system; plus spinal degeneration. 800 mg ibuprofen twice daily and I can't tell that it does a darned thing to relieve any pain.

Looking at the big picture, I'd go for sleep over all else. You can't go without sleep for long until your whole world falls apart, mentally and physically. Really sorry to hear of the burns, that's terrible.

Since I work outdoors running equipment and doing physical labor, I hurt alot for my age. I take what I call a contractors cocktail, 3 ibuprofin and one excedrin (or generic) before bed. Alleviates pain until I can fall asleep. May try some combination of over the counter meds that won't trip you out.

Not that it helps in any way, but after seeing three people get addicted to Hydrocodone, it is one drug that scares the crap out of me. When I had my ACL replaced, the surgeon prescribed it for me, but I just took Ibuprofen to manage the pain. That said, I have a pretty high pain tolerance, but everybody is different, so what works for me may not work for you.

THAT friggin hurts just looking at the pic!!

since I fell on my hip a week or so ago, and aggrivated the severe osteo arthritis in my hip, I have been taking some sort of pain releiver.
Had some Percocet 5/325 left over from dental surgery, and half of one of those helped. Extra strength Tylenol other wise.
Ortho doc gave me some 10/325 Norco tabs. Those tend to keep me awake, but do kill all the pain. I took those for about a week, and then got off of 'em. Back to a single extra strength Tylenol.
One severe side effect for me, was an instant bump in my BP after taking one of the Norco tabs, and for a day after. About a 20 point jump. I got the ok from my cardio doc, but he said to use the Norco tabs sparingly.

I was lucky, it could have been much worse. The left side of my face/neck got it almost as bad. I'd post that pic, but I'm not much in the looks dept, this didn't help .

All the while, the chores are building up at the house. I need to cut the grass, have about 7 acres. Tomatoes & peppers to pick, garden watering, and of course have a new Ruger 77 .308 that needs to be played with! Thought I'd never admit to it, but my wife is back from vacation on Tuesday, will be nice having her back!

Needless to say, no more brush to burn.

btdt combo... having read of it.

Does ZERO, about as good as taking nothing.

I would never go to a dr that made me suffer on purpose.

stay away from narcos for osteo pain

celebrex or cheaper version mobic

I have interaction issues with Celebrex and a couple of my heart meds, or so I am told. Not suppsed to take any NSAIDS.
I am off the Norco now anyway, so it's a moot point.

Kinda snapping out if today's umbilical hernia surgery.
While waking up, had an anxiety attack.
Was a mild one. Had to sit up, and made them open the doors in the room.
They gave me an anti anxiety pill, and it's working.

Paging Rattler.......

what? yeah the stuff keeps some people awake....far from an unusual side effect for the stuff

Same here. I've had two shoulder operations, one of which involved taking a bone graft out of my hip to rebuild the socket. Only took Vicodin once or twice. I didn't need it and didn't like the way that it made me feel.

Well, it's a week after my unfortunate "incident" and I'm mending well. Took those damn pills for almost a week, at times, 3 per day. Had to take the last one nlt 6pm to get any sleep. Now that the pain is gone, I have ZERO urge to start popping pills. They took the edge off of the pain, but did nothing else for me.

Good to hear.

Keep healing!

The old lady is back home tomorrow after being gone for almost 2 weeks .
Another week of peace & quiet would have greatly aided my healing.

the addiction thing is SOMEWHAT overstated....there are two different things, physical and mental addiction....if your a coffee drinker(or other type of caffeine) or a smoker you deal with physical addiction....not that hard to deal with, you just taper yourself off over a couple days and you dont have much of an issue

the psychological addiction depends pretty much on how your brain is wired....with most people its a nonissue....they just will never actually become addicted....ive taken opiates daily for 15 years and this has been a non issue because its not how my brain is wired.....every time the docs want to try something else ive been all for it, unfortunately nothing else works well one thing does but its frowned apon even more.....

if you are recovering from surgery and the doc is saying your gonna need pain meds for a short while i would not worry bout the whole addiction thing at all....you are usually far better off taking the meds so that you can do the physical therapy pain free or nearly so as it will shorten the healing time and get you back to 100% or nearly so alot faster and get you out of being in pain alot faster...you are dealing with short term acute pain which is what opiates are great for, its the treatment of chronic pain where most the issues arrise

as im guessing BGG is just giving me chit over is my b!tching in the past, my b!tching has been related totally to the physical addiction end because of what i take and the political bullchit(not medical) thats lead to what i have to deal with getting my meds from a doc, chit im sure most people wouldnt be anymore willing to put up with than i am if they were in my position.....

but i am not taking a few vicoden a day for a week or two after surgery and i cant just quit taking my meds with out a severe reaction.....me just stopping because i cant get my meds means missing several days of work while my body goes through withdrawls....but once again im on significantly more than docs gives a person to recover from surgery....if you took the pills every day for 10 days the doc gives you for post op than quit cold turkey your gonna have a crappy day but not a big deal...taper off over 2 or 3 days and your not gonna notice much of anything....

trying to heal in pain is often very counter productive, especially when dealing with things like neck, back and shoulder surgery, the muscles unhappy and tense during the healing will often cause more long term issues...

Doeslayer,

There is always this advice for your pending meeting...



YMMV

My experience has been likewise. After suffering furious sciatic pain, hydrocodone produced zero pain relief and only made my nose itch. Recently, I have wrenched my right shoulder. The first tramadol pill I took seemed to reduce the level of pain abed but when I take them while using my right arm on the mouse or shaking hands or otherwise reaching out or over this drug is useless.

I want to express my best wishes to the OP for quick and painless as possible recovery.

The pressure will be good for you now.

I was sent home from the hospital from having brain surgery to remove an acoustic neuroma tumor with a script for hydrocodone.

I slept fine with it. The only side effect I noticed was things seemed bigger. The 24" TV seemed like a big screen. The small portable phone seemed like one of those huge field military phones in my hand. The funny thing is I could sit there and talk about it knowing that it wasn't real.

The stuff worked...never in any pain and weaned off of the drug after 2 weeks.

Dan

if hydrocodone doesnt work for you and you do need the pain relief following surgery there are other opiates to try...ive never had the itching side effect with the 4 different opiates ive been on over the years but have talked to plenty of people where only one of the bunch caused itching and a few where all did....

speaking from experiance, opiates, even really strong ones do jackchit for sciatic pain.....they are good for pain at the source like post op pain or a broken arm but "phantom pain" where the pain is away from the source due to a nerve being pinched it works really poorly.....i had better luck with advil for relief from a bulged disk due to it reducing the inflammation at the site than i did morphine....in that case all opiates do is knock you loopy so you dont care your in pain and thats where you run into addiction risks cause you start chasing tolerance build up

I learned that and thanks for the affirmation. I chuck 4 Advil for routine pain. AT 270 that always works for me but not for this shoulder. 2 Alleve do no good either and Tylenol has killed too many so I shun that no matter what.

different NSAIDs work best for different people....been on them all trying to stay off the opiates for my knees and in the end stuff like Celebrex has been a godsend for some but for me Advil works the best of the group, far better than any of the perscription ones but none works truly really well for me for more than a headache or very minor stuff(pinched nerve from bulged disk being an exception)....if something doesnt work for you but seems to work for alot of people with the same issue its generally a good idea to check and see if there is something else in the family of drugs that may work better for you....

My preferred poison was scotch. Nothing fancy, usually Johnny Walker Red. I don't do that anymore, though this past week may have been a mite easier w/a little help .

My wife's not a bad one as women go. Of course, she has some of the gender's faults, though not all. I plan on taking that up with God in a few years. I guess I could be worse off.

More good news! You are truly a lucky man...well, outside of the burns!

I appreciate your kindness and am indeed getting better. I've let a lot of chores get by me this week because of my foolishness. With the wife back, I can get that stuff done. In 4 weeks, I'm off to Colorado for a cow elk hunt. Still haven't decided on a rifle. Would like to use my .260 w/120 gr TTSX's, but my '06 and 168 gr TTSX's has always worked for me before, so why change right?

I used ta sleep like a baby.
Now I'm up every 2 or 3 hours.

Hydros, oxy's, and percos worked until the fuggin doctors decided fighting the phony drug wars was their personal responsibility.

I'd cut them them little pills into halves or thirds, a little piece every 6 or 8 hours and I could sleep or be productive, which ever time of day it was.

But no.
"These are the most abused drugs in America today."

So thanks to you people's phony fuggin drug war I'm stuck with ibuprofen and acetaminophen and acetycilic acid...

Along with very little sleep, very little productivity, and too much blood in my stool.

I'm one angry young man.

I been tellin the ole lady for near a year now I'm either gonna knock off a pharmacy in broad daylight or turn to the streets for morphine or heroine or whatever the fugk I can find.

I Still have have my graduated cylinder and bunsen burner.

Had my hernia surgery yesterday. Everything seemed to go well.
I'm awake at this time tho, but a scratchy throat, from the tube, and the cat walked across my belly, has me awake.

Had an anxiety attack while shaking the cob webs out tho.
It was a good thing for the staff to see it

Got a script for an anti anxiety pill, and tramadoll.

Ahhh, did I sleep great last night.

Looking forward towards sleep now.

If anyone is interested, I put readers on and just ask for the name of the anti anxiety pills.