Opiates as the Other Man

This gentleman answered my post about the limits of will power. I feel for him– I moved his post up here because it describes what happens when one partner falls in love with narcotics. As I read the post, about his wife slowly checking out with opiates and then with benzos… addiction makes a person fade away, lost in hazy fog… I had this image of his wife cheating on him, telling him lies about it being over…but going back again to the other man without even having the decency to go to a motel.
Will Power. I’m a person with strong will power, but my wife is not. My will has no power to get her help. Twenty years after 3 spinal fusions, she is now a daily methadone user (which I just found out 8 months ago?) for the past six years, to get off Oxycontin for chronic back pain. Since I confronted her about it she has repeatedly said she was getting weaned off of Methadone, and only had to go to the clinic twice a month now. Eight months later, nothing has changed, only getting worse. She is losing her mind, nodding out on her feet sometimes (“Oh, I was just thinking!” she’ll say) forgetting the most simple things and saying the craziest things. I have found Xanax, and Ambien in her purse and flushed them. Apparently local doctors (the ones she hasn’t been to before) have given them to her for depression. These combined with the Methadone makes for a person I can’t stand. Disgusting. Like someone who has been drinking scotch all night.

This is a nightmare, and my 31yr. marriage is about to end unless I have an intervention or something. She says she will do “whatever it takes,” but she’s dosed-up when she says it. She says her life sucks, and she knows Methadone is a wedge that is driven between us, but she is powerless to do the right thing.

I can’t afford Narcanon(?) and really don’t understand all this “agonist” stuff to well. I quit doing drugs at least twenty years ago and don’t even take an aspirin anymore, so I’m a little apprehensive about taking another drug (Suboxone) to get off another one (Methadone). The money she must have spent all this time on something that has convinced her brain she will die without it, she could have had two laser spine corrective surgeries by now. This is absolutely crazy. What’s to prevent a Suboxone user to not also include their Methadone dose as well? Chasing the dragon.

Is Suboxone a way to get off of Methadone?

Man I hope somebody reads this.
A couple thoughts.
Yes, Suboxone can be a way off methadone.  You will find some disagreement on the web, but since this is my site I can share my observations and opinions.   I have helped a number of people  change from methadone to Suboxone; most of the time those people were happy with the change.  But I don’t get the impression that this gentleman’s wife would be happy.
Methadone is an opiate agonist, and buprenorphine is a partial agonist.  The ceiling effect of buprenorphine allows one to take a sufficient dose to bind up all of the opiate receptors, which results in the loss of cravings for opiates.  To my way of thinking, buprenorphine, by eliminating the obsession to use, treats the heart of addiction itself.  That’s a good thing most of the time;  the person describes feeling much less ‘busy’– suddenly the person has tons of time and empty space in his/her mind to think about other things, such as wondering how one’s partner is doing, wondering about the meaning of life… whatever.
But I don’t get the impression that this gentleman’s wife is into all of that.  Were she to change to Suboxone, she would have time to feel ashamed of herself for what her life has become.  She would have to acknowledge her husband’s anger.  She would have to return to the living. s That would be a dramatic change from her self-obsessed fog.
For the writer, it is obvious that your wife has checked out of the relationship.  Is she still inside that doped up person?  I don’t know.  If you give her an ultimatum– come back to planet earth, or you are out of there– which will she choose?