[drooogs]

opioids are a large class of drugs with widely varying effects and potential for abuse. for instance, the active ingredient in Imodium is an opioid, but you don't see a lot of recreational Imodium users.

kratom is certainly not a miracle herb, but its characteristics do make it a lot less addictive and lethal than its more popular relatives. it's not unreasonable to think it might be used in replacement therapy, similar to buprenorphine.

[LordDragonfang]

Using Imodium as an example really hurts your case here. Loperamide (Imodium's active ingredient) isn't used recreationally because it's not psychoactive - or more accurately, it doesn't cross the blood-brain barrier. Meanwhile, you'd be hard pressed to find an opioid which does (as kratom obviously does) that lacks recreational users.

[drooogs]

that's exactly my point. maybe it wasn't worded well. "X is an opioid" does not imply "X is an extremely dangerous drug with high potential for addiction". not all opioids have psychoactive effects. some (eg, buprenorphine) do have psychoactive effects that are generally considered unpleasant by users. it's a large class of drugs...

[netizen-936824]

Occasionally people with opioid addictions actually do use loperamide at high doses to stave off withdrawals. But it does not have the same effects as ones that cross the BBB, correct.

[cik2e]

- kratom is certainly not a miracle herb, but its characteristics do make it a lot less addictive and lethal than its more popular relatives.

Yea, that's what you read online. But after going 2.5 months without sleep (I would doze off for half an hour once a twice per night), 4 months of acute depression, and umm like a year of PAWS, I beg to differ. If you're going off of personal experience, congrats, you didn't abuse it.

Someone already linked the quitting kratom subreddit where you can hear all kinds of horror stories.

Finally, comparing Kratom to traditional opiods isn't all that useful. Kratom has a shitload of other active alkaloids and very little research on their effects. Saying it's less addictive than other opiodis is like saying you'd rather get hit by a car going 60 vs 100.

Personally, I would have been much much better off if Kratom had been illegal, and I am amazed it still is.

[drooogs]

I've only tried kratom a couple times, many years ago. I can see how someone like me could have a severe problem with it, but I didn't find it to be nearly as addictive (to me) as heroin. I knew someone, like you, who had withdrawal symptoms for a very long time after quitting. I've also known a couple of the mythical "chippers", who've used heroin/oxy/etc occasionally over the course of many years without becoming addicted.

humans can become addicted to pretty much anything that's enjoyable. some things are probably much more addictive than others, but you can't really create a strict ordering of addictive substances/activities when every individual responds differently. is kratom less addictive than heroin? I would guess yes. is it more addictive than alcohol? I don't know, probably yes for some, no for others.

[novok]

Did you try weed?