Addicted or not addicted

[m1946]

Last night I e xperceived very painful calf muscles and restless leg syndrome . I thought I hade taken my normal prescription of 3 x 50mg of Tramadol! & you can imagine the thought processes regarding augmentation!!When morning arrived my wife asked what was the one Tramadol capsule doing in my pill box!!!

I couldn't believe that I had only taken two not three capsules. I exclaimed that I now know why I take 3 capsules !!!

She said you are addicted!

I said no I am not!! I said rls came first and the Tramadol helps to romove the terrible effects of rls!

Who is right?

I am 78 and don't consider myself to have an addictive personality

[Madlegs1]

You are not addicted.

And unlikely to be so on Tramadol.

It's no harm to test yourself every now and again, as to how badly you need the full dose of medication.

If you need a label to assign to yourself- it might be that you are "dependent " on low dose opioid.

And that is ok.

You are also dependent on oxygen, food and water and lots of other things.

Good luck.👍

[SueJohnson]

As Madlegs1 said you are not addicted. You are dependent. Show your wife the Mayo algorithm.

[Joolsg]

Addiction means you crave the drug and need higher doses to get your 'hit'. Tolerance means you need to take higher doses to achieve the same result as a lower dose gave you.Dependence means you need the medication to control your disease.

You are dependent on your meds and will suffer withdrawals if you stop or reduce the dose. That happens to most people taking meds to control different diseases.

I take MS meds to stop MS symptoms. If I suddenly stop or reduce my meds, I will get withdrawal symptoms AND the original symptoms will come back.

So, rest assured, you are NOT addicted.

You are Dependent.

Just like diabetics are dependent on insulin and thyroid patients are dependent on thyroxine.

[Wanman4]

Are you taking magnesium Glycinate, it helps relax the muscles and is necessary for overall health. Everyone here should be taking, as most people are deficient in magnesium anyway.