Taper isn’t a word typically found in my dictionary. When I decide I don’t want something in my life or diet anymore, I usually cut it out cold turkey, why keep it around?  Unfortunately I made this mistake when I decided to cut back on the pain medicine the doctor had prescribed.  In my defense, she said to take it as needed and I was feeling pretty good – until about 12 hours after my last dosage.  I got the shivers, couldn’t get out of bed, was hot, then cold, my pulse was racing and I was miserable.  We called the triage nurse who decided I just had anxiety but I decided to take the medicine to see if it helped and voila! It did!  The next day my doctor’s nurse called to follow up and after asking me a series of questions, she decided I was having withdrawal symptoms and gave me a plan to taper them in a way that wouldn’t harm my body so much. 

Lesson learned – some things are okay to cut out cold turkey, other things should be cut out slowly!

Note: This post was originally written in October 2013