Need some advice

[Griffin (OP)]

So a friend (which i don't have many of) from work invited me to hike a fourteener with him, his family, and a few other friends. I really want to go as I have never hiked a fourteener and its getting cold so it will be one of my last hikes of the year. I love doing short hikes in the fall because the leaves changing colors are so beautiful but I have never done a fourteener and I am not in very good shape. I think the hike is around 9 miles total so I'll have to take quite a bit of water and ill have quite a bit of weight on me from that and extra clothes sense it will probably be 50-60 degrees that high up.

I put in a thing into the state asking them to let me have a takeout that day 3 weeks ago and they have not responded and my counselor said that is unlikely that it will happen. I am thinking about just not taking my Sunday take home and toughing it out through work that day and bringing that with me for my trip to go hike because I don't think I can hike 9 miles to the top of a fourteener without dosing. I know that I can make it through work without dosing because I accidentally spilled my entire take home 2 weeks ago and had to work that day. I am not sure how long I am scheduled to work sunday but if it is a short shift I think I can manage.

My question is sense the date on the bottle will be wrong could I possibly get a felony charge if we are pulled over and I am searched? What would you guys do? Should I just put it in one of my water bottles and chug it the morning of? I really want to go because I have never done a fourteener, it will be one of my last hikes for the year, and I have been trying to make friends who don't do drugs. They smoke weed so if I have the money I am going to get my red card and I might smoke with them after I show my PO the red card. This is all happening in a week so I gotta get this all figured out soon. Any advice would be awesome

I definitely don't want to get a criminal charge because if you do get a charge for any kind of diversion they stop giving you take outs on Sunday and you can no longer get any take outs at all while you are a patient there so I could only dose 6 days a week. Plus I would goto prison for few years probably. All ideas and advice is welcome because I really want to go because I am desperately trying to make friends.

If I do get my med card and can smoke with them on the hike it will be awesome sense I haven't smoked in 2 years. I'll just hope that I don't get tested for 2 weeks after the hike sense I will be getting my phase one on Monday so I won't have to goto the clinic on Saturdays anymore. However if I am tested then it will only set me back one month to get my phase one again. I have zero dollars so it is unlikely that I will be able to get my medical card but if I do it would be really awesome then I will just smoke if i get UAs at the beginning of the month so that I won't have dirty UAs.


Griffin

[St. Theresa]

Hey man, I think it's awesome you're going out to make new friends and I know it's rough hiding your maintenance, people make judgements and it's always better to create a friendship before disclosing past shit.

I think you may be worrying a little too much on getting pulled over, can't you just put the 'done in a empty juice bottle that looks like the liquid?  I've never been on mmt just subs. So I could be totally wrong

Also, maybe save some of your urine ? Are you watched in the drug test peeing? Can't you give them your pee without the thc in it?

Hope any of that helps, hope it all works out and let us know how the hike went . Sounds awesome. This time of year is great to be outdoors, such beautiful scenery and the weather is perfect.

[nick]

Unless you've pulled some heinous shit in the past I see NO reason why your clinic shouldn't arrange a take out dose.

What reason did the people at the clinic,the people who are supposed to be helping you,give for their decision?

[Griffin (OP)]

I have a wonderful reputation with my clinic I have never had a dirty UA and everyone there likes me because I keep to myself and am very polite. My counselor said it is up to the state and you have to ask the state for permission for take outs for any days that you aren't supposed to get them. I am not sure where it goes to or who has to authorize it. No one in the clinic can authorize it though that I know for sure. They sent it out about 3 weeks ago and sense we haven't heard anything back yet. I'm supposed to go in a little less than a week and y counselor said today that he is doubtful that it will be approved.

I don't know if any of my past history or anything is involved because before I got my methadone DUI(Which may count against me if they check that kind of stuff) I was at the highest phase you can get in colorado which is 2 weeks at a time. You can get 28 days only if you have a severe disability that makes it so that you can not make it twice a month to get your methadone and my counselor who has been a MMT counselor for 17 years says he has only seen it once with a physically handicapped man who lived in Wyoming and was coming to colorado to get it because I think there are no methadone clinics in Wyoming I could be wrong but thats how I remember the story.

I don't know what all they check or who it is that authorizes it but I have never had a dirty or missed UA and was on the Highest phase that I could get before I got arrested. I have only been going for 3 months and my first phase will be approved Monday so I don't know if they are only counting the time that I have been on MMT this go around. I was getting counseling at the clinic after I got out of jail from the clinic so I have always been a patient there and if it was up to them I would be getting two weeks of take-homes at a time sense I started back up but they have to go by the regulations and I had to start from the beginning.

St. T I think you are right that I am over thinking it and I could just pour it my water bottle or juice container or something and have it concealed if they pulled us over. My friend I am going with just told me that they don't smoke weed in the car so thats a plus. That makes the chances of actually getting searched or any of that a lot lower cause if they smell pot they don't care but if you have been smoking you can get a dui. I am over paranoid about it just because of the last time I got arrested for driving under the influence of methadone 18 hours after taking it and having to kick in jail from 280 so I am definitely paranoid about it because I don't want to ever go through that again. I just want to be as pre-cautious as possible with everything I do until I am off probation.


Griffin

[Griffin (OP)]

I forgot to answer your second question St. Theresa.. All of my UA's are observed. So every time I take a UA I have a guy standing 3 feet from me breathing heavily tapping his watch acting like its taking forever. I almost had to have a failed UA a few days ago because I didn't think about it and went to the restroom right before I went to the clinic and of course I had a UA so I chugged a bunch of water and failed 3 different times to get any pee out finally I did it right before they were about to close. If you can't pee in front of the person, if its diluted, or you miss it by coming in to late then it counts as a dirty UA. I am praying mine wasn't diluted sense I drank a bunch of water (3 water bottles full) this time but it took me 2 hours of sitting at the clinic for it to digest and for me to not have stage fright and be able to go. So hopefully all is good there I will know in a few days. I think it is stupid that they can give you a diluted UA if its observed because they count as failed UAs. It took me 3 months to get over my stage fright to be able to pee in front of someone staring at me when I first got on probation.

My probation officer decided to let my UAs that I take at the clinic count for my probation sense medicaid covers all my methadone costs my UAs, counseling, dr visits, and the actual methadone which is freaking awesome. Because before when I was on probation I had a month and a half left when I got arrested I had to take one every week that cost $10 each and had done that for that past 18 months plus the one a month at my clinic. But sense I am on probation through a private company my PO is really lenient and said that my UA at the clinic will be all I will have to do from now on. She said they usually start people off at 3 but sense I haven't had a dirty UA sense I started that I will only have to do one.



Griffin

[St. Theresa]

I have a wonderful reputation with my clinic I have never had a dirty UA and everyone there likes me because I keep to myself and am very polite. My counselor said it is up to the state and you have to ask the state for permission for take outs for any days that you aren't supposed to get them. I am not sure where it goes to or who has to authorize it. No one in the clinic can authorize it though that I know for sure. They sent it out about 3 weeks ago and sense we haven't heard anything back yet. I'm supposed to go in a little less than a week and y counselor said today that he is doubtful that it will be approved.

I don't know if any of my past history or anything is involved because before I got my methadone DUI(Which may count against me if they check that kind of stuff) I was at the highest phase you can get in colorado which is 2 weeks at a time. You can get 28 days only if you have a severe disability that makes it so that you can not make it twice a month to get your methadone and my counselor who has been a MMT counselor for 17 years says he has only seen it once with a physically handicapped man who lived in Wyoming and was coming to colorado to get it because I think there are no methadone clinics in Wyoming I could be wrong but thats how I remember the story.

I don't know what all they check or who it is that authorizes it but I have never had a dirty or missed UA and was on the Highest phase that I could get before I got arrested. I have only been going for 3 months and my first phase will be approved Monday so I don't know if they are only counting the time that I have been on MMT this go around. I was getting counseling at the clinic after I got out of jail from the clinic so I have always been a patient there and if it was up to them I would be getting two weeks of take-homes at a time sense I started back up but they have to go by the regulations and I had to start from the beginning.

St. T I think you are right that I am over thinking it and I could just pour it my water bottle or juice container or something and have it concealed if they pulled us over. My friend I am going with just told me that they don't smoke weed in the car so thats a plus. That makes the chances of actually getting searched or any of that a lot lower cause if they smell pot they don't care but if you have been smoking you can get a dui. I am over paranoid about it just because of the last time I got arrested for driving under the influence of methadone 18 hours after taking it and having to kick in jail from 280 so I am definitely paranoid about it because I don't want to ever go through that again. I just want to be as pre-cautious as possible with everything I do until I am off probation.


Griffin

Oy vey... Kicking 280 'done in jail is scary shit I'm glad I haven't ever experienced. I actually don't blame you at all for worrying now that you've shared that! That kinda kick will keep the fear of God in you. Lol

[Griffin (OP)]

Yes it has haha I am over pre-cautious or paranoid whichever you want to call it but its only cause I've been through some shit. But I found out today that another person at my clinic got arrested for the same thing. He was able to get it dropped to careless driving with a lawyer and he has some kind of neuropathy which made it so they didn't allow the roadside test to be used in court.

The top guy at Denver health's methadone department just wrote a letter to all law enforcement that basically said to stop arresting his patients because its been proven in studies that it does not effect your driving. He sent them the studies and also some studies on MMT patients who got arrested and did not return to the clinic because they detoxed in jail and then overdosed and died from using on the streets after they got out. It shows that the rate of people who return to methadone clinics after going to jail or prison who were not treated with methadone while incarcerated was very low and that it led to more health risks, overdoses, and death.

I don't know how many people have to die for them to start mandating that people be given treatment in jail. That is why in Oklahoma which is a very conservative state now provides methadone in all jails and prisons and not as a taper unless thats what the person wants. So many people died detoxing from drugs that they finally had a bill passed a few years ago mandating that people get there methadone treatment in jail if they were getting it on the streets. It is sad that only one county in all of Colorado does this and it is because the guy who wrote that letter who has been the head of the Denver Health methadone department for a very long time got the county to start giving MMT treatment to people who were detoxing in jail a few years back. I can only hope for a better future for people struggling with addiction.

I am still open to any ideas about the original topic. I have to work 8 hours Sunday but I think I would rather have it on the hike and that I will just conceal it and drink it the morning before the hike. We are going down the day before and staying in a hotel or camping. My counselor said that me not coming into dose the day of my hike if they don't hear back from the government allowing me to have a take out that day will be excused and will not effect me moving up in phases or getting my take-outs. That is definitely a good thing and I am glad they aren't punishing me for trying to have a life while on methadone.



Griffin

[Wildcat]

Griffin-

I am sure you will be fine as St. T and Nick have implied.(hey St. T and Nick-sounds like the title of a Christmas story!)

About the dui=your atty didn't get that thrown out? Or at least dropped to a lesser charge?

[Griffin (OP)]

My attorney was a public defender who represented 3 different counties. He was an idiot who had literally 1000 open cases he was dealing with at the time. They were trying to give me a felony intent to distribute and felony possession charge for having some of my meds in the wrong bottle. I had to tell him that they can't charge me with intent to distribute because it was less than 7 grams which is what the law statute here is. He had no idea and didn't think I actually had prescriptions for the meds so he was treating me as a junkie while I was in jail fighting it.

I should of got him fired but I figured the next one would be just as bad and that I would be in jail for another 3 months trying to figure out a new deal with a new public defender. I was kicking 280 mg of done with only an occasional tylenol and it had already been 30 days so I was ready to gtfo,

He didn't even tell me that they were still charging me with a misdemeanor possession charge for having my meds in the wrong bottle. When he told me about the plea deal he said they dropped the drug charges and you will only get a misdemeanor dui. He then proceeded to beg me for 5 minutes to take the deal.

 I found out I was going to be getting the drug charge as well as the DUI when I walked into court to accept that deal. I had brought in all my prescriptions to get the drug charges dropped a month earlier and thought that it would make them drop all the drug charges and that is what he told me. I still have the voicemail of him saying that.

I was thinking that I wasn't going to get off because my public pretender was an idiot, it is a gray area in the law, and I failed the roadside test and had methadone in my system. Even though it had been almost 18 hour sense I had taken it. They don't test your blood for drug levels they only test to see what is in your system. So they had somewhat of a case sense I didn't have a real lawyer even though I had a note from my doctor stating that I had been on a stable dose for 18 months and that it would not have any effect on my driving. I also had copies of the last 18 months of clean UA's that I had taken at the clinic and for probation.

I was on probation at the time and only had a month and a half left of the 18 months when I got arrested for this bs. When you are on probation they can search you, your house, or your vehicle at any time for no reason. That is how they found that I had some of my other meds in my blood pressure medication bottle because I am an idiot and packed at 5 that morning before work. I just put them in that bottle to save room not thinking about it. They completely trashed my car and broke the backs off my seats so they don't stay on anymore and threw everything on I had in my car and trunk on the floor. It looked like an 80s hair metal band was in my car it was so fucked up I was surprised they didn't slash my tires.

 I got 18 more months of probation for it along with $4000+ in fines and 48 hours of community service. This all happened in March when I was driving to visit my family. It was in a small ass hick town and I didn't think I had many options and It sucked driving 3 hours each way every month to deal with it and sense I didn't think I could get anything better I just took the deal. I shouldn't have sense I didn't know about the drug charge until about 30 minutes before I saw the judge and made the wrong decision because I should of fought until they dropped that but I was ready for it to be over with and they promised no jail time even though I got 5 days suspended which is stupid because I did over a month for the shit already.


I definitely made mistakes on how I dealt with the situation legally but I didn't think I had many options because I couldn't afford a real lawyer the country town wasn't going to let me off. They were trying to get as much money out of me as they could and thats why they tried to charge me with felony intent to distribute and felony possession. The way the law is written if you fail the roadside sobriety test and have anything in your system you can get a DUI even if it is an OTC med. If you are under the limit or have nothing in your system and fail the roadside test you can be charged with a DWAI.

I should of kept my meds in their original bottles, and I should of drove the next morning instead of driving through the night. I like to drive through the night because there is less traffic and with a few red bull I don't get sleepy. I had been up sense 5 worked a 9 hour shift and had been driving for 3 hours so I am sure I looked tired and my eyes were probably red because I had been up all day and worked in a warehouse for 9 hours before I started the drive. When I got pulled over he said I was veering and that "i wasn't crossing the lines but I was going back in forth in between them". Which is bullshit.

 Sorry to derail the topic but I wanted to answer your question and let as many people as I can know my story so they can be aware of what can happen and ways to avoid it from happening as well as how to properly handle the situation if you are in it. It is cheaper overall to get a lawyer. I know 2 people who were able to get it dropped down to careless driving with a lawyer, a legit reason why you can not pass the road side test, and a note from your physician.

Griffin

[Sand and Water]

Wow Griffin-- I'm so sorry you had to go through all this, but sending a huge thank you to you for the tips you provided, especially regarding roadside testing and how neuropathy can get the results dismissed. 

Though I'll probably always be a bit nervous (like. you) when driving, after reading this, I'm confident that if I need to, I can get documentation from my Dr to prove my inability to perform the physical portions of those tests.  Along with my med history it should be enough to make a DA think twice before charging me for a dui.  (I hope!)

[Griffin (OP)]

No problem thank you for reading and putting in your input and I hope that it never happens but if it does I hope you have the knowledge and resources to get out of it without going through what I am. I just want as many people to hear my story as possible so they don't have to go through what I did.

The take home dose for my hiking trip Crisis was adverted the state ended up approving my take home for next week for my hike they got the approval in late yesterday and I found out this morning so I will have my take out for my hiking trip! I am super excited to do my first fourteener, meet and bond with new friends, and get out in the peaceful, wonderful, beautiful, wilderness its gorgeous this time of year. I hope the trip goes perfectly and I a sure it will.


  Thanks everyone for all the tips and info, this community has always been great to me I don't know what I would do with out it. Also my phase one was approved so today was (hopefully!) the last Saturday that I will ever have to come dose at the clinic which is freaking awesome to. I love when good news rolls in makes my days way better!


Griffin

[St. Theresa]

Griffin-

I am sure you will be fine as St. T and Nick have implied.(hey St. T and Nick-sounds like the title of a Christmas story!)

About the dui=your atty didn't get that thrown out? Or at least dropped to a lesser charge?

Lmao! Just saw this, wildcat