Ive read majority of the thread and wrote this as i went
When you ask him about it or try to talk to him, he goes defensive, he gets a hit from opiates and possibly a high to either get him thru the day or he is waiting until his next hit,
He is an addict and could be doing any number of things, you know he is taking codiene which he admits to be addicted to and pregablin helps, i have heard of many instances where to get a better hit its IVed, same with the codiene, tolerance builds, they cant get any more, they go into withdrawals, the anger bursts lash out (i know not in every single case but often), will lie, steal, prostitute themselves for the sake of a hit, (so you need to protect yourself that way too if you are DTD).
Could be mixing with other more available medications that are available in supermarkets or getting from "friends", the friends will never stick around if something goes wrong tho.
In the chance he was to OD have you ever heard of getting a OD kit, you dont have to give your details, go into a chemist if you like far from home explain someone you know is at risk and the training is less than 10 mins and they give you a kit to inject the person if they have possibly ODed on opiates, Ring 999 first before you do this as they will wake up in sudden withdrawal so will be quite angry but are likely to fall back down as drugs move around their system again, www.changegrowlive.org/get-help/advice-information/drugs-alcohol/naloxone-the-opioid-overdose-reversal-drug the kits should be free and "Naloxone takes 2-5 minutes to have an effect when injected into a muscle. The effects last for about 20 minutes. This means the use of naloxone can buy critical time while waiting for an ambulance to arrive" try and keep the person in the recovery position if possible, ive seen it that someone had to put body weight on top of them.
" As PP have said, people sometimes use pregabalin to assist with opiate withdrawal. Is he attempting some kind of home detox from the codeine? He needs to leave you out of it, but it doesn't sound like you feel you have any real ability to make that happen." - what @LimonViola said,
Out of interest does he do grocery shopping when he is out of house (Tesco, Asda, Sainsburys etc) as straight off I can think of a list of medications can purchase to potentiate or help take the edge off the withdrawals right in the medication section, Ah i just seen the visits to several chemists on way home from work or on holidays,
@FASH84 Nothing can happen from his side as you prob agree until he makes the decision for himself and is willing to take ownership of it
This is not a good environment for you op or child/ren and you need support, when i worked in detox and rehabilitation centre we all had to attend at least 1 anon type meeting per day every level of staff, inc the cleaners and catering right up to the Senior manager and all inbetween, there was only a small group temporary exemptions. as detoxing. For you if you dont feel up to tackling support for yourself face to face at this point but might in the future, can i recommend Families Anon who have groups online.
As @Slartybartfast says you are being supportive of him by challenging him because sitting patting his hand and telling him everything is going to be ok, is not really going to help in the bigger picture
"He does crush them.ive only seen it once but he uses a sort of bag to crush the codeine." if its just codiene then could a chance that its neurofen + he is buying and cutting and if crushing like that to a really fine powder i would be watching out for needles, wipes, sharps, tourniquet etc as when down to a power like that can be injected or snorted and it would be if he knew what he was doing (and i think he might) be getting pure codiene
My partner has been on maintenance prescribing (not methadone) but he is still an addict abeit in recovery, i didnt meet him till a year after he went on it, he has had one blip over the years where i saw things fall down and despite his reassurances that he had it under control he didnt realise i already had his family on board aware of what he was doing and it was the day he sat watching tv and went to inject his medication, i blew up, he grabbed the phone to ask someone to pick him up as he doesnt drive and i was going psycho at him leaving out a vital bit of information to which i picked up the other handset and spoke to his mum saying bring you and his dad,
He is very angry and irrational, he claimed i was encouraging him to inject as i bought him some syringes (his parents already knew that i had got the syringes as he was reusing the ones he had so that wasnt good, clean ones each time), he stomped out to the car with them never wanting to set eyes on me again,
As agreed with his mum who is his carer i rang his addiction key worker and explained the whole thing as we were well aware if he had to relay the incident it may get "lost in translation" to say the least, and he was called for an appt the next morning before he could pick up meds from the chemist.
About a week went past and with nobody enabling him and his parents doling his meds out exactly to him so he couldnt get anything else, he realised that nobody was going to enabling him and life would be a lot easier if he admitted he had fecked up, he knows if he does it again, im done. That blip was 2010 so he has done well since. Il be there for his family but i will not enable him or they wont either,