I am having surgery requiring anesthesia and pain meds. I am a methadone user. What is safe and eff?

With all due respect, would you mind telling me why you are taking methadone? I ask because it makes a difference when thinking of taking a methadone vacation . Can your body tolerate not taking it for a few days? I'll explain my own situation to you and maybe it will help you to understand what I'm trying to say. I've had migraine headaches for most of my life. For the past 15 years , minus the last two years, I was being prescribed some very strong narcotics for pain control. I did o.k. For the first few years, never taking more than prescribed and only taking them when needed for the migraines. Then something happened in my life which triggered my addiction gene and before you know it, I'm taking a lot of medication for all of the wrong reasons just to feel normal!! To try and make a long story short, two years ago I woke up one day and decided that I had had enough!! I went through 10 days of the worst detox you could imagine and then I went to a Suboxone clinic. I was put on Suboxone 8mg. Tabs sublingual twice a day, everyday. I felt better almost immediately. Suboxone prevents a person from suffering from the lingering effects of withdrawal. Most people are only on it for a few days. My doctor and I have chosen to stay on it long term. I have only had about three migraines in the past two years and the Suboxone relieves the pain caused by them. It also enables me to feel normal and lead a normal life, drug free. Before that I was up to having a migraine about every couple of days. After I quit taking all the drugs they prescribed me, the headaches stopped!! I was taking ativan1mg. Twice a day, Lortab 10mg. Tabs 4xday, vicodin 5mg.tabs 3xday, Phenergan 25mg.tabs 4xday, Lunesta sleeping pills-supposed to be only once at night, but was taking them 2-3xday! I was taking too much medication for anyone to be taking!! So for the past two years I've been taking only the Suboxone , Phenergan for nausea and vomiting, and acifex for my acid reflux. I had my uterus removed a year after my last child was born 25 years ago because my uterus prolapsed after having such big babies. My last child weighed 10lbs., and I wasn't a big girl, I only weighed 105 prior to that pregnancy, 156lbs. At delivery. Anyhow, 25years later my bladder prolapsed too!! Ain't it just great being a woman? Ha!Ha! So I go into the hospital for a two night stay for the surgery. I stopped taking the Suboxone three days prior to my surgery. I did fine with the anesthesia during surgery, morphine IV post op, Percocet tabs after the morphine was stopped in hospital, and went home with 20 tabs of Vicodin which was to last me for a week at home, but I quit taking them after three days , waited another three days without taking anything, and then went back on the Suboxone and did fine with all of it. I was up front with my Suboxone doctor, my GYN doctor, and to this day I continue to take Suboxone everyday. I live a normal life, I feel fine, even good somedays!! And I continue to work as a nurse-LPN. It's kind of ironic though when I consider that for years I was taking narcotic pain meds just about everyday and still working just fine. I never had a problem with drug testing because they all knew about the narcotic pain meds I was taking for migraines. You would be surprised to know how many nurses have migraines and are taking narcotics for them. I have more trouble now taking the Suboxone and working. Before when I was tested I could continue to work even with narcotics in my system because it was on my records as needed for migraines. But now that I am taking a medication to prevent me from taking any narcotics, to prevent me from wanting to take any narcotics, and preventing me from getting any kind of buzz from any narcotic while taking the Suboxone, if it shows up on a random drug test I will be relieved of duty for it. Crazy huh?? I thought so!! Anyhow, back to you, I was given methadone once in my life for a migraine, if you can believe that!! I was so out of it from that drug that I couldn't function at all !!! For me, it was worse than all of the drugs combined. Drugs effect everyone differently. So my advice to you for your own safety would be to be honest with your methadone prescriber and your surgeon too! Explain to them why you are taking the methadone, why you need surgery, and they will come up with the best plan of care for you. The recovery time will be different for everyone , but for me, for the same surgery I was up and about three days after the surgery. I went back to work a week after the surgery and I felt fine. I hope that everything goes well for you! Let me know how you are doing! Nik