How long can I take co-codamol before it starts to affect my body?

If I getting you right you're asking how long you need to take it before you get physically dependent on the drug and have to worry about being addicted. Right? A couple weeks of daily dosing will usually do it to the point you could get sick if you stopped suddenly. That not addiction, though. It's physically dependent, but no more so than most drugs. There's a bunch of drugs that require slowly weaning the dose down to avoid nasty side effects.

Addiction is when a person continues a behavior that they know is harmful. That's how you get gambling addiction and internet addiction. If someone compels themselves to do something harmful, they are making a choice, conscious or not.

Don't tear yourself up worrying about addiction. People who have actual pain rarely end up abusing drugs, far less than 1% of them ( 0.17% on the highest end of the figure.) So take as prescribed and never cold turkey. Doctors know this but sometimes don't remember. You may need to remind him, cause cold turkey rarely works and they can do a lot to help any illness you may feel. Do those 2 things and you will be fine.

I was advised when I had problems with my foot to take no more than two or three a week for a maximum of two weeks. Then if the pain continued to go back to the doctor.

For some reason, he also gave me 100 tablets, so I still have most of them in my drawer.