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My Opioid Addiction
MY OPIOID ADDICTION
My body is my major negative asset. I am riddled with pain. At a 5, 6 or 7 out of 10 on my pain scale, I still function normally, just living through it. At a 10, I suffer in bed. As a youth I had occasional, classic aural/nausea migraines. They became more frequent and less severe, till they morphed into chronic daily headaches. Knee pain resulted in a knee replacement. But arthritis continues to attack my lower back and neck. My piriformis muscles too, add to the relentless pain.
I probably saw a hundred medical practitioners from both traditional medicine,-pain or neurology specialists, to alternative treatment, from acupuncture to cupping. Nothing worked except drugs... especially when oxycodone was introduced to the medical market.
My doctor was very enthusiastic. There was a medical mantra they all bought into that was clearly promoted by the drug company.
They believed that there was a difference between those who used oxycodone for recreational use who could be addicted, but if used for pain and no high was experienced, you could not become addicted, you were only ‘dependent’. I never experienced any high on opioids.
Somehow it was assumed that ‘dependent’ was a mild issue that could be easily rectified if necessary. You could just quit anytime. I started with Percocets a few times a day. It soon was not enough. My doc prescribed Oxycontin. It was soon not enough.
A friend had a fentanyl patch. My doc said he only prescribed a patch for terminal cancer patients. He upped the Oxycontin dose... again... and again. I continued to complain of pain. Finally he added a fentanyl patch. I began taking 160 mg of combined Oxycontin and Percocets, plus the patch.
I was a drug addict. I remember driving up the Don Valley Parkway in Toronto, in bumper to bumper, stop and go, rush hour traffic, in a drug stupor. I fell asleep at a pause and was only awakened by car horns urging me to move on. It was time to stop.
A pain specialist advised moving into a residential rehab facility. I opted for the do-it-yourself option. I researched the process and decided to do it on my own. It took me 6 months to get off the opioids.
I asked my wife what it was like when I was getting off the drug. “You lost your mind. You kept saying to everyone you saw the Buddha on the road. You wandered up and down the beach at the cottage buttonholing people and talking nonsense and breaking down crying.”
My cottage neighbour, a doctor, who observed me in this state, called it ‘ebullient emotion’, typical when patients have strokes or when in shock. I burst into bouts of convulsive weeping without any reason. I did that frequently during my detox.
I reduced my dose by 5mg a week. It was agony. After a couple of months the detox twisted my mind. I was nearly mad. Even when I was down to 5mg per day it was excruciating. I wanted to give up and get a strong dose, but I persisted.
I remember talking to Laurie, a pharmacist at Shoppers Drug Mart in Penetanguishene and asked her if there was anything I could take to get me over the agony on my last 5mg.
She asked how much I had reduced from. “160mg and a fentanyl patch,” I replied.
“On your own?’ she asked, incredulously.
“Yes,” I said.
“That’s unheard of,” she said. Her face signalled shock.
Every time I hear one of many current statistical opioid stories on TV, I am reminded of my addiction and detox. For example: * There were 2833 opioid related deaths in Ontario last year. * In the USA, there were more than 70,200 overdose deaths in just 2017. More than 130 people died every day from opioid- related drug overdoses.
On TV as I wrote this, someone declared, “One hundred people die from gun violence in the USA every day”. 130 from opioids! 100 from gun violence! Are these not preventable?
I have been free of opioids for a few years now. The pain persists but I am better off than where I was. My wife had nightmares about my drugged period. “I thought we were going to lose you.” I am still here.
By the way, I really did see the Buddha on the road.
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@jdiakiw That sounds so much fun . And what an experience you have to remember now . My son wanted to do that buy got married instead . He would love to read your story. I,ll have to send him the website . Great story thanks for sharing .
Hello @jdiakiw,
Your mention of your annual walks without your usual pain reminded me of a video I saw of Michael J. Fox with Dr. Oz. In this video (the link posted below) during the time Michael is skating, his PD symptoms disappear completely. It just reminded me of your experience and I thought you might enjoy it.
https://www.oprah.com/own-health/michael-j-fox-goes-ice-skating-with-dr-oz-video
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2 Reactions@jimhd Thank you Jim. Helping others makes for helping ourselves. I need help from everyone in our group. It is so important to hear what each of us is saying.
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6 ReactionsWow - this group has become fun. I didn't expect to get tales of wild adventures in addition to excellent examples set by people who have years of first-hand experience with a condition that I'm fairly new with. Thank you all! Peggy
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2 Reactions@jdiakiw Hi there, Jerry! I just read your article! It blew me away! Were you a writing teacher? You write with such eloquence. A joy to read. Thanks for sharing...Lori Renee
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1 Reaction@jdiakiw I am a chronic pain person too, and just got a DRG stimulator to block pain signals to my brain. However, after several tries of different companies, I happened upon ethanaturals.com It is a Kratom company, approved by the American Kratom Association. I swear by their Kratom, and use it about every other day for severe pain. The stuff works!!!! Lots of cheap crap Kratom does not. Just wanted to share this with you.....best of luck to you, Jerry..... Lori
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1 ReactionThat’s funny. Me, a writer is very strange. All my school life there was more red ink on my essays than my own ink. I am totally incapable of reviewing editing etc. I have to move on. No matter what. Same reason I don’t buy footwear with laces. Got to move on.
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1 ReactionOddly I did write about the wrong way to teach writing. "You can’t learn to write by rote" if interested
https://diakiwsdigest.wordpress.com/2016/02/
I am proud of the piece I recently posted in the group here called "aging well". A piece I called ‘thinking about death "
My Opiod addiction part 2
I lived a while without any painkillers and was in pain most days. My back and neck particularly. My family doc, who prescribed the oxides and fentanyl patch told me that a new synthetic opiate was available that was not all that addictive. They were a great relief for a while. I think I was taking the 300mg slow release version. They were wonderful . . . For awhile . I then took tylenol 2 s, which are available over the counter in Canada. And slowly upped them as pain persisted. I realized I was right back where I started. My docs attitude was you are 84 get riot the pain any way you can to enjoy your last days. So what if we have to increase the dose.
I returned to my pain specialist I sent my part 1 story to. My debilitating pain was chronic daily headaches, especially. The theory as it goe is the audio album classic headaches of my teens and 20s increased in frequency and reduced severity . If my functional pain was a 7, I worked normally, constantly aware of pain. At a 9/10 I had to lay down in bed and wait out the severity . The 9/10s became 4 or 5 times a week. He diagnosed me as having transformed migraines and MOH or Medicine Overuse Headaches. The plan he offered was to get off all pain meds and hope I reverted back to classic migraines which he claimed occurred normally except with patients with a long history of transformed migraines. That’s me. He supervised my withdrawal veeeeery slowly, a reduction only every 3 or 4 weeks. I got off the codeine in the Tylenol and the tramadol. It was awful . Some detox easily and others not so. I am the latter. Every ache in my body exploded. I tried vaping mj and tried kratom with no effect from either. I researched the web and identified two drugs used for my condition, Topomax and amytrypilene. When I my doc for one to try he explained that if there was improvement we wouldn’t know whether it was MOH or other cause. I said, try me. I started with topomax because he would’t prescribe amytriptylene, his preference until my heart specialist okayed it. But he was away for a month. So I took topomax and got very ill from it. When my heart guy came home he okayed amytriptylene. I titrated 10 mg a week up to 80 mg a day. Somewhere along that process my headaches disappeared for the first time in 60 years. My back and neck pain were much reduced. Bit bit bit the headaches returned, though. But nowhere near where they were before. He suggested I try weaning off amytriptylene as there is an dementia connection. Out of 100 seniors. 10 will get dementia , out of 100 on amytriptylene. 13 will get dimentia. I tried weaning but pain came back again. I’m a work in progress I was hoping to revert back to a classic severe migraine because they are so much more treatable today . No such luck. But I am in a much better place with pain than for years