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GUEST COLUMN
With prescription, new form of pain
By BRIAN CLARK
Thinking of taking OxyContin? Think twice.
I hesitate to say so because a great many individuals in this country who suffer from debilitating chronic pain are not adequately treated. I do not wish to add to the burden of those who might need the drug. But it took me to the deepest depths of misery and despair.
After injuring my back in an automobile accident, I took less powerful, less potent pain medications as needed for several years, without incident, prior to reading an article about OxyContin in The New York Times. Intrigued, I talked to my doctor about switching. I quickly learned how different OxyContin is.
It is difficult if not impossible to get a doctor to give you enough of the less potent pain medications for you to become addicted. But one can walk out of their local doctor's office with more than enough OxyContin to do the job because of the significantly higher levels of narcotics present. Thirty tiny OxyContin tablets can be as potent as 480 Vicodins.
The practical effect for me was that I became more promiscuous in my use. Before, I saved my medications for all but the most severe pain, as I hated having to ask my doctor for more. With a more potent medication, I exercised progressively less discretion.
Soon, my conscience did begin to kick in. There was an alarm going off in my head and a very stern voice in there saying: "VERY BAD IDEA!" But by then I had achieved physical dependence. I was addicted.
Ashamed and completely alone -- by my own choosing -- I began looking for the easiest way out. I tried to follow my doctor's advice and taper down gradually. But I always reached a point at which my body seemed to refuse to go any lower.
It wasn't really a matter of willpower. My body seemingly needed something as much as it needed food and water. So I then researched rapid detox and a less addictive substitute -- buprenorphine -- and anything else that could get me out of this jam.
I now realize though that the single greatest misconception I had was that getting through the physical withdrawals would solve the problem. Withdrawal involves acute muscle pain, sweats, chills, vomiting and hyper anxiety.
Horrible as they are, far, far worse are the insomnia, profound depression and lethargy that linger long after the withdrawal ends. I didn't sleep for weeks. Compounding this is an indescribable lethargy and depression for which, as far as I know, there is no known treatment.
In fact, depression doesn't adequately describe it. It felt as if I was completely dead spiritually and emotionally. It seemed that getting out of a chair required more effort than I could muster.
It felt as if there was glue in my brain and my thoughts were traveling at a fraction of their normal speeds. It felt absolutely joyless and unfathomably bleak. Most of all, it felt as if it would never stop.
Invariably, I would reach my breaking point and would take the one and only thing I knew for certain would instantly snap me out of it. I hated myself, of course; but in my clouded thinking I saw no other way, which I suppose is the textbook definition of addiction. This cycle continued, each time exponentially more horrible than the last. For me, this stuff seemed insurmountably hard to kick. I felt for certain I'd be taking it for the rest of my life.
I suspect a great many relapses happen exactly the same way. And I had countless rationalizations to support my insanity: I'd seen so many "normal" people on TV taking this drug therapeutically. I never took more than prescribed. My usage was significantly less than others'. There was no way I was an addict.
Outwardly, I suppose, I seemed like a fairly normal guy: family, mortgage and minivan. I do know for certain that despite all of the wonderful gifts for which I had to live, OxyContin took me to a place where I lost all perspective.
Like radio commentator Rush Limbaugh, I kept my addiction a secret. I felt my life, as I knew it, would end if I told anyone.
Astonishingly, the day I told my wife and employer was the day I began the process of reclamation.
This is my experience, nothing more. It is nobody's fault but mine. For many, this medication is a gift from God. For me, it ended up being a deadly dance with the devil.
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