The Devil We Know

By K. Grahame, Guest Columnist

I was on opioid medication for over 10 years as treatment for acute and chronic pain in 27 diagnosed pain conditions, including herniated lumbar discs, arthritis, spinal stenosis, and torn muscles and tendons in my lower back. 

Now I've been involuntarily taken off opioids by my pharmacy. Guess what? There is NOTHING available that treats pain like opioids.

I am 66. The pain has driven my blood pressure up into the 200/90 range, and since I've already had both heart surgery and malignant melanoma surgery, I'm on so much blood pressure medication that I cannot walk.

The government would not let a human treat a dog like this. The rest of my life looks, at this point, to be short and a piece of hell, thanks to the media blitz on 67,000 annual overdose deaths -- of which only 17,000 were overdoses from prescription opioids. That’s fewer deaths than happen from common falls in the home.

While I'm at it, there were 72,000 alcohol related deaths in 2017. And the Surgeon General estimates that 440,000 people die every year from tobacco-related health conditions. Where are you, FDA and CDC on that?

The reason I care about this so much is not only how it affects my life. In 1978, my mother died in mortal agony from bone cancer, without much in the way of painkillers. The hospital refused repeatedly to give her opioids for pain relief because they were afraid she’d become addicted!

I watched the angel of my life pass away looking like a victim of Nazi Germany death camps, after she begged me to find something that she could poison herself with.

God in heaven, nobody should have to watch someone they love beg them for death! It simply boggles my mind that this is happening in America.

I'm going to die soon, most likely of a heart attack or stroke, and that's what will show on my death certificate. It won't show that I was doing just fine, taking care of myself and the pets who are the joy of my life, while I was taking opioids. The only side effect I had to deal with was constipation, and a GI doctor fixed that for me with simple OTC meds.

I don’t really want to die before my pets, but this ain’t living, people!

The government should be outed as the killers they are, because it sure as hell isn't the legally prescribed and supervised opioids. As for the 17,000 people that died from prescription opioids in 2017, the stats aren't available on how many were deliberate overdoses, if alcohol or other substances were involved, or even if they had a prescription.

Those stats should be provided, because that information should make a BIG difference in how the governments, state and federal, make their decisions.

Please don’t tell me that cognitive behavioral therapy or hypnosis are going to cure the pain in my much-damaged back. Or the arthritis, tendonitis and bursitis. Or the pain from my cancer surgery-severed nerves.

There is just so much to tell people that isn’t known or hasn’t been communicated. It’s the devil you know versus the devil you don’t. I really do think the devil we know is trying to reduce the expensive medical costs associated with the Boomer generation. What happens when death is made cost-effective for the government?

Pain News Network invites other readers to share their stories with us. Send them to editor@painnewsnetwork.org.