New and Desperate

[Andre819]

Hi. I am a 44 year old woman who had 2 back surgeries in 2008. My last one was in November and I was given Norco. I know that I should be feelng better by now but every time I try to stop taking it the pain in my legs is excruciating! I know that I need to stop taking it but I just don't know how I'll be able to handle life without it. I hate being dependent on it. Sometimes I feel like I am the weakest human being alive and very ashamed of how weak I am. I wish that someone could help me. It's so creepy how I start to feel when my pills start to run out. It scares me! Does anyone know how I feel? Thanks, Hopeful

[CarolD]

Welcome to SR....

You feel panic when your running low on your drug?
Sure...many of us can relate to that.

It's always a wise move to see your doctor
and be completely honest ....before abruptly quitting anything.

Best of luck...

[DesertEyes]

Hello there Andre, and pleased to "meet" you

I agree, it's time to see your Doc and get them to help you out. There are tons of other meds, and all kinds of new procedures that can help you. Unless you tell them, they have no way of helping you.

Mike

[MROBI]

yes talk to dr.

[riverman]

Originally Posted by Andre819

Sometimes I feel like I am the weakest human being alive and very ashamed of how weak I am. I wish that someone could help me. It's so creepy how I start to feel when my pills start to run out. It scares me! Does anyone know how I feel? Thanks, Hopeful

I DO!!!!

No need to beat your self up what you are feeling is normal, all of it, the pain, guilt, confusion etc.. I know I've been there so many times.

You've already received some good suggestions here so use a couple and keep coming back.

Take care & be well!

[hiding]

Hi Andre

It's been 3 years since I had fusion surgery on my L5/S1 and I'm still on a mix of painkillers. Among other things, I'm still on a high dose of tramadol but have slowly reduced the morphine. These things take time and a huge amount of patience (never my strong suit)! Please, please don't put pressure on yourself to be fixed by a certain date. It's frustrating and I know I found it really hard to listen to my body at first but slow and steady is best in the long term.

Whatever else, you're probably physically addicted so lowering the dose needs to be gradual to deal with that, regardless of any phychological addiction. My gp reminded me that there is a difference between fearing the pain and being psychologically addicted to the drugs (we agreed at an early stage that I don't have the right personality time to get addicted to morphine anyway - probably a good thing in the circumstances!). I fear the pain and fear running out of painkillers for that reason. I'm really careful about filling my prescriptions on time because every so often I do miss a dose. It hurts most of the time but it hurts like hell then. Why wouldn't you be focused on managing the one thing that helps with the pain? That said, I know that I don't need or want the drugs for any other reason so I keep taking baby steps

What's really helped is a good, sensible gp. This might be really obvious but it's worked for me so here goes! My two priorities for long term progress:
a) keep the pain low enough to function through the use of painkillers
b) work hard on the rehab to improve my strength
As my strength improves I test my boundaries every so often but I don't worry if I don't feel ready yet. My gp prescribes a slightly lower dose of morphine. I test it for a while (sometimes on really complicated routines I have to track through a diary), ignoring the withdrawal (crying, feeling like I'm going to sneeze but not (weird and dangerous if I'm driving) and falling asleep at inconvenient moments (ditto) - fun!) and focusing on whether I can to cope with the new level of pain or not.

I'm taking the same approach to work hours & exercise - it really is a baby steps thing. Just so long as you're moving forward, you're doing good. For that matter, not needing more is a good sign. I think it's the same with norco - when I couldn't drop the morphine, my gp reminded me that if I wasn't getting better I'd need to increase it. Keeping it stable wasn't perfect, but it was progress. Give yourself a pat on the back if your dose hasn't increased!

If your doctor's any good, you should be able to have an honest conversation. If not I'd consider trying to find someone you trust but I'm really picky about doctors!

Hope that helps. Wishing you all the best.

[hiding]

I realised when I read this back that it might have seemed really blasé, you know, 'don't worry, you'll be fine' and I thought maybe I should clarify a couple of things (in another very long post – sorry for that). I don't know whether you've been through addiction before. I haven't so maybe I'm missing something.

The other thing is about social pressures and pain. Until the surgery I constantly felt guilty that I couldn't function 'normally' through the pain. I thought a mentally stronger person would get it together and be able to work. Pain's subjective and only people who've suffered from chronic pain can have a clue what it's like so I guess that attitude's not surprising. It changed things alot when I got the closest thing to an objective opinion I'm ever going to get. Apparently (thank God I don't remember it) I came round from surgery screaming in pain. My very experienced surgeon was terrified by my reaction. Afterwards, he told me about it and said that he and the anaesthetist (who fortunately had treated me before and was expecting a pretty extreme reaction) decided I must have both a very low pain threshold and a very high tolerance for painkillers – a bad combo. I can't remember it and had no conscious control over my reaction so I know now that I couldn't have influenced an instinctive reaction to the pain - I am actually weird in a physical sense.

Might sound odd, but that feels a lot better than thinking I'm weird because other people would cope in my situation. I feel lucky to have found that out (even if I'm not lucky that I'm built that way). That said, I've also come to accept I might never be totally free of painkillers. I'll keep working towards that goal but it might not be possible. We'll see.

It's hard to cope with the pressure to be well and be normal. Especially if it's something like back pain when people are forever saying 'oh I know exactly how you feel. I overdid it in the garden at the weekend and now I'm really aching'. Huh? You know how I feel from that?! Even now, I get defensive about the fact that I work part time. I feel like people are judging me and think I'm lazy because I haven't made it to 'normal' yet. That feeling is partly because I assume people think the worst of me but I think it's pretty common to chronic pain sufferers anyway.

On my less paranoid days, I feel proud enough of having come this far and annoyed enough by people who say things like that to think of the Depeche Mode song, Walking in my shoes. I've always assumed that it's about the singer's battle with heroin addiction but it sticks with me because the lyrics include “Now I'm not looking for absolution, Forgiveness for the things I do, But before you come to any conclusions, Try walking in my shoes, You'll stumble in my footsteps, Keep the same appointments I kept, If you try walking in my shoes.”

A lot of us are walking in your shoes or in shoes very like them. You're not alone so please don't feel as if you are.