Why do people take drugs? ITS THE PAIN STUPID!

[Taverner]

It always amazes me when people don't get it.

People who use drugs, whether they be aspirin, tylenol, ibuprofen, caffeine, nicotine, alcohol, valium, xanax, welbutrin, effexor, zoloft, lithium, codine, vicodin, morphine, heroin, crack, cocaine, whippets, mescaline, LSD, opium, XTC or sniffing glue do it for one reason. The pain.

To be alive is to suffer, said Buddha.

Its also why we buy stuff, overeat or gamble.

It takes us away from the pain. Whether its emotional or physical. It either distracts us from the pain, or removes the pain.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

1. There's one in GD...

saying we shouldn't use drugs because we shouldn't get sick in the first place.

[lightningandsnow]

4. Geez, that's wonderful.

I'll remember that the next time I get strep throat.

:sarcasm:

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

5. It's that reason I'm against seat belts.

I don't think people should get in car accidents.

[Connonym]

16. that made me giggle n/t

[TZ]

9. Hmm

Sounds eerily familiar to a certain person who seems to be trying to correct the skeptics on the "error" of their ways....
Of course I am only saying that because thats what my company issued tool kit tells me to say...:crazy:

[Elidor]

2. That title is the official DU Lounge Zen Koan of the day

Declared by me because...well, no one else has declared one yet, and it's so true.

[Lyric]

3. Addicts are an easy way to satisfy society's need to Judge.

Kinda like fat people, addicts are considered fair game and easy targets.

I feel a lot of compassion for them. Much like suicide, addiction occurs when Pain outweighs a person's Coping Methods for Pain. Sometimes it's emotional pain, and (all too often) it's purely physical pain that isn't being properly treated. I have known quite a few people who have used unprescribed pain pills, for example, and with the exception of two who use purely for "the high", all of the others were treating pain that their doctors either didn't believe, or refused to properly treat.

One of the most responsible people I've ever known used to (illegally) buy Vicodin once or twice a month and take teensy "maintenance" doses to self-treat her fibromyalgia and herniated disc pain. Her doctors either refused to prescribe it, or dicked her around for years with medications that simply did not work (like Lexapro for fibromyalgia.) Was she addicted? I don't think so. She didn't increase her dose over time, she went "off" for a week every month to reset her tolerance, and she went for three years using 20 pills a month. That averages to less than one a day, when the usual dose is 1-2 every 4-6 hours. But she'd have gone to jail if anyone had ever found out, and nobody would have cared that her doctors were at least partly to blame. She'd have been branded a "drug abuser" without any further question.

There is a serious problem in this country when people who are honestly and sincerely in constant pain are left to suffer because their physicians are too frightened of the DEA to prescribe the medications they need to function and have a decent quality of life.

[Taverner]

6. And there are some physical pains that cannot be treated

Say back pain. What do you do if you ruptured a disk or two? Surgery? 50% chance of fixing the problem, 10% chance of making it worse.

Chiropractory? Well it works for about 1 hour, and then you do things and it hurts again.

Physical Therapy? That's great to make a body mobile where it wasn't previously, and keeping physically fit definitely helps - but its not a cure all.

Drugs are not a moral issue.

[skygazer]

7. Then there's the insanity of worrying about addiction in the dying

My aunt's doctors gave her husband a hard time about the amount of morphine she was getting when she was dying of cancer and in constant, severe pain. :wtf:

The woman was DYING! Who cares if she's addicted? She was going to kick the habit in the most final possible way.

[Redstone]

8. Fuck, yes, that's Simon-pure, deliberate cruelty. And how many hospice nurses risk

their careers by mixing up Brompton's Cocktails to ease their patients' suffering?

They're angels, each and every one.

(This message brought to you by one of the Pain People.)

Redstone

[Lyric]

11. Worrying about addiction in terminal patients is stupid. But worrying about

tolerance is another matter. When my step-grandmother was dying of lung cancer (not a smoker, just migrated breast cancer) her docs were worried that because she was taking so much morphine, she'd become tolerant to it, and it would stop working by the time she needed it most.

Still, there are more powerful pain meds than morphine. If a patient becomes morphine-tolerant, move on to something else. Don't make people suffer. Especially not dying people.

[Redstone]

10. Yes. Can we ask ourselves why it's OK to be dependent on insulin if you have diabetes,

but NOT okay to be dependent on opioids to keep you functional if you have chronic pain?

Redstone

[Lyric]

13. Because insulin doesn't make you "high", of course.

Never mind the fact that people who take doses of opioid pain medications regularly generally lose the "euphoric" feeling pretty fast. Like the person I was talking about above; one-eighth of a Vicodin pill every 6 hours isn't going to make ANYBODY "high". But it *is* enough to dim the constant background pain enough to function.

There was a guy down in Florida not long ago who was wheelchair-bound with a muscular issue (MS, I think?) Anyway, he was buying Percocet to deal with the pain of it because he'd moved, and couldn't reach his regular doc. He wound up getting busted and sent off to prison...where the prison promptly put him on a morphine pump full-time.

The level of paranoia about opiates in America is dangerous, and it ruins people lives. Ruins. Lives. People who would otherwise be perfectly functional and happy get to sit around or stay in bed all day, every day, in agony, because they are denied the very medication that eases the pain enough for daily functioning.

Here's another infuriating irony; there's an alarming rise in the number of people overdosing on Tylenol because the government insists that drugs like Vicodin must contain a certain amount of Tylenol...not just because Tylenol is good for pain, but more because putting Tylenol in these pills is a deterrent to abuse. Tylenol is lethal at high doses, and liver-damaging even at normal doses over an extended period of time. People in America DIE because the government wants to "deter drug abuse."

The government is terrified that if people don't have to depend SOLELY on the government's approval (via prescription) in order to obtain pain relief, they might stop being properly fearful of pissing off said government.

[Redstone]

14. Man, do you GET IT. Chronic pain rewires your brain so that you don't GET stoned

from opiates.

May I quote a magnificent sentence from your post?

"The level of paranoia about opiates in America is dangerous, and it ruins people lives. Ruins. Lives. People who would otherwise be perfectly functional and happy get to sit around or stay in bed all day, every day, in agony, because they are denied the very medication that eases the pain enough for daily functioning."

You indeed GET IT. Thank you in no small measure from one of the Pain People. (And yes, I've had to argue to get medicine with the smallest ratio of Tylenol to opiates.)

Redstone

[Lyric]

15. I get it because I live it too.

I have psoriatic arthritis, fibromyalgia, endometriosis, and back problems. I am prescribed pain medication for precisely *none* of those conditions. Believe me sweetness, I get it. :hug:

[Redstone]

17. Good God, do I feel bad for you. I'm damn lucky that I'm able to get enough

Vicodin EX to be able to take then edge off the pain just enough that I can work 20 hours a week or so.

Mind you, it's not enough to actually STOP the pain, but God help me if I were to ask for anything more...I'd be branded as one of those Evil Drug Seekers.

Redstone

[Carnea]

32. Because nannies on both sides if the aisle want to control your body...

Obviously is you are in pain the pain medications don't get you high.

But what if they do big fucking whup...

It's the same assholes that took the hatchets to the liquor bottles in the twenties and pass increasingly stringent and weird drunk diving laws.

Fucking Puritans.

[Throd]

12. It's the only way I can get that crazed squirrel that lives in my skull to take a nap.

I gotta soak that little fucker in beer or something else from time to time.

[triguy46]

18. Here's Dickens' take on it:

Gin-drinking is a great vice in
England, but wretchedness and dirt are a greater; and until you
improve the homes of the poor, or persuade a half-famished wretch
not to seek relief in the temporary oblivion of his own misery,
with the pittance which, divided among his family, would furnish a
morsel of bread for each, gin-shops will increase in number and
splendour. If Temperance Societies would suggest an antidote
against hunger, filth, and foul air, or could establish
dispensaries for the gratuitous distribution of bottles of Lethe-
water, gin-palaces would be numbered among the things that were.

[ismnotwasm]

19. Not me dude

Back in the day, I wasn't feeling no pain. It was just the life. It was a lot of fun sometimes you know?

Those days are long gone and not regretted.

[davsand]

20. I think Insomnia is another reason for drug use.

Try going without sleep for very long and see how quick you are to reach for chemical assistance. The Antihistamine stuff just does NOT get the job done (actually creates a rebound if you do use it for too long) and mentally humans can only go for so long without sleep. My doc is saying I need to go off the Xanax I take at night, and I have NO idea what I'll do to get some sleep.

Ambien and all the other sleep pills are not an option, really, because they can deliver some pretty awful side effects (Ambien actually made me hallucinate and have panic attacks during the day!) The herbal stuff is an absolute waste of my time and cash--I have a cabinet full of different stuff I have tried including Valerian, Kava, and Melatonin.

There have been nights where a bottle of scotch or a joint seemed like a pretty attractive alternative to being awake all night. I can easily see how somebody could be tired enough to go buy a narcotic just to get some sleep.

I am in NO way comparing the issue of insomnia to chronic pain, but I am convinced that it IS a contributing factor to some of the drug use.


Laura

[ileus]

21. because the don't have jobs or don't want a job.

Being in the medical industry I've learned first hand 90% of drug seekers want to avoid labor at any cost.

[Taverner]

22. I work. I seek pain relief.

I want to work.

I also want the pain to fucking stop, whatever it is.

[Rhythm]

36. I'm willing to wager, however, that it is a tiny minority of people who are purely 'drug seekers'

for the purposes you mention. The vast majority are people living day to day in life-altering pain; unable to live up to their potential because of seriously lacking pain-management on the part of their doctors.

[SPKrazy]

23. Its when the pain CAUSED by the overindulgence is greater than the original pain

that it ceases to make sense, even the Buddha would have said that attachment is not a good thing.

So while drugs and actions may decrease pain... in some people, at some point, the pain caused by the drug or action exceeds the pain it was originally being used to get away from. At that point, in Western society, we call it an addiction.

An addiction has neurochemical correlates as well as psychological correlates.

Certain neurochemicals, or neurohormones if you will, are involved in the brain being able to take a substance and get "high" from it, or escape pain. There is evidence that some activities ie gambling, sexual activity, etc. also can alter brain chemistry, not to mention that some people use certain substances with certain activities to enhance the high either direction. (Cocaine and sex, alcohol and gambling, etc,)

Okay, simply put, addiction or attachment if you will, has both psychological and physiological correlates. It also has in fact what one might call spiritual correlates as one can "make" a substance or activity, their "higher power" or the thing that does it for them. For some this might be drinking alcohol. For some this might be cocaine. For some this might be sexual activity (I mean who doesn't like sex, but this is more than just 'liking sex') or gambling. So this "higher power" has a significance in that it begins to be thought of as the answer to whatever question is bother a person. "I've had a bad day" so I drink. "I've had a good day" so I celebrate with drink. Change the equation to fit anything and you see where I'm coming from. Brain chemistry and psychological/spiritual feel goods are interrelated and often have the same causation or reinforcing causations as well.

Babble babble babble on, and my point:

Drugs for pain, yes. When pain exceeds drugs or activities, addiction.

:shrug:

[Taverner]

24. I dunno - I measure addiction by a different yardstick

Is it causing physical harm?

[SPKrazy]

25. Physical harm, emotional harm, etc.

Having worked in the addiction treatment field for 10 years or so before doing purely mental health, I would have to say that something is a problem, when the person doing it says it is. Then if they can't quit, then they can't quit and need some kind of help.

It isn't always physical harm. My gawdess, if that were the case, then all we would see is really low bottom drunks and addicts, but in fact people are able to get help in earlier stages of their respective addictions despite the fact that there is little "technology" that has ever been developed to help addicts when I can think of computer software desensitizing programs that could be developed to help addicts who are at high risk. For example, crack addicts tend to have solidly measurable physiological responses to seeing their drug of choice. They have extreme reactions of a psychophysiological nature. I would venture to guess that all addicts of whatever brand of drug or activity that they are addicted to have measurable responses. If you could hook people up to blood pressure, pulse rate, and galvanic skin response reactions, you could do a great deal to help them deal with the reactions they are having to just seeing the drug or pictures of it or of people using it or doing it.

EEG biofeedback would offer even more possibilities and there are some people using that for relapse prevention, but I'm talking much less expensive equipment and measurement devices that are simpler.

All right, I'm off topic again.

I would guess the Buddha would say attachment is first and foremost, emotional and or spiritual in nature, right?

attachment = addiction for all practical purposes in many cases.

Why would someone have to wait until they had physical harm before they realized they had a problem?

Honestly, and no offense to you, but that makes no sense in light of the little we know about addiction to categorize defining it that way.

[skygazer]

30. Well, I would say SPK has a very good point actually

There are different types of pains, and different types of drugs, and there are different types of addictions.

For instance, I began using some pretty gnarly street drugs because I was in total despair, trapped in a relationship with a man I was afraid of, who hurt me, who threatened to kill me and who I was afraid to leave because I knew he would track me down and carry out all his threats.

I hid in drug and alcohol use, not uncommon for battered women. You have to find some peace somewhere.

But I ended up drowning in an addiction that I finally realized had the potential to kill me. Kicking the addiction damn near killed me.

When I began using, the drugs helped me make it through the day. I was using so I could function. By the time I quit, I was no longer functioning; my life was wrapped up entirely in where I was going to get my next fix. And I required that next fix sooner and sooner.

So yeah, I was certainly suffering physical harm, the addiction had superceded the pain it was originally taken for and I was in big trouble.

Your point that addictions are almost always caused by pain is right on, but it is also true that the addiction can become a very big problem as well.

[Schema Thing]

26. I'm more inclined to say "it's the pleasure"

I don't agree that pain, or suffering <i>is</i> life.

[CreekDog]

27. It makes the teevee funnier

:rofl: :smoke:

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

28. When a GWB speech sounds like wisdom

then it's time to cut back.
:rofl:

When you got pain, drugs are a godsend. So far (knock on wood) my pains have been due to injuries, so they're temporary. I'd have been in more trouble without demerol, vicodin, etc. Even novocain, for the occasional dental procedure.

"kicking" demerol was pretty bad. not nearly as bad as kicking nicotine, though.

Back to the OP: wishing you the best, Taverner.
:hi:

[Shell Beau]

29. Some people are just curious.

[LynneSin]

31. So why does one take Viagara? There is no pain involved with not getting a hard-on

:shrug:

[Dogtown]

34. OBVIOUSLY

you know not of that which you speak!

:+

that would count as *emotional* pain, but i'm merely guessing, o/c!

[redqueen]

33. Thanks, Nancy. The anti-drug hysteria is still with us.

I know it was around before those fucking evil scumbags... but they made it fashionable. :puke:

[Orsino]

35. That's a very broad definition of pain...

...that includes insufficient fun and perceived need.

[Taverner]

37. Pain is anomie - disconnect - even boredom

Levels you can live with, however, are different