My name is Brian K Freberg and I'm an addict. 4 years ago I was diagnosed with bi-latteral forminal stenosis, cervical ridiculopothy, severe degeneration of my c3,4 and 5. I had bulging discs" meaning the liquid was popping out the sides of what was remaining of my very broken discs. I went to my doctor for help because I needed relief. Relief from no sleep, relief from the grueling and constant pain radiating from the center of my back all the way up through my neck with constant nerve pain shooting all the way down my left arm into my very numb fingertips . Who would have ever thought 90 oxycontin monthly which is a very strong 12 hour time release pain medication and a fast acting roxycodone "120 pills" wouldn't be enough? Not me. In the beginning those pills lasted almost the whole month. During the next year, they went faster and faster, leaving me in an absolute state of physical, psychological and chemical withdrawl. So I did what any normal person would do and told my doctor who kept adjusting the pain medication to a larger dosage. Why wouldn't I have trust in this person who had a medical degree?
You see, in the beginning I had no educational understanding of what was happening to me on a very psychological and physiologically fundamental level. I trusted the doctors and I believed them when they said I would not get addicted, because why wouldn't I believe this person with 15 years of education? The doctors never told me that these drugs we're going to hijack my brain. That they would rob me of the necessary chemicals to feel even the least bit of happiness unless I took another pill. They didn't tell me that I would be anxious and angry all the time and with the most soul crushing depression a human can face or that I would become a slave to these drugs and be stigmatized by every person around me that didn't understand. That I would not sleep through the night because i would wake up to horrible withdrawl symptoms and that I would need them just to wake up in the morning more than I needed a cup of coffee. They didn't tell me that I would feel sick all of the time and they didn't tell me that when I stopped it would be the single most difficult thing I had ever done in my 38 years of life.
Little by little and month by month as each prescription was swallowed, I sank deeper and deeper into oblivion. The doctors promised help through pointless procedures, such as at least eight or nine epidurals. They took a 17 gauge needle and plunged it into my spine all with the promise of relief. They performed procedures called radiofrequency ablation to burn the offending nerves so they would die, all causing even more nerve damage and constant chronic pain. All with the promise of relief. Nothing worked. Nerve conduction tests were done over and over again as well as useless MRI'S. I say useless because they knew after the first MRI that surgery was necessary.
But let me ask you a question. Why would a doctor who is prescribing pain medication offer a suggestion of surgery when every month they get to prescribe a lot more of the medication, do unnecessary procedures and line their pockets to buy their next house or Mercedes Benz? This is a sad but very true reality of the world and climate we currently live in. I didn't ask to become an addict, I was sold a faulty bill of goods.
My education through this has been the single most profound tool at my disposal. I needed to understand what was happening to me in order to get free of this nightmare.
You see, after I finally had the surgery, the surgery I should have had to begin with. I asked my doctors for help in the withdrawal process "trusting them again" but desperate for help. Their answer was to either increase the doses of my current drugs or I should take either methadone or Suboxone. Neither of which were appealing, but as an addict I didn't want to be so sick that I would have rathered die then be faced with that dilemma. Please let me explain.
Day 1-5...Flu symptoms worse than any flu you have ever experience in your life. A restlessness in your entire body which can only be described as electricity running through every nerve in your entire Central Nervous system. Legs kicking and arms flailing. Your freezing in such a way as to describe it as being put outside in 30 degree weather without any clothes on and yet your sweating. Your hypothalamus has failed you!!! Diareah so bad that it can only be described as peeing out of your rectum every 2-5 minutes, so aware of the passage of time that your literally counting each second as though its an eternity. I lost 10 pounds in 2 days. Healthy, right ? But wait, it gets worse. You feel so emotionally wrecked because guess what, as it turns out we need dopamine and endorphins in order to feel happy and not sad. Depression worse then anything you have ever felt before in your life. As though all of the color drained out of life and their is nothing left to live for. Lets not forget about the anxiety which is because adrenaline is absolutely pumping through your body, leaving you incapable of one moments worth of sleep or rest and you feel the most incredible pain because your brain doesn't know how to produce endorphins " a natural pain blocker" and dopamine. The insomnia is the worst. I didn't sleep for almost 20 days.
And so I took the suboxone for 5 and a half month's. Well guess what. One day I asked him to lower my dose of the new "miracle drug" called suboxone. I came to the appointment armed with 4 year's of grueling research and a pool of knowledge that probably was more understood by me, "the lowly peon" without a degree then by this legal drug dealer. He wanted no part of this and from that moment on I knew I needed to take complete control. He didn't care and so I needed to stay in the drivers seat with my only tool and that's called education. I spent hours a day doing homework, taking notes and looking for ways to break these horrible chain of catastrophic rinse and repeat events and that is when I got the news that my insurance was dropping me. And that my doctor "supplier" was letting me go as his patient. I needed a plan and fast before I ran out of my suboxone entirely. With my new insurance I thought I could by more time. So I started calling other suboxone providers and out of the 45 doctors I called, would you believe that not one accepted my privately owned insurance ? Well believe it. They all wanted cash.
Lets put that into perspective. Suboxone doctors can only take 100 patients a month and they only accept cash at 200 dollars a visit twice monthly. That's 40,000 dollars a month for these untrained doctors who are not addiction specialists. But I digress, they care right ? Wrong!!!
It's a trap that millions of people fall pray to every year. 56,000 American's died last year becsuse of this epidemic. That's more than car accidents and gunshot victims combined and its because they were lied to.
The worst part is the post acute withdrawl syndrome which last for up to 2 years as our brains heal. I'm almost 4 months clean. Everyday is a fight kicking and screaming. But it does get better. This is my abridged version. I could write a book. The best thing people can do is to arm themselves with the truth. Knowledge is power.