And a few brief minutes becomes a few days. I apologize for the time dilation.
So we know pain can take on many different forms. We know that pain is this abstract concept. As I stated about "love", pain is also a concept that denies any real verbal definition yet we don't need one, as we all know first-hand exactly what it is, even if we can't explain in. Pain can be physical. Pain can be psychological. We know that through the psychosomatic loop, these two interact with and influence one another constantly.
I'm obviously not a doctor or a scientist. I think I know enough about the basics to discuss this without making a fool of myself.
I used the analogy of a person in pain, let's just call it physical pain for this example. Anything "pleasurable", that is, that releases Dopamine and other pleasurable neurotransmitters has the ability to reduce our subjective feelings of pain. A person who is able to watch their favorite movie, listen to music that inspires them or who is among people who care about them are going to report lower subjective levels of pain. My understanding is that this process is largely the release of the neurotransmitter Dopamine, the "pleasure chemical" as they say.
I think when people start discussing Opioids as "painkillers" and especially after studying their effects, it's easy to assume that Opioids are the alpha and omega of pain relief. They are definitely the gold standard/true north when it comes to the relief of both physical and mental pain. Opioids like Morphine mimic the same chemicals in our bodies that are released in response to pain/stress.
Amphetamines, in doses that could be considered "therapeutic", are known to make previously boring, uninteresting topics seem more appealing or exciting. Amphetamines are like those distractions I talked about earlier, but in a much more pronounced way. Amphetamines raise Dopamine and other neurotransmitters and this is often experienced as life suddenly becoming more interesting. Hell, doing my taxes might even be fun; as a matter of fact, I'm going to learn a little bit about tax laws, their history and why they are so important! Man, after learning about the history of taxes and the IRS, I found a new appreciation for something that once seemed so tedious. That is my experience.
There is the saying "mind over matter". It's my honest belief that a person can conquer any stress, pain or discomfort with a strong mind. I believe Amphetamines inspire confidence and their well-documented euphoric effects make a person more able to make that "mind over matter" statement with true confidence. If a person is weak-minded, pain can easily consume them, isolate them, make them give up hope and when the hope is given up, the pain fully consumes a person, bringing their life to a new low of misery.
Have you all heard the story of the Finnish soldier during WW2? It's pretty famous at this point, with multiple youtube videos telling the story. Well, he was by himself. in the snow, dying; freezing to death slowly. He was done. The pain had consumed him. Sure, he probably could've saved himself with a Herculean effort, but he has lost the will to do it. He remembers he has Methamphetamine tablets in in his kit as supplied by the German Military. I believe he was carrying his whole unit's supply or something like that. Well, he was basically numb so without any dexterity, all he could do was dump all these pills in his hand then into his mouth. So he took the whole unit's supply at once with no prior experience with the drug.
He describes the feeling of knowing he was going to die and accepting it. A few minutes after taking the pills, he describes life returning to his body. He pulled himself out of the snow, put his skis on and ended up skiing for several days straight, skiing straight through a Soviet camp and to the Finnish lines. Amphetamines took a man who was fully ready to die, got him up without food or water and enabled him to ski and ultramarathon back to his friendlies.
As I started with this post, pain is a phenomenon that lacks proper definition, yet we all can understand it plainly. If you want to call this experience with the Finnish soldier an act of "painkilling", then I would be hesitant to call you wrong. However, at the end of the day, Amphetamine can reduce the perception of pain in higher doses, yet this is only a sideshow to what the drug is really about which is stimulating the body and mind. In the process, a person can be distracted and even relieved of their pain through the release of Dopamine, but Opioids will always be the true painkillers as they are mirror images of mother nature's painkilling chemicals.
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As stated above, it's pretty apparent that Amphetamines' effect on a person's subjective experience of pain is due to the release of Dopamine and to a lesser extent, other neurotansmitters like Serotonin and Norepinephrine. If you want to call this analgesia, I suppose you could. The psychosomatic nature of these phenomena pretty much make anything possible, right?
Speaking more about these other neurotransmitters I feel is important. You see, some people say that Central Nervous System Stimulants like Amphetamine "boost" the analgesia they experience from their Opioid alone. This tracks pretty well with what we've covered so far. However, there are others who say Amphetamine actually makes their pain worse in conjunction with their Opioid.
Could it be possible that the Amphetamine is producing anxiety? Is it possible that the increased level of focus produced by the Amphetamine in fact causes a person to zero in and focus incessantly on their pain just as a person would doing those taxes I was talking about earlier. I've heard descriptions from folks in this exact position whom I feel are experiencing this sensation. The Opioid, the relaxation and sedation perhaps were causing this person to be less present mentally and physically. Perhaps the Amphetamine is taking them out of their trance and forcing them to focus on their pain?
I'm just throwing some possible scenarios out at you guys. This isn't the first time I've discussed this issue and it's certainly not the first time I've ever pondered it.
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It's my understanding that this proposed phenomenon is not really founded in evidence. I think this is more the result of people making their own assumptions based upon their own understanding of these drugs. An Amphetamine increases the heart rate, speeds up the bowels... it stimulates; makes things go faster. Does this "speeding up" in turn make everything about a person speed up?
I understand the logic, though it is my understanding that this is not something that actually occurs. If you're wondering how these two groups of substances might interact with each other, I encourage you to keep your thinking abstract. There is of course research, but at the end of the day, like we've already discussed, pain is not a phenomenon with any kind of standard definition, so to answer the question using something like the scientific method gets really hairy quick, bordering on the impossible.
but i can't do it all in one setting