amediocrity
Greenlighter
- Joined
- Mar 30, 2016
- Messages
- 43
Sorry if this is against the rules, I have already written this story as a reply on another thread of mine, but I just really need some thoughts on what happened to me today.
I visited my gp last week to ask to be put on a tapering plan of codeine phosphate. I have ALWAYS been honest with him about my addiction. The first time I told him I was addicted to the cocodamol he was prescribing me for migraines he gave me this disappointed look, as if I had done it to personally insult him. He handed me a phone number for my local drug counselling place and refused to give me any more codeine. I remember feeling so alone and overwhelmed by this response. It was like he was wiping his hands clean of me. He wouldn't even refer me to the drug team himself, told me I had to do this alone.
So when I went back to him last week to tell him I had gone back to the codeine via nurofen plus, explaining I was taking 32 a day and having serious stomach pain and black tar like stools, he gave me that same look of disappointment and said he wanted me to have some bloods taken to see how badly my insides have been damaged. I asked again if I could taper, he told me he won't prescribe me codeine unless a member of the drug team give him permission to do so.
So today I spend six hours talking on the phone to the people at one drug counselling place, getting transferred to another, until finally breaking down in tears to a lady on the phone at the first place I tried and got referred back to (what is it with me and full circles?). I told her I didn't want to injure myself anymore and I wanted a safe, controlled taper on codeine phosphate. She told me it was bad form for my GP to have not let me taper when I first got addicted. She said she would get the nurse to phone my GP that afternoon. I cried even harder with relief. I started letting myself think about a future free from nurofen plus and the damage it has been doing to my scrawny 8 stone body. She told me I would receive a phone call from the nurse just before my appointment. But I didn't. I rang back, she assured me I would get the phone call, but I didn't. So I went into the GP room, (it was a locum doctor, my GP had no free slots) and asked the doctor if she had received a message regarding tapering. She went really silent and then awkwardly told me the drugs team nurse had contacted my GP and together they had decided I shouldn't be prescribed codeine phosphate.
I can't explain how much that hurt. The double standards, the false hopes, the negligence and failure to even ring back and tell me before I walked into that room. I sat there and just cried and cried and cried whilst she awkwardly clicked on her computer mouse. When I left I tired ringing the drugs team but their office had closed. I had been holding off on buying any more nurofen plus as I thought the taper plan had been approved, so I walked, in tears, to the pharmacy and bought a box of 32 and then a box of plain co codamol 8/500 at another pharmacy. I took over half the packet in one go and just wanted to die then and there. I still do. I feel like these 'professionals' have just walked all over me. They get me hooked on a drug and then refuse to help me get off it. The fact that my GP prescribed me some stuff to protect my stomach last visit just says it all. It's like he's endorsing my using nurofen plus, so what if it kills me, as long as he doesn't have to deal with it.
I am so broken, guys. And so, so tired of this. Any ideas if this is something I can make a complaint about, or thoughts on other avenues I can try in order to taper off this drug safely and with full support?
I visited my gp last week to ask to be put on a tapering plan of codeine phosphate. I have ALWAYS been honest with him about my addiction. The first time I told him I was addicted to the cocodamol he was prescribing me for migraines he gave me this disappointed look, as if I had done it to personally insult him. He handed me a phone number for my local drug counselling place and refused to give me any more codeine. I remember feeling so alone and overwhelmed by this response. It was like he was wiping his hands clean of me. He wouldn't even refer me to the drug team himself, told me I had to do this alone.
So when I went back to him last week to tell him I had gone back to the codeine via nurofen plus, explaining I was taking 32 a day and having serious stomach pain and black tar like stools, he gave me that same look of disappointment and said he wanted me to have some bloods taken to see how badly my insides have been damaged. I asked again if I could taper, he told me he won't prescribe me codeine unless a member of the drug team give him permission to do so.
So today I spend six hours talking on the phone to the people at one drug counselling place, getting transferred to another, until finally breaking down in tears to a lady on the phone at the first place I tried and got referred back to (what is it with me and full circles?). I told her I didn't want to injure myself anymore and I wanted a safe, controlled taper on codeine phosphate. She told me it was bad form for my GP to have not let me taper when I first got addicted. She said she would get the nurse to phone my GP that afternoon. I cried even harder with relief. I started letting myself think about a future free from nurofen plus and the damage it has been doing to my scrawny 8 stone body. She told me I would receive a phone call from the nurse just before my appointment. But I didn't. I rang back, she assured me I would get the phone call, but I didn't. So I went into the GP room, (it was a locum doctor, my GP had no free slots) and asked the doctor if she had received a message regarding tapering. She went really silent and then awkwardly told me the drugs team nurse had contacted my GP and together they had decided I shouldn't be prescribed codeine phosphate.
I can't explain how much that hurt. The double standards, the false hopes, the negligence and failure to even ring back and tell me before I walked into that room. I sat there and just cried and cried and cried whilst she awkwardly clicked on her computer mouse. When I left I tired ringing the drugs team but their office had closed. I had been holding off on buying any more nurofen plus as I thought the taper plan had been approved, so I walked, in tears, to the pharmacy and bought a box of 32 and then a box of plain co codamol 8/500 at another pharmacy. I took over half the packet in one go and just wanted to die then and there. I still do. I feel like these 'professionals' have just walked all over me. They get me hooked on a drug and then refuse to help me get off it. The fact that my GP prescribed me some stuff to protect my stomach last visit just says it all. It's like he's endorsing my using nurofen plus, so what if it kills me, as long as he doesn't have to deal with it.
I am so broken, guys. And so, so tired of this. Any ideas if this is something I can make a complaint about, or thoughts on other avenues I can try in order to taper off this drug safely and with full support?
