Advice about a situation involving prejudice against drug users

[cduggles]

So it didn’t go entirely well, but I said my piece gently but firmly, without encountering prickly defenses.

I was then informed condescendingly that I am utterly naive about drug users.

Fortunately he’s moving away and can’t “unofficially” talk smack about me or affect me or anything.
Unfortunately, he’s moving away with a horrible attitude about addiction and those who he thinks are drug addicts/users.

I tried though, and maybe one day it will be absorbed.

When you say "he was all offended on [your] behalf" - how are you sure he was offended by the subject matter and not the simply the falsity of the claim? Maybe they are a champion of truth? Maybe they think the other person is an idiot from past dealings and it came out in this encounter? Maybe he just thinks highly of you and wouldn't want any gossip that could negatively impact you in that environment being spread?

How do you know they have a disdain for drug users? What sort of job do they hold that you are so concerned about their contact with an individual with drug problems?

The way he said “it’s easy to tell who drug users are” with disgust was the tell. It wasn’t an ambiguous situation.

And this guy is a doctor who works in an area where he regularly comes into contact with addicts.
(I know MOE is gone but I thought I should reply.)

 

[nuttynutskin]

Some men you just can't reach.

 

[Phoenix_rising]

This is a really good read.

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In the UK there aren't any laws against discrimination of drug addicts. I know this all too well.

Back in 2013 my Mother died from Cancer and it hit me hard. I'd been addiction free for nearly 20 years,but relapsed as I couldn't cope with the grief. Subsequently I crashed my car whilst on Buprenorphine,Phenazepam and Etizolam. Luckily no one was hurt. I was arrested and lost my license for 3 years. I went into a maintenance program and cleaned up my act,but when I reapplied for my license I was honest and told them I was a recovering addict. I needed my car for work and seeing my little boy who lives 70 miles away.

This is when the trouble started. There was quite clearly prejudice against me by the DVLA (Drivers license agency.) They made me jump through hoops "metaphorically speaking." I had a full medical which I expected and had to tell them everything I was taking,over the counter and prescribed. This I did but mistakenly listed diphenhydramine and not promethazine,which are both over the counter sleep aids and are legal in the UK. I was refused my license because of this. I wrote and telephoned them to explain the mistake,but they wouldn't have it,they basically told me I was a liar. I told them what's the difference? They are both the same for all intents and purposes which they replied "promethazine" is an opiate. Can you believe that? This was their medical department. I had to correct them of course and told them they needed to get their facts straight first which they didn't like.

I had to get letters from my recovery clinic and Doctor,but the Doctor refused claiming that how did he know I wasn't using illegal drugs. WTF I was being tested regularly and never tested positive,my recorded was good.

I was tested and screened more than a geriatric driver whose prescribed opiates and benzodiazepines and God knows what else. I even told the DVLA that I would take another driving test if needed. This all took a year before finally they let me have my license. Most professionals think addicts are scum and tar us all with the same brush. I even explained that I was a functional addict being maintained on a buprenorphine program,that I was self employed,that I'd never indulged in criminal activities to fund my habit and was basically a good citizen.

It opened my eyes to institutional prejudice and how it effects lives. It was definitely detrimental to my recovery,but they didn't care. I was doing the right thing,being honest. Having a record,what would happen if I hadn't declared this and got pulled over by the police and tested. I would've been tested positive for buprenorphine and lost my license again,this would've set me back and maybe relapsed. Fucking crazy.

 

[Jabberwocky]

When I look back on all the things I've said and done sex, drug and alcohol related, I can forgive or ignore a lot of other people's failings to me. The sad truth of it is that we're all flawed people. I was treated very unfairly by someone I work with when I disclosed my alcoholism years ago. I probably could have sued. But I still work with that person today and we have a good relationship. Everybody fails, everybody has character flaws. I haven't been held to account more times than I can remember, especially by family.

It's really a no win situation for addicts and alcoholics, that tension between being an antisocial, lying, high all the time asshole (that's me at least), and needing other people's help. Institutional prejudice is never good, and how people here have been treated is not good, don't let anger consume you and push you to act out and abuse your DOC.

 

[JessFR]

It's true, most people seem to think doctors have some sort of omniscience regarding drug information. When in fact most doctors went through their courses and have no real obligation to stay up to date. A lot of doctors just accept whatever information is in drug pamphlets given to them by pharmaceutical reps who throw them kickbacks for prescribing. Whereas if you're into drugs and neuroscience as a hobby/passion, and have lots of real-world first hand experience, you may know a hell of a lot more than most doctors. They don't like you trying to tell them you know more though, you get seen as a druggie.

Exactly. You only need to talk to ask a pharmacist what they think about doctors knowledge of drugs.

All the ones I've spoken too say they're totally incompetent. Frequently writing out dangerous combinations of drugs or bad doses or impossible doses.

Most doctors, and especially the ones in general practice, know shockingly little.

 

[1funkymunky]

You know, earlier this year i was hospitalized with a very strange complication (due to covid-19, i suspect. I am the exact opposite of a pandemic kool-aid drinker, but i do believe i did, in fact, get the flu this season) that resulted in a 107°F temperature, which earned me a bed in the ICU for a couple of days. I don't think that most patients in the ICU are not conscious, and a lot of things that go on there, medically speaking, are truly horrible; so much so that patients are given amnesia medicine so they will completely forget the very necessary but truly horrific treatments they require in order to save their lives. Well, i just had a life-threatening temperature, so i was very alert and very much aware of everything i was hearing at night, all day...and i was scared shitless. So i refused to go to sleep - which resulted in the nurses becoming suspicious and drug testing me. Now i had been laid up with this horrible infection for at least 4 days prior to my ambulance ride to the hospital and, during that time i wasn't the LEAST BIT interested in any drugs. But, in the days leading up to my falling ill i had smoked meth. So it showed up in my tox screen, and the head nurse who was on my case confronted me about it, they took my keys, and all my clothes, which are all i went in with, and said, "you tested positive for meth." After noticing the about-face, complete 180° turnaround in the kind of care i was receiving from that point on i called the head nurse back over and said to her, "i need to ask you something. Ok, now i have been under intense observation ever since i got here and i brought NOTHING with me but my keys, so it should be obvious that i have done no drugs since i got here. Now, whether i did drugs 5 days or 5 minutes before coming here, the fact remains that this fever (resultant from acute sinusitis) did happen and i NEEDED to come here to save my life. This isn't an overdose. So EVEN IF i did use drugs prior to my coming here, the fact remains that i was and am very much in need of medical care, and the drugs should have NO EFFECT WHATSOEVER on how i am viewed or the quality of treatment i receive while i am here. I have noticed for years now, having watched my ex-boyfriend go through the same trials and tribulations, this prejudicial, and sub-standard treatment he received by medical professionals once they saw his record. That is tragic, in my opinion." She said, "well we need to know because you could be coming down and might become psychotic or aggressive and need..."...i stopped her right there. I said, " you have been watching too much television. Is that what they teach you? That people coming down off of meth become psychos? I'm really not trying to be the spokesperson for all meth users, or anything, but if you had ANY experience with ACTUAL meth users you would know that this narrative is absolute fiction. I'm not saying there aren't anomalies, but - this is your PROFESSION. Your CAREER. This is the path you've chosen for your life's work, and your education in this particular arena is categorically filled with falsehoods. And based on what I've observed over the last 7 or so years, is a systemic problem which originates at the education level. You people are filled with such lies about what happens to people on drugs and poisoned with such a fear of how we react that you have no real idea about how to treat someone who tests positive for a residual amount of drugs, and you wind up giving sub-standard care to the people you swore an OATH to treat. You are in the business of public service, yet there are a great number of people you fail to treat properly simply because of disinformation you received when being taught how to do your job. I have not asked for ANY pain medication, in fact, i have specifically asked NOT to be given any, because i want you to treat the PROBLEM, not dull the symptoms with a drug. I want to get WELL, and i can't give you accurate feedback if I'm all doped up. So please, stop treating me like a drug seeker and help me get out of here." Since that particular shift on that floor were the only ones to hear my diatribe, those were the only ones who treats me with any dignity. Once my fever broke i was sent to another floor that, structurally, looked no better than one of those fleabag motels one rents by the hour. But the medical community needs a SERIOUS update in it's prevailing collective thought process on what turns out to be the majority of their patient base.