Ricki151
Greenlighter
- Joined
- Jan 24, 2016
- Messages
- 8
Over the past couple of years, I’ve occasionally jumped on this site in order to ask a few questions, but now I’m ready to put my big girl panties on and introduce myself properly.
I taught elementary school-age kids for 26 years before retiring 4 years early due to a couple of auto-immune disorders which eventually made it too risky health-wise for me to be hanging out with first graders all day long; for example, if one of my precious angels came to school with a stomach virus and threw up all over me during reading group time, I’d end up with Noro virus and be out of school for the next 4 days. You get the picture.
So how did I end up here, seeking answers to questions about opiates? Well, one of my auto-immune issues is rheumatoid arthritis (RA) which causes painful swelling in my joints, especially my knees. No doubt my knees are where the majority of my pain is due to playing roller derby with my local league from 2006 until I was diagnosed with RA in 2012. I know...bad-ass, yeah? Although I had torn not only my ACLs but one of my meniscus discs as well, I have to say that roller derby was worth every concussion, torn ligament, strawberry bruise, and broken bone that I earned. But it goes without saying that I was forced to stop playing. Since my rheumatologist doesn’t “believe” in prescription pain management except for the occasional Rx for prednisone (because steroids are sooo much safer
), I enrolled at a local pain management clinic where I was given Rxs for much too low in dosage hydros (and only one per day), but it was better than nothing. After 16 months of clinic visits, I showed up for my 7:30 a.m. appointment only to find it closed down, courtesy of the DEA. Yep, it was that kind of classy joint. Needless to say, I was in a terrible bind since the hydros were what gave me mobility and relative comfort, at least compared to my other options which were the usual suspects such as Aleve, Advil, and other OTCs which triggered flare-ups of my original auto-immune issue, Crohn’s Disease. What to do??
Enter my new best friend, heroin. It was by no means the ideal choice, but Aleve and Advil were no longer making a difference (at least not in safe doses), and with all of the local pain management clinics shut down by the DEA sting, I was stuck. I should also mention that although not exactly cheap, heroin is much less expensive and much easier to obtain than scoring hydros or Oxys off the street. I should add that I am a strict snorter; I’ve never shot up any kind of recreational drug. Also, over a 5-year span, I tried everything I could think of and that had been suggested by friends, family, and colleagues in order to relieve my pain, including chiropractic sessions, massage therapy, acupuncture, and swimming which I did competitively beginning at age 10 and continued throughout college. To this day, it is my go-to (and least stressful) form of exercise.
I don’t know if this matters, but I’m 54 years old now and my two kids, ages 18 and 23, are full-time students, so they live with me. Their dad and all 4 of their grandparents have died over the last 9 years, so along with everything else, add in the stress of having no other family for any kind of support.
If you made it this far, thanks for reading all of this. I look forward to interacting with as many of you as I can and to learning as much as I can.
I taught elementary school-age kids for 26 years before retiring 4 years early due to a couple of auto-immune disorders which eventually made it too risky health-wise for me to be hanging out with first graders all day long; for example, if one of my precious angels came to school with a stomach virus and threw up all over me during reading group time, I’d end up with Noro virus and be out of school for the next 4 days. You get the picture.
So how did I end up here, seeking answers to questions about opiates? Well, one of my auto-immune issues is rheumatoid arthritis (RA) which causes painful swelling in my joints, especially my knees. No doubt my knees are where the majority of my pain is due to playing roller derby with my local league from 2006 until I was diagnosed with RA in 2012. I know...bad-ass, yeah? Although I had torn not only my ACLs but one of my meniscus discs as well, I have to say that roller derby was worth every concussion, torn ligament, strawberry bruise, and broken bone that I earned. But it goes without saying that I was forced to stop playing. Since my rheumatologist doesn’t “believe” in prescription pain management except for the occasional Rx for prednisone (because steroids are sooo much safer
), I enrolled at a local pain management clinic where I was given Rxs for much too low in dosage hydros (and only one per day), but it was better than nothing. After 16 months of clinic visits, I showed up for my 7:30 a.m. appointment only to find it closed down, courtesy of the DEA. Yep, it was that kind of classy joint. Needless to say, I was in a terrible bind since the hydros were what gave me mobility and relative comfort, at least compared to my other options which were the usual suspects such as Aleve, Advil, and other OTCs which triggered flare-ups of my original auto-immune issue, Crohn’s Disease. What to do??Enter my new best friend, heroin. It was by no means the ideal choice, but Aleve and Advil were no longer making a difference (at least not in safe doses), and with all of the local pain management clinics shut down by the DEA sting, I was stuck. I should also mention that although not exactly cheap, heroin is much less expensive and much easier to obtain than scoring hydros or Oxys off the street. I should add that I am a strict snorter; I’ve never shot up any kind of recreational drug. Also, over a 5-year span, I tried everything I could think of and that had been suggested by friends, family, and colleagues in order to relieve my pain, including chiropractic sessions, massage therapy, acupuncture, and swimming which I did competitively beginning at age 10 and continued throughout college. To this day, it is my go-to (and least stressful) form of exercise.
I don’t know if this matters, but I’m 54 years old now and my two kids, ages 18 and 23, are full-time students, so they live with me. Their dad and all 4 of their grandparents have died over the last 9 years, so along with everything else, add in the stress of having no other family for any kind of support.
If you made it this far, thanks for reading all of this. I look forward to interacting with as many of you as I can and to learning as much as I can.
