Share Your Pain Story

999 Replies to “Share Your Pain Story”

1. I have been in severe chronic back pain for 30 years. I’ve done shots, physical therapy, machine put in my back … on and on. They make you feel like a drug addict. I’m on disability for my back and they still won’t help. The reason people became drug addicts is because they cut everyone off after giving them like candy. The pain was so unbearable … they turned to cheap street drugs. I even weaned myself off for 3 years but the pain is too great. All I see is red all day if pain was an actual color.

2. I’m a thirty-year-old mom of three who suffers from a cardiovascular disorder. There is no cure, there is no surgery, there is nothing to do besides suffer. The only way I can eat and stay above 90 pounds is through low-dose opiates. Doctors understand how painful this debilitating disease is. But it seems that Walgreens has full control over my treatment. No matter what surgeries or procedures I get, Walgreens is always there to tell me no. They minimize my pain and efforts to be a healthy happy mom. Don’t punish people who want to have any type of normalcy in their lives or their children’s lives. Chronic pain does not only affect a patient. Family suffer too.

3. Hello,
   Currently I receive sporadic pain control. As stated by Lindsey, Walgreens pharmacy in my location also abuses their power over clients. Each day must be carefully planned. For me it’s a quality of life issue. I’m also tired of being labeled and judged by political and medical entities.

4. Doctors in North Dakota are terrified to prescribe pain meds even to people who need them occasionally for very severe pain and have used them without addiction or any other issues for decades. The best way to give them back their discretion, I believe, is through a ballot measure that protects them rather than relying on legislators. I am one of the people I just described, with an ORT score of ONE because of a brother’s use of alcohol – otherwise it would be zero – and will be in an unbearable situation when I run out of pills prescribed by my brave but now retired doctor. I also have extensive experience with the initiative and referendum process, having worked on many state measures and for a national institute dedicated to the process. I can do I&R. Looking for allies in ND and suggest people in other states do the same. (It takes a large group to succeed in this, but I have worked with such groups – including drafting three measures and producing petitions – and hope to build one.)

5. It’s so hard to find a good doctor. I’ve had chronic pain for as far back as I can remember. Pain medication has no effect as my enzymes eat them too quickly and other medication is barely effective or does the opposite because of my system. However, no matter how I explain it to doctors they give Vicodin and label me an addict. Even though I can keep the same 10-20 pills they give me for months since they aren’t effective. I’ve even had a pain doctor stop my appointment to go grab all my medication because he believed I just sold it. I was angry and hurt and they were embarrassed when all the medication was there. But they refused to do any more for me. My primary attacks my weight constantly, but if you can’t move, how do you lose weight. Finally I was referred to another specialist and had surgery which helped one area, the pain down one leg, but has set off others. I have several specialists due to my conditions and all of them are nice but won’t give anything for pain. Just pile on additional multi symptom medications and give me a look of judgement when/if I ask for anything else. To the point of taking so much medication I can’t eat but am still in pain. My pain tolerance is very high and pain response is different. This then causes more issues.

   I want to have a semi-normal life and instead I’m constantly anxious and nauseous from pain. I’ve learned to push through on certain days but it puts me out for days after.

6. I’m 32 years old. Two years ago I ended up on life support and in a coma due to medication nurse gave me while in coma I got a blood clot in my leg I have avascular necrosis in multiple bones in foot and ankle deformity and a bunch of other problem know I’m having issues and being denied for help with pain no surgery can be done the damage is done I shouldn’t get denied for any service when this was done because of medical professionals pain was never managed and now I’m being denied

7. I am a 43 year old veteran. I suffer from both DDD and most horrific Chronic Pancreatitis. Before the 2016 CDC Guidelines I had a doctor that prescribed me what my body tolerated. After the guidelines my doctor quit, and I had to find a new doctor. The new doctor will not prescribe above the guidelines because he is worried of the DEA. He does not agree to the guidelines.

   This year I spent two weeks in rehab. I had surgery and was in horrific pain. Due to rules I was only able to get one extra pill. I looked to the street and ended up with pressed Fentanyl. I then could not get off of it due to severe withdrawals. I tried to ween myself off, but it was too strong. I went to rehab two weeks. I had doctors there diagnose me with Pseudo-addiction which was a life saver – if I did not get that diagnosis I would have been kicked from the pain program.

   I suffer daily with pain. Last week I spent it in pain from Pancreatitis in which no one could get me a bed because of so many Covid patients. I had to suffer because I cannot get what is needed to control pain. I want to tell my story and help others like me. This is horrible to be punished.

8. I am a 33 year old mother of two. I’ve had pain for as long back as I can remember. But in 2010 things changed. I was hit in a very bad accident that totaled my vehicle. My body wasn’t the same after that.

   I live with chronic debilitating pain daily since 2018 when my doctor cut me off my prescription pain medication that I had been on for 8 years. Cut me from 6 to 8 pills a day down to 2, then put me on bupranorphine/naloxone. What I didn’t know because I trusted my doctor was that they put me on too high of a dose. Combined with my other medications caused me to have black out periods. Now I can’t drive because of the fear of it coming on suddenly. I’ve been to multiple specialists because I have fibromyalgia, Sjögren’s syndrome and connective tissue disease.

   But in 2018 I couldn’t handle the pain and memory loss. I told my doctors I was afraid I would commit suicide because I was in so much pain, and I did I attempt suicide in March of 2018. I just wanted to die. I couldn’t handle being in pain and letting my daughters down as a mother. After two weeks in treatment for my PTSD and depression, I came out hopeful that maybe my doctors would take me seriously … Ha yeah right now I’m even more of a risk.

   I don’t want to be in my body anymore, but at least I have found a couple natural options like kratom and CBD to help. Kratom has been demonized and is at risk of being federally banned. I don’t know what I will do if that happens. Unfortunately I’m stuck in a state where medical marijuana is still illegal for most people. I found out I can get my card because of my PTSD (Texas just added it to the compassionate care act) but it’s so freaking expensive and insurance doesn’t cover it, so like everything in the medical industry, if you don’t have a lot of money you’re shit out of luck.

   I’m just so done but I keep fighting to stay for my kids’ sake. I wish this damn opioid epidemic would just end already, so those of us who need our medications can get them.

9. Amanda, I’m so sorry that this is your life. You are not alone.

10. My story is like so many others — I am a 74 year old chronic pain patient, as a result of an auto accident in ‘91. I’ve been in physical therapy so much that a rehab doctor I was seeing asked if I’d read and comment on a book he was writing because I have learned to adapt standard exercises to my own level. I have had three lumbar and one cervical disc and fusion surgeries. My diagnoses are DJD, spinal stenosis, osteoarthritis and now scoliosis. I was in pain contracts for almost twenty years, and all drug screens were clean. I have not abused my prescriptions, nor sold or given them away, and I have never taken anyone else’s medications.

    Recently, I moved to a dryer, warmer climate, thinking it would help my back pain. Unfortunately, I didn’t know about the algorithm used in the program Narxcare database, that incorrectly determines my probability to become an addict. Dear God, with this system, people like me are doomed! I am dumbfounded to learn that Missouri is the only state that does not use this system, but it is reported that it, too, will soon use it. Are you aware that all doctors and pharmacists have access to this program and that it is also made available to the DOJ and police departments? Did you know that your diagnoses are not included? And, if you are referred to another doctor, as I recently was, did you know that the algorithm interprets that as doctor shopping? Never mind that the referrals were to an oncologist and then to a cardiologist. Unbelievable? So is this — the meds you get for your pet are listed under your name, and the algorithm says you are also taking those meds. Gets better, folks: if you use a discount prescription card and buy a med at a different pharmacy than you normally go to, that is interpreted as drug seeking.

    I just want to retain as much mobility as possible and to have the best quality of life my condition will allow. The current system is broken and I am held to an algorithm standard that is even more broken. Why are my diagnoses not listed? Why should I be held accountable for an addict’s choices? Why can’t the medical profession understand that most of us will not abuse or sell our meds or purchase street meds. We just want help to live as normally as our conditions allow!
    We need to fight and eliminate NarxCare and give back to our physicians the ability to again treat patients in an educated, compassionate way!