Oxy addiction and mental health.

I apologize if I'm in an inappropriate forum for this.  I'm not an addict but I'm married to one.  I'm not sure how to begin so I'll just free associate a little.  

I'm male 44, married, with a 5 year old daughter.

My wife has a legitimate and inoperable nerve pinch in her groin that cause her severe pain all down her left leg.  I've spoken with her Dr (he's mine also) and am convinced that it's a very real and serious pain. Her left leg is actually smaller than her right.  Her big toe is colder to the touch.  

She's told me in the past that suicide was once a consideration to escape the pain.  

She actually had a plan.

She's 4'11 and weighs less than 100 lbs.

She started out on lortabs etc. and over the years gradually made it to Oxy.  She's now prescribed 5-40's a day but usually runs out before the month is up.

I have an old script for lortab 10's that I  rarely use so he usually gobbles those to hang on.  

She's has a script for patches that also help hold her over.

She doesn't know that I've seen her chew one up.

Her Doctor has told me that he's prescribed as much as he is willing to.  The next step is a pain mgmt specialist.  Possibly a "pump" or electro stimulation of the nerve.  

I'm hopeful but not optimistic.

She rarely sleeps and there seems to be little to be done about it.  She sits on the couch in the den and will literally pass out.  Face down on the coffee table where our 5 year old daughter often wakes to find her after I've gone to work.

I try shame. I try anger. I try reason.... zip

I love my wife.

Obviously, she's not the woman I married 7 years ago.  

But beyond it all, there seems to be a creeping mental instabillity that appears beyond the "norm" for this type of addiction.  Very unpredictable mood swings.  An unreasonable (for the given situation) negative point of view.  A VERY sudden religious fervor she never really had.

I've answered (and occasionally deflected) many inquiries from her friends.

A few Quotes:
"What's up with ****.  Has she wigged out?"  "Shes suddenly gone all religious and preachy on us."  "She thinks she has "special" insights to god that no one else can see",

"she thinks she's an angel"

That last one scared me a lot..

I'm not sure what my question is exactly.  Does Oxy addiction (or any addiction) bring on anything like this?  My wife had a mild run in with depression 15 years ago but there was a legitimate cause and she got over it.  As far as I know there is no history of serious mental illness.

I feel the need to protect my daughter from my wife.... but I don't want to abandon my wife.  I'm trying to steer her towards "family" counseling with the hope of steering her towards some help...

But I'm not hopeful.

[beachtowel]

Wow, and welcome to the forum........
I had to read your post three times before I decided to respond to your post........

extreme pain can do funny things to people.......
a lot of heavy duty drugs can also do funny things to people.......
Mental disease can also do funny things to people....

My opinion is she has the whole trifecta...............
Has she been seen by a counselor?

What bothers me is that a five year old may not understand what is going on with her mother.......
At five years old she is very vulnerable and I would take that into strong consideration........
That is an awful lot for a five year old to try to comprehend mentally........

You say your doctor is also her doctor what does he recommend for further treatment........??
I hate to invade with this question but what are you leaving out here?

I'm sure over the last few years some real changes have been going on..........

I'm sorry about this post and don't feel comfortable about posting but I am intrigued by your situation and further I hope that you find some very tough answers to some very tough questions in regards to your wife....
If you would like to talk in private about anything please send me an invite on yahoo IM my user name is beachtowel1

I wish the best for you and your family hopefully we can talk some more.........

[my-wits-end]

Also... I hate to sound like a "typical" idiot male but I'm pretty sure she's pre-menapausal.  How big a contribution might that make...  ...

[my-wits-end]

Thanks.  I appreciate it a lot.  And you're not "invading" at all.  I posted here for 2 reasons. 1)  I just plain needed to and 2) perspective from people who don't know me and can be blunt.  Just typing it all out in my first post like that and re-reading it was kind of...  I don't know... it helped.

I agree that it looks to be the "trifecta" you described.  It's tough enough dealing with the drugs and the pain and then wham... throw in a new kind of instability.

I said to my wife the other day that I will keep fighting for her right up to the point that I believe her behavior is a threat to our daughters peace of mind.  After that.. I didn't know.

That sounded all fine and assertive but where that line is exactly is a bit foggy.  It's still by and large a decent enough household for our daughter.  She only occasionally  sees the "consequences" but never the "cause".  She's extremely bright and seems to be fine.  But who really knows.

Our Doctor is a GP who doesn't mind bucking the state and prescribing the pain meds that people actually need. But like he told me.  This is as far as he's willing to go.  

As far as my wifes pain.  There's no hope of a fix.  No doctor will operate in suce a sensative area.  The chance of permanent nerve damage is too great.  And we've seen LOTS of specialists... I lost my temper with the last one and screamed the question "What if she was a wrold class millionair athelete?  Would you operate the? A##hole?"  But that was just my frustration.  I talked it out with him.  He was actually prettty decent.

If my wife is to continue living, it will have to be a long term "managed" condition.  We've seen a specialist who's discussed a morphen pump or possibly an electrical stimulator directly to the nerve.

I couldn't contain a loud chuckle when my wife expressed concerns about "body image".  I know I shouldn't have but I couldn't stop myself.  Like she doesn't have any other concerns..

[beachtowel]

I am truly sorry for what your going through.........living with extreme pain is awful........

I take it your wife is not working so when your at work and your little girl is not in school your
wife plays Mom with your daughter on a full time basis.........

What can she do physically.......

[justlikeyou]

i have a friend in a very similar situation, i believe the answer is personal, anyone in your situation will have to figure out 'personally' what you can and what you cant accept / do, and make your decisions from there.my friend has been 'hanging on' with his wife for 10 years, her pain med use is chronic, she does little but sit and rock back and fourth.
if your wife has and is doing everything she can to heal (yoga massage chiroprator swimming etcetc) then shes amazing.my back injury left me to miserable to do anything and the pills made it bearable, but now i have quit the pills i can see that my thinking was a long way off.

if your child is safe id say things are workable, if shes in any danger id consider changing things.

your post has made me very grateful for my wifes good health, im genuinely sorry about your situation.

[pheggie101]

i have to post to you. i also am a "normie',they havent booted me off here yet,but you can sure learn alot about the issues. i too had a wife who went thru this. let me tell you the habit just grows,mine ended up in rehab 3 times,and now has been on sub almost 4 years. as far as the mental stuff i experienced the same thing. i litterally flipped me out when you brought up the religous thing, my wife,now my ex did the same thing, totally over board. she said she had revelations, saw evil spirits in the house,talked to god and her angels.she finally met a man from her small church,said god sent him to her, and married him within 5 months........i dont think that was god,as we were living together and trying to reconcile at the time. also beware the mood swings, they will or may get horrible, and can change by the hour. as far as the chewing, they all do that even hydro pills, and her addiction shall grow and grow as her tolerance goes up. i feel for you dude i lived and died with this **** for years............im pheggie101 on yahoo messenger so feel free , Jim

[beachtowel]

In my addiction I did wheel barrels of very strong pain killers and for years but never got religious or saw angels....just the opposite most of all my religious beliefs went dormant I'll probably hear about his comment but maybe its a gender thing..........

[pheggie101]

no, im caughtredhanded on yahoo messenger, sorry, any one else wants to cha t feel free, JIM

[my-wits-end]

My internet access is spotty but I just wanted to say Wow!  You folks are great.  It's nice to know that at least I'm not alone and there are folks out there who "get it".  That means a LOT!!

Oh and just to be clear I'm definately NOT against religion.  Far from it.  It's just that it was an extreme character break for her that was way out of the norm.  Not trying to offend..

[beachtowel]

non-taken............

[The_Sandman]

For what it's worth......I have recently been diagnosed with "GENERALIZED ANXIETY" disorder......I had always had an underlying anxiety, but managed it by self medicating - smoking pot -

Recently I started to abuse NORCO PAINKILLERS.....for about 3 months.....8-10 a day.

Decided to get off the Drugs.......but was unprepared for the consequences.

Apparently I had an "underlying anxiety" issue that, as I said above, I self medicated in order to cope.

However, once I stopped using the PAIN KILLERS my "underlying Anxiety" went thru the roof.

I actually exasperated an underlying issue unwittingly by developing (even for just a breif time) this dependency.

SURE, I could have just found ways to keep getting the pills, but I was lucky and recognized the signs, came clean with wife, doc, pharmacist the works.......

........but I was really surprised when I realized that something psychologically had ALSO happened.

MY POINT: I think addiction and withdraw issues can create or magnify other 'underlying issues' and ....well I for one had never considered this.

I am currently seeking counciling and am feeling much better.....my business is back on track. Headed to Hawaii (big island) at the end of the month with the wife and 7 yr old twins and I have created a day by day attitude.

But when opiates and pain meds are involved.....unless you plan on staying on them the rest of your life.....your gonna have to pay the piper one day:......and sometimes that can dredge up some past skeletons too.

It did with me.......hope this helps you understand some.....

DISCLAIMER: I am mainly regurgitating what my psychologist and therapists are telling me....one comment that really stuck with me from yesterday's session, she told me that I have been "abusing my brain" ......and it will take time for it to heal.....months, even years.......a sobering thought.....but you have to realize that any drug even when you switch from one to another.....jacks with your brain, and your brain can't heal overnight.

GOOD LUCK!

Sandman

[pheggie101]

AMEN, looking back at my ex she just changed,plain just changed about 15 years ago when she really got into her addiction. now i know all well people do change, but drastic changes she had,almost like the woman just died and the other one came to light. after all the years of abuse (300-400) mg's of oxy a day fora few years then a final detox after 2 others failed, then on to sub for the last 4 years.............your right, i guess a way to say it is her brain is major "bruised" and may never heal. i know it wont on the sub and i dont think she can ever function without it anyway, her underlying stuff came charging out like a mastedon on steroids. my kids love her so much.........well all i can do is pray and hope,................Jim

[808state]

Hello, ,
New to the site, was hesitant to write down my experience, but need to come clean and relate to perhaps, all of you. I have read all the above and found common ground to feel free to type this.
Never taking Hydrocodone until injury happened, lived at home, mother was taking the horsepill sized hydro for many years. Taking half of one, right after injury, boy it hit me with a euphoric feeling ( no tolerance to any pain killers), since then been taking on and off for 2 years. Never had a withdrawal symptom ( peraps timing of on/off weened me off at the right time ). In January, i was living on my own and the transition of moving out was a bit anxious ( mothers boy ). So when i drove back home to visit i get these anxious feelings and uncertainty feelings within. I pop one to pacify my apprehensions and mask my feelings towards my parents. Do the same on the drive back home. Anyway, it finally hit me one night after watching 24 ( 9pm )EST. went to lay down and all the sudden felt freaking HOT and Nausea and then the panic fell in. Gastrointestinal tract was cramping up and dry heaving, funny thing was that i felt so weak after the acute phase that i would fall asleep from exhaustion. This went on for 3 months but eventually gotten better, The only thing that i feel now is timed events of PAWS that occurs every other weekend ( saturday or sunday ) The anxiety is present but less amplified, I first yawn and have that unstable offset in emotions. Then the hot flashes come, vulnerability is also a key element. My wife says i am a Furnace of heat, she actually has to move off the couch due to my bodies thermal event. These PAWS times really throw you down, when this happens i get the thinking that i am having a prodromal phase of a pre doomed psychotic state waiting to happen. That whats bothering me when i feel these withdrawal states, i read too much like the limbic system and the temporal lobes and the feaking lobotomy hell stories they did back then. I understand that this is off a tangent to many of yous, but please understand that by talikng and getting any feedback does help. I just wish that this yawning ,sweating,loss of sleep ( wake up earlier) anxious feelings would just go away all ready. Its been 6 months now. What the hell. I days that i feel good are real good,,in fact too good, like wax and wan. The funny thing is that I KNOW that this is from the OXY/codone. And i actually force the sweating out by wearing a sweater,( helps me face the symptoms i assume in a positve way)  Been clean since Feb 27th .

Thanks for listening.

[PrettyIs]

Whats PAWS??  Thanks :)

[my-wits-end]

Started this thread a while back and was/am very grateful for the advice and comments I recieved so I thought I'd post an update on the outside chance that anyone wondered what happenned.  

My wife had a pretty massive seizure right in front of me when I got home from work 3 days before thanksgiving...  There may be a book in this but I'll make a very Looooong story as short as I can.    

Call 911

ER.

The look of Shock on the ER doctors face when I handed her my wife's pill bottles.  All legal.  All prescribed.

Physically Stable.  No repeat seizures.   Altered mental state.  Loss of 3 or 4 months memory (she thought our daughter was 5 and in daycare.  She was 6 and in Kindergarden.)

Admission.

6 days in hospital where pnumonia is found

Meds reduced over 5 days to 20mg/day of oxy.

Physical Recovery.

No permanent or noticeable physical damage.  

Straight From a Hospital to a 30 day "Very Prestigious" local addiction recovery and mental health facility.

Was there 1 day.  They lost track of her for an hour and she had a fall and minor injury.  Sent to another nearby hospital.

I just happened to be bringing her things when they were leaving to transport her so I followed to Hospital.

In ER she tries to pull IV and leave to go home.  

I tell her no way.  I tell ER Dr the quick story on her.

Sher tries to leave.

I talk the ER team into Baker Acting her.... Now things get weird...

She is baker acted to the far less prestigious (it's a dump) but amazingly enough a "Sister Facility" to where she spent the 1 day.

She's now in a very very bad place.  Suboxone that does nothing for the pain.  Mental health issues that are a direct link to that pain, and she's now essentially just massivly pissed off and making everyone's life there (nurses mostly) miserable.

So she gets bumped to the "E-wing" where "troublesome" patients" must go.

Yes.  It's a VERY scary place with some scary people.

I literally can NOT get her out but I'm not entirely sure I want to.  In a way I want this to suck for her I want to snap her out of it a little.  But the truth is she got absolutely NO help from them at all except for suboxone.

SO!

Released after 10 days with lots of "advice" but no real help or plan with her VERY real pain OR her mental health status.

Went to see the original "very prestigous" Dr from the first facility at his nearby private practice.  Kept her on Suboxone but it did almost nothing for her pain which at this point was now massive.

He can't seem to separate her highly agitated state from her addiction and essentially refuses to do more.  He insists that suboxone is a very successful pain management medicine.  I go and print out 20 pages of conflicting evidence all from reputable sources and basically blows me off. (There's a LOT more to this but it's lengthy and may result in a lawsuit.)  He's giving her all she'll get. (there was an anti psychotic also but I forget the name and all it did was "surprise" make her more agitated!

SO I wrangled her original family doctor into putting her on methadone.  The legality at this point is questionable because he's doing it for pain management purposes which is tricky in her mental state  

And Bingo.

Calmed down.  Gained appetite.  Gained weight.  Today she's more relaxed and physically healthy than I've seen her in a loooong time.  I just hope that her near super-human tolerance doesn't overcome the large dose of Methadne she's on.  Oh and I'm in control of all meds.

I did however, had an anxiety attack 2 weeks ago but I'll be fine.

As a bit of a vent I have to make a few comments about the way the health care system almost killed and later tortured my wife.  I've obviously left out all the subtlety to her story and there were a LOT of subplots in this.  I talked to a lot more doctors during this process than I even begin to mention here.

There are 2 great forces at work in this country where prescription pain medications are concerned.

On one side there are the "Treaters of pain".  From family doctors to the pain management specialists who are concerned with the relief of pain.  They are almost all overworked.  

On the other side there are the "Treaters of addiction" who in my recent experience are like the man who owns a hammer and sees every single problem that walks into his office as a nail.  They are almost all overworked.  

In my experience working with these 2 sides.  The do not seem to know each other very well.  And they don't seem to care.  They do a nice job perpetuating each other and if you're all one way or all the other at least you know where you're standing.

May God help you if you somewhere in between them..

Thanks again for your support.