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4622451 tn?1360595255

So here I am again...(long....and fairly boring)

Don't see many off the old familiar names so I'll just start like new. Had to make a new acct anyway because I forgot my acct info. Some of you might remember me... I'm Jimi...and I'm addicted to Oxycodone. Actually I am addicted to anything that ends in "codone", but Oxy is my DOC. when I left Utah, clean several months, many here suggested that I should seek aftercare. I wish I would have listened. I wish I would have done alot of things different though.....

Upon landing back home in Wyoming, I almost immediately began to dabble. Found a great Job running heavy equipment and ended up tearing up my shoulder....to go along with existing back problems. At first my caring Dr had me on Hydro 7.5s. Then upped that to Oxy 15 IRs. Wanna make one thing clear....  I don't blame my Dr. He is really a good guy and gives a **** about his patients. More than once he asked me what my "long term plan" was? My answer was always "to get up and go to work tomorrow". He would shake his head....mutter something about "that was a crappy plan" and write my new script.

This all worked fine in the beginning. Took the meds as prescribed (mostly), I had no pain....slept like a baby....was up for work at 4 in the a.m. every day, feeling great. All was well. Then after 7 good months it started to change. It caught up with me in matter of weeks. The insomnia kicked in, anxiety began.....and then something happened that totally ****** up my life. It's called Psychogenic Hyperventilation Syndrome. Or "over breathing syndrome". Never heard of it? Don't feel bad...neither had I. But after a battery of tests they concluded there was nothing wrong with me physically. In short I am a nut case. I started thinking about my breathing....ALL THE TIME!

I won't go into the details of the symptoms except to say it really *****. With breathing exercises and clonazepam I have gotten better. But this thing has had me out of work since before thanksgiving. I love my job and it's great $$. My boss loves me....and would love to get me back out there. But not until I can assure hime that I won't have some wild panic attack and have to be driven 40 miles, off the mountain, to the ER again.

One thing I could not fail to notice is that I am fine.....all morning long. Until I take my first pain meds. then it starts. Don't know if the meds alter my breathing or if it's all in my head. But one way or the other...I want off these. and this time a few things have changed.  Before I thought I wanted to change. But I really didn't. Maybe I did want my life back....but I still wanted the buzz more than I wanted to change. So why should even I believe myself now? Because with the buzz comes with an added price now. My breathing problems and panic attacks that I am almost sure are due to the pill use/abuse.

That and I have to grand kids now. 7 and 9 months. And I love he little buggers. I live for them... but I don't even actually live anymore. Since I last worked in Nov I just exist. Like a house plant. I stay up until 3-4 and sleep until noon. My $$ I saved over the summer is dwindling. I have no quality of life and I feel like a bum.  Even though I didn't file for UE of workers comp, which I could have, I still feel worthless. I guess this is rock bottom. Not near what some others have had to go through...so I feel embarrassed even saying I'm at rock bottom. But for me, not working...and not really even living...is rock bottom. I am depressed constantly and don't even feel like getting out of bed most days. This life (or lack of) will no longer work for me.

I have spoken to my Dr and we have a taper plan. Unfortunately it isn't fast enough for me. I don't have till spring to whittle this down. I have tapered down to 31/2 - 4 15s a day. Early next week I plan to call him to try to get clonadine and I'm just gonna do it. I hope you people don't mind terribly if I hang around and get a little inspiration while I am waiting. Just reading these posts, by people with more courage than me, has always helped out a great deal.

This time one more thing will change. I will seek aftercare. This is a small town in Wyo where I have a lot of family and everyone knows everyone and what their up to...sort of like living in an episode of Hee Haw.. THAT is why I avoided aftercare last time around. Now I know longer care what  this town thinks or says. Hell, they are already talking about me being a hermit. Wondering I'm not working....why I've left my house 4 times in the last month. I also will tear up my pain contract and admit to my doc that I'm an addict. All I have told him is that I want to decrease my dosage and not live on the pills the rest of my life. If the doctors up on the hill know I'm an addict...it's game over. This town had a fairly big pill problem for years. After it hit the local HS they changed things. It takes an act of god to get pills here now. So admitting my addiction would be a giant plus in beating this thing. Ok....I've babbled enough and probably bored most of you into a well needed nap...thank me later. I just wanted to introduce myself and say that I'll be around.

Peace
-Jimi
49 Responses
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710547 tn?1295446030
OK - here I am again - that Afrin addiction is no ****,  I had chronic sinusitis decades ago when I first moved from Hawaii to KC.  If I didn't have that stuff, my nose swelled completely closed and NO air went through.  I tried to get off multiple times but just couldn't.  I finally went to an ENT who couldn't even see into my sinuses.  She had to put a bit of cocaine on a q-tip at the back of my nose to "open it up".  She assured me that it wouldn't effect me systemically.  

I use flonase now - it's a long acting prednisone based nose spray.  It isn't like taking prednisone orally - I have to occasionally, but hate it.  It's a prescription, but if anyone needs something and doesn't want the hell that is Afrin and the other quick acting nose sprays - try these - there are several types. (Flonase and Nasocort)

Boy - that made me laugh - I remember making my husband go to the drug store to get more Afrin for me.  Also - once when we went to Europe, I had to pack a case of the stuff. lol

I understand your desire to take the leap too.  When you are ready - you're ready, and there's no  better time.  Blessings, Jan
Helpful - 0
4622451 tn?1360595255
Well it's been awhile...2010...since my last CT. But as I recall my nose was runny however not stuffy. This was right smack in the middle of the "swine flu" outbreak btw. And Utah was hit pretty hard by it. I would go to the store to get vitamins or gatorade and people would see me sniffing and wiping my nose... and they acted like I had the black death or something lol. I had one little old lady at Albertons that sprayed Lysol at me as I walked by her in the aisle.

I hope my nose doesn't get stuffy because I need to breathe thru my nose for these breathing exercises I do...for the problem I talked about in my OP.

And I won't use nose spray because I got addicted to that stuff back in like '09. No kidding....You can get addicted to that fast acting nose spray. Afrin or whatever it was. You talk about miserable? Yeah it took me a  month to get over that. And I don't know of anything else that works well.I have allergies as it is....

Anyway. Hope  all is well with you. And everyone else on the board.....cheers.

-Jimi
Helpful - 0
4628837 tn?1364557915
I get the sneezes. Last time I sneezed every two hours three times in a row for two weeks. Started that today , lol, sneezed three times in a row all day, and. But at night, I get so stuffy I can hardly breath.
Helpful - 0
4622451 tn?1360595255
Yeah my Dr in Utah used to give me hycodan syrup for my cough in the winter. They get nasty inversions and real bad air in the dead of winter. I have mild chronic bronchitis.

Of course it worked out that I had a cough....A LOT! Funny how that happens. Man I had more ways to get meds.

But the last times I've gone clean....the cough usually mellowed within a week or so. Along with the runny nose issue. My nose slways gets runny. Like when you go out for a walk in the cold. It's clear....breathing is ok but it runs like a faucet. Ok....glad I'm not the only one haha...

Thanks
Helpful - 0
2107676 tn?1388973859
Yes, absolutely.  It really messes with my lungs and my sinuses too.
I didn't know that the meds were a cough suppressant.  So that explains it.  
Helpful - 0
4622451 tn?1360595255
Thanks lol. Humor is a necessary survival skill right now. without it I' d just lay down on the freeway and call it game lol.

I'll be writing alot. Reading posts here give me some inspiration... That's necessary at this point also. I don't have much of my own.

One quick ? for anyone reading......I am a smoker, not heavy but daily....am I the only one that starts hacking when wds start? I mean I know the meds are a cough suppressant....but I haven't seen it mentioned. So anyone else get that?
Helpful - 0

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