“Half
Drugged-up, And Yet...Not Half Drugged-up Enough”
10/07/13
To
my very, very dearest friends, and always loyal readers,
Well…it finally had to happen, I guess.
It took almost twelve years, but I finally made it.
It seems a lifetime, now, but when I first embraced
illness and disability, there was a pain that I could manage.
Oh, the depression, agoraphobia, and panic were
there is full force; but I had—maybe—three different pills for it, and an inhaler.
All around the merry clock, I patiently took my
medications, and they worked, in part, because I still believed they would
work; that in some pharmaceutical conjuring, this, “medicine”, would do the
trick. Restore a kind of health and
balance. Take away the pain. Soothe-away the anxiety. Relieve the depression.
Despite my having nightly, spontaneous panic attacks
that nearly threw me out of bed, I still felt as if a docent’s night sleep had
been arranged.
Why…in those days, I could—with increasing
reluctance—run a list of errands, and even drive my car.
I was forty-eight years old, took what my varied
doctors told me upon faith as, after all…they should, ‘know’. And I believed them.
The year 2006 was one of agony, dread, and
disappointment. My then-shrink swapped
my pills for others (by now, I was taking six or seven of them a day, at set
times during the day) which failed to work sufficiently (along with
withdrawal), that I very nearly lost my mind, and everything dear to me.
I will be sixty years old in just a couple of
fleeting months. Oh my dearest friends,
how I have been etched by agony, passing back and forth through the molten fire
of pain, and the relentlentness of it and the loss of Grace, and in a panicked
suspicion that something…everything is wrong.
I tended-well to that little, evil garden that was
my medications, and watched them blossom into fifteen, then twenty-six, then
(at is is at present) thirty-six different pills, vitamins, supplements. Two inhalers
and two opiates.
At least three times a day, I find my week-long,
pillbox full of either this or that or the other to take.
I lost my the majority of my belief—except for some
waning bargaining rights—in all this shit, and have long-ago lost my respect
for my doctors about the very first time they said, “Well…let’s try THIS, and
see if it helps,” as they reached behind to (usually) a wooden chest full of
drug samples. One quipped,”…that’s why
they call it the, ‘practice’, of medicine.
I dumped his ass just as soon as I could find
another.
But especially in these past four years of heavy
duty so-called, ‘Pain Management’, never ONCE did I fool-around with my opiate,
recognizable, I hope, by referring to it as the, ‘big ‘M’’.
Until
late last week.
On Thursday, I found myself quite awash in
unutterable agony, pounding and pounding migraine, shaking, sweating, crying…yes,
crying-out to God, to His Son…to, well, anybody I thought would listen.
There are times when pain becomes an almost, ‘out of
body’, experience; I could not move. I could not keep my eyes open.
Regrettably—though—I had already taken the opiate
not two hours before, and in my full-flung flight for some kind of major
relief, absolution, or just plain oblivion, I staggered into bed.
It
was just 6:30 PM.
It’s like a thing one deep-down knows one shouldn’t
do, but, hell, I took yet another one; certainly—I thought—safely not-enough to
overdose.
Up and down, here and there I was dragged in and up
and out of a light but tortured sleep; I began to see exploding stars behind
closed eye lids.
The pain ricocheted off every wall and all around
the room.
I panicked. I threw-myself from side to side in a
bed I was now roasting in.
Pleas followed prayers, and I was sorry for
everything.
There are those levels of Hell we can only imagine,
and those, we can only see too well.
Maybe it was somewhere around dawn, that—still in a
mass of pain, but too exhausted now to care very much—I finally fell into a fitful
nap.
The night had been a side-show circus of horrors.
And
what, my most precious friends, did I learn?
Reluctantly, I guess that there will always be some
greater depth of pain that—to my utter disappointment—nothing will touch. What to do, then, but…to endure…endure, with
eyes tightly shut and fists clenched.
It’s O.K. to argue with God; I think He understands.
But to you, my dear, dear friends my loving caution
to please never, ever, never play freely with your medication, self-dosing at
will, in pursuit of need.
At least the pharmacy gives you guarded parameters
on dosage and frequency. Please, please
heed them well. I would not ever wish
you any more distress than you have now.
In wishing for myself, I also wish so much for you:
No pain, or if it must be…lessened pain; deliverance
from financial need, distress or despairing.
I wish for you balmy, bright, and untroubled days,
and afternoons of contemplative quiet.
May you always be in-full surrounded by family,
friends (or, pets!), who—frankly—adore you, and love you for the very special
person that you are.
I
would be remiss if I did not speak to you of my gratitude in your having
befriended me; you cannot know how that gladdens my heart.
And then I would wish you dreamy, comfortable, and
blissful sleep. True and restorative,
and—as ever—kept safe and watched-over by gentle angels.
Please,
please know that I think about you often, and so fondly, and that I love you
dearly!
‘Zahc’/Charles
P.S. A glance at my Profile (at MDJunction) has
revealed a new feature: apparently now, all of my diary entries—almost all,
from the beginning—can be perused at your convenience.
Should you so choose, your comments would be so
very, greatly appreciated; their often what helps me get-though a day.
