I have been straddling this issue for 32 years. At one point i stopped using painkillers for 4 years. Other times would go months at a time and maybe only 2 week binge. Bottom line is at age 11, I read somewhere in some associated assigned reading for school that "a truly self-actualized being will use drugs to improve the quality of their life, only for positive reasons, not to escape or denigrate their humanity."...something to that effect anyway...imho that quote is scary~~
Soooo here we are thirty-something years later after experimenting with everything available on this earth as a child, (and maybe some things that are no longer available)...and I find myself arguing a no-win argument with my detox Dr. that i really need counseling for the depression and anxiety and have only been "self-medicating" to get through the all-nighters required by life when you have multiple life/death situations hit you all at once for a period of 9 years...i agree with your detox doc, if we have any MI one has to address it too. i'm bipolar and until we treated the alcoholism as well as the bipolar i was caught up in a vicious cycle. treating both has allowed me 20 years sobriety and a fairly stable bipolar. I think the meds for depression are worse than a couple vic's in the morning and a couple 8 hrs. later.vics cause depression as a side effect. puts you on a roller coaster. if you use them in place of your meds you're "shooting yourself in your own foot".if I got on ok like this for YEARS at a time and only recently needed more to stay productive and stable emotionally am I really addicted? Yeah, says the doc...you've got a 32 year history. None of my so called "friends" can cop and keep it for weeks at a time...None of them can believe that I do...there are many patterns of addiction. just because you don't use all the time, doesn't mean you're not addicted, imho. those drugs have a half life in your body meaning the drug is still in your body even if you don't use for a period of a time.
I guess I'm writing on here now because NOTHING is helping get my life back on track after death, bankrupcy, abuse, alzheimers', raising a child alone, becoming a caretaker, losing my home, losing my business, losing my dreams, losing my retirement fund....i mean, c'mon - do you guys ever watch "House?" Somedays are just beyond functioning when you've a history of producing a productive life....and it's all gone, and you hafta start from scratch again.getting off the drugs like vic will enable a clear head to deal with your life as it stands now. old saying-we used when the dog lived, we used when the dog died. ppl addicted can always find an excuse to use.



omg