Thanks, bp. I remember reading back in the late 70s that heroin addicts were known to claim that, even after being off it for years, that the craving for it never completely goes away. This was in a publication by a very respected nonprofit organization. Heroin, of course, is an opiate. This is why I think it's silly that doctors have defended overprescribing opiates by saying they weren't aware of how addicting these drugs were. Opiates are not something new. They've been around for centuries. As a student nurse in 1977, I was taught about the lethality of these drugs, which depress the body's drive to breathe. I was surprised at how many Vicodin tablets my doctor ordered for me when I first complained of neck and back pain. Politicians seem to want to villify the pharmaceutical industry for the opioid addiction epidemic . . . like they had some new information that they withheld from doctors and the public. It's like we are just realizing how addictive these drugs are, and we're just figuring out how lethal they can be. None of that should be news to anyone.

It does seem that doctors became a lot more open-handed in prescribing opioids in recent years. That seems to me to correlate with a movement starting in the 60s and 70s that said patients have a right to pain relief, and that pain is as bad as the patient says it is. Another factor, I think, is that alternative forms of analgesia have been found to come with their own very serious risks. Tylenol is awfully poisonous. NSAIDS, from aspirin to Motrin to prescription versions like Indocin, can cause bleeding ulcers. Opiates - if you don't overdo them - may actually be safer than aspirin or Tylenol. So their usage took off.

I think your dream is evidence of the hold that a drug in this category has over the mind of a person who becomes habituated to it. My initial post here gives similar evidence. The big question is where do you draw the line between appropriate use and abuse. Another issue is: Should we be just expected to consider pain part of life and something we have to put up with? I have trouble with that because I don't do well with pain. I feel I shouldn't have to put up with it when it can be remedied. But I do have to ask myself if I'm creating another, maybe bigger, problem.