Marijuana as wonder drug

[bufo marinus]

Thanks for your interesting article Jess. Good Shit

All the best RobbieGanlaSeed, I remember you from Cannagenetics., your a good dude rob, I know you were a good friend to Heather. Bong on mate

[pipeman]

The generalisations people have made in this thread about Doctors is not true. They don't blindly believe what pharmaceutical companies tell them, and they certainly don't believe cannabis is more dangerous than opiates.

 

Robbie I agree with what you said Doctors can't prescribe or recommend cannabis without putting themselves at risk but I'm not talking about that, I'm talking about Doctors who think cannabis is a dangerous drug. Sure there are some stupid Doctors who believe the hype. Stands to reason that a proportion of societies stupid people are Doctors, you just need to try to dodge them.

[DownUnderDoper]

Both my (and Mrs DUD's) doctor and pharmacist know about my cannabis use, how much I use and why I use it.. whilst neither can officially condone it, off the record they both admit that when eaten or vaped it is less harmful, more effective and less likely to cause side effects than many drugs that they could legally prescribe, to either of us.

 

It may be coincidence that both are in their 50's so have been around the traps long enough to realise that much of the hype is just that.

 

As for Dr Hayllar, the very fact that he is head of DDU makes his statements about cannabis unsurprising.. most doctors in similar positions would say the same, how many cannabis users who are not having some sort of serious problems end up seeing doctors in such units? They can only form opinions from the patients they are treating.

[Zaknefain]

only thing that cured me when i had the flu

[RobbieGanjaSeed]

Bufo Marinus hey there. I haven't spoken with Heather for so long I often wonder how she is worry about her like. She was in the firing line there for a while hey.

Do you know if she's well?

 

Pipeman I know where you're comming from about generalisations with doctors and I know you have personal knowledge of the scene and given your own values can only assume those doctor/s you're familiar with are good ones. I have no doubt there are good doctors.

 

And "good" is a totaly subjective term isn't it. I mean someone looking for a huge supply of speed or opaites on a legal front would classify any doctor that prescribes without question as "good". yet that very same definition has killed people.

The last long term GP I had was certainly a great doctor even though he took my daily does of oxy from 40mg x 2 a day right up to an equivelant of 2000mg morph per day; he did it for good reasons. He saw the situation I was in was untreatable and just did all he could to releave my situation in spite of danger to himself legally. He's a great bloke. He's now on serious restrictions on his licesnce for the way he freely prescribed such drugs. Not just to myself but I believe he was a bit of a pushover to people simply chasing drugs on the system.

 

But what I mean by him being a great doctor is he took his own experience (huge amounts) and treated each person accordingly and I regret loosing him as a doc. BTW he detesetd marijauna and advised everyone of the serious dangers it poses. So even though he's probably the second best doctor I ever had he was still wrong on that point. So a great understanding well expereinced and caring doctor doesn't automatically make him right on everything and if I changed doctos based entirely on his view on pot I'd be doing myself a dis-service. These things have to be taken into account on ballance a dogmatic view that due to some GP having a hang up about grass making him or her unsafe is a bit extreme.

Conversely a GP I once saw continually advised me to stop using opiates (at a stage I could have done so) and use more pot. He even said he would appear in court if needed to advise the beak I'd had this discussion (although made it clear he wouldn't say he told me to do so). He was arrested a while back for molesting a young boy in the exmination room with child porn in his drawers.

I'm just thinking of earlier when you said you'd change doctors if one told you pot was more dangerous than opiates because you don't know what else they could get wrong.

I think it's a highly confusing area for people to underdstand who aren't in the know in some personal way and it can hardly be a watershed issue on their abilities or general character.

Hell I know people these days who smoke that are starting to belive the crap about mental health symptoms and are often citing some crap about hydro being more powerful than bush buds or the chemicals in hydro grass is sending people around the twist etc.

(I usually just tellthem if this is true then we're all in danger because everythig from our tomatoes to monbulk jam is now grown withthe same chemicals). But just goes to show how people can be mistaken on these issues and still be fine in other ways.

 

As for GPs being tools of phamacy companies in the course of the last 10 years or so I've seen many more GPS than anything like the avergare person would (at one stage 3 times a week for 4 years) and I sincerely believe the standard of caring docotros is falling right before our eyes. Those who do care are almost impoissble to get in to se because the comunity values them so highly. That's certainly not to say there are not good careing doctors they're just not as common as they used to be.

 

I thouroughly believe many GPs do no more than prescribe what the chem companies tell them. A doc observes certain symptoms prescribes the drugs their rep reccomends for this season's specific list of said symotoms and anything harder than that is punted on to a specialist.

One doctor I saw in Northern NSW actually took out a book and simply checked what symptoms you had against the drugs his company offered and prescribed that way. Of course there's valid reasons why a doc would do that too.

 

At the stage (until very recently) I was seing a doctor 3 times a week for over 4 years the first appointment post lunch was reserved for drug company reps. If these guys aren't coached so directly by the drug company reps why are so many meetings with them needed? Each drug company saw this one doctor every week. 3 different companies all constantly inthe doctor's office. Couldthey possibly be releasing new drugs that frequently? I would say doctors meeting this fequently withthe pharmacy reps is common only that I was in the doctor's office almost daily allowed me to see what man people never would. I think a lot of strange stuff goes on in that relationship.

 

I once saw a shrink (public health system ina private hospital) behind the reception desk was a stack of boxes of the very same phyc drug. Samples I assume. There were thousands of them. I knew what I would be prescribed before I even set foot inhis door and is exactly what I was given. How many people over the years have we all known on some kind of anti-depressant? What's amazing to me is how they're nearly aways onthe same drug (or drug name alternative).

 

My fave doctor was Dr. Bruce Carr. He opened his office at 8 am and was frequently still there that time in the PM. His dinner was served up to him while he researched cases he was unsure of and were ongoing. He'd do his daily exersize on an exersize bike while he watched the news his wife video recorded earlier for him. His office was his house and it was heavily planted with organic fruit trees. He did so mcuh for people I wonder what drives the man from one year to the next. And he had to cover an area of patients from Balckbutt to Nanago west to Dalby (40km one way and about 70km the other). He helped do rounds a couple times a weel atNanago hospital and was the gov doc for all accidents deaths etc.. There were twoother GPs in Nanago neither worked either a full week or a full day; theywere semi-retired. Seeing a doctor can take 2weeks!

This just 2 hours drive nth west of brisbane 2 hours from Noosa..why is he on his own covering such a huge area? Certainly not for lack of business. He told me himself (when I asked why he didn't geta locum to give him a holiday) that doctors don't want to live in the sticks (this was hardly the sticks Imean just 2 hours from bris!) because the opportuity for hob-nobbing was non-existent. I was told ths by a neurologist I saw at Kingaroy who's wife had left hi becuae other doctor's wives all got to hang out together in cliques of social dinners etc..

Seems there wasn't enough social distinction opportunities to attract any doctors so dramatically into the "bush" so the concept of doctors entering the profession to care for humanity wears a bit thin these days. I'm sure some do after all take Dco Carr as I just mentioned and I would dare say the doc you are thinking of too pipeman.

 

I'm not saying one and all doctors are bums but I think they're on the increase.

 

Downunder you're dead tight in what you say about the advise needed to be given in the environement of drugs of adiction centres. but don't make the mistake of thinking everyone in these treatments are lost junkies who have doctors worried about their every move. Many people who are not privately insured such a smyself and aren't the type to sue employees unwarrnted (sucha s myself) are given opaites for treatment of pain which may well (and usually is) dealt with surgically or some other more expensive way. They (we) end up on huge doses and are by law simply required to be listed withthe unit. I choose to withdraw and set a goal of zero wanting to be free of opiates asap so I could get back into college/uni mainly. But simpy to be free of opaites essentially.

Just last week they "raised" my dose back up from what I was on because they detected the pain I was going through (which I had said not a word about) was fairly wrecking my life. I was virtually needing to be carried into the office to have my meetings.

 

SO while you're right about the patients these DDU blokes see being different from the avergage patient it's also true it's the highest likelihood of the medical fraternity being in direct contact and open and free conversation regarding the use of drugs such as pot for pain.

 

(You'd be forgiven for thinking the "pain clinic" would be the most likely point of contact) . I used to be a pain clinic patient but due to problems with the hospital system I've been waiting over two years for a fresh appointment for accute and urgent pain needs. The DDU (drugs of dependancy unit) has taken over the overflow as mentioned nothingmuch is done for public patients anyway so why not pass them (us ) straight onto the drugs of dependanct guys who's job wholely and soley is to watch people using drugs of dependancy don't accidently kill themselves from un-monitored amounts of the drugs prescribed for said pain conditions basically.

 

So you're right about them not being the average doctor seeing the average patient but since originally being diagnosed with my back condition I've gone from having more than the average number of doctors (secretly) suggesting pot as an alternative to opiates to it now being a rare very rare suggestion at all. I've never been backward in admitting using pot either for pain or for fun to a doctor. Seeing how many I've seen in this last ten years specifically to do with severe pain I feel my take on it is probably fairly acurate.

 

Not sure what you mean about

how many cannabis users who are not having some sort of serious problems end up seeing doctors in such units? They can only form opinions from the patients they are treating

. Just trying to figure out how many doctors would be chatting witht thier patients about their need for pot for their medical condition if they weren't in some kind of serious problem? Seems like a catch 22.

A doctor/patient relationship without serious medical issues discussing their need for pot as a medicine seems highly unlikely anyway. And the opinions formed by the doctors treating at the DDU is based not onthe patients they're dealing with rather their understanding of the drugs they're dealing with.

Anyway..

 

 

cheers

rob

 

PS turns out it wasn't an accidental OD. I asumed it was because I could think of no other reason why I "went down" so badly. Sometimes you forget that you've already taken a dose and so take it again hence double dosing. As it turns out I have a blood sickness again and rather than an OD I was in shock. Last time it happened I spent 3 days in hospital over xmas with staph in my blood. It's caused by the infection in my lower legs (extremeties). They've gone so bad they look like amputation material but they've looked that bad (worse in fact) before.

 

Just thinking about diagnosing neuopathy one of the problems is the syptoms wane and wax they feel like a thousand cigarette ash sparks constantly landing on my lower legs. (don't gte me wrong not looking for sympathy just explaining how it works).

 

There's also something that can develop from untreated paintoo called brain atrophy. Not 100% accepted by all doctors it seems like other muscles the brain can suffer atrophy and I often wonder of grass might be a good treatment for this too. Even if it can't stop the pain etc it keeps one's mind really working hard doesn't it.

 

Anyway just a thought.

 

cheers

[pipeman]

yeah robbie obviously your case is extreme what I say mostly relates to GP's in general, as I have known a few on a personal level for many years.

 

some doctors were known to freely prescribe addictive drugs. if a drug addict comes in trying to con a prescription, if you refuse you will likely have a lengthy argument/confrontation on your hands. While if you give them what they want, you have a quick easy solution and everyones happy. Whats more, if you get a reputation in the drug community of being an easy mark, more and more of your regular patients will be simple prescriptions. Its easy medical care, no complicated treatments of decisions, and its bloody good business, got a steady supply of patients and they all quick an easy. And who is to say its not ethically the best medical treatment for these people anyway? It would be easy to justify it to yourself I imagine.

 

Of course, you need to be morally bankrupt to operate in the way I described above, but it happened to some extent, and as Robbie pointed out with new auditing procedures in recent years there has been a crackdown. Now Doctors are more cautious about doing anything out of the ordinary because they don't want their profile to pop up on the radar.

 

In terms of the drug companies, yes they do put on lunches and dinners, even weekends away. I know surgeries who have lunch provided for their entire staff every day, they just keep a roster of drug reps and have a different one booked for each day of the week. This may seem sus but its not really, its just the only way the drug companies can get the ear of the doctors to plug their products. Doctors don't get kickbacks, and they don't sell the drugs. a busy Doctor is making $300,000 a year you really think he is going to compromise his medical practices for a free lunch? ok, some would, but mostly it doesn't happen. Remember Doctors are just human beings like the rest of us, most are reasonable people, while some are pure evil.

 

And remember no drug gets prescribed by any Australian Doctor unless it has passed clinical trials, no matter how many free lunches were purchased. as most people know a lot of drugs are just the same thing under a different brand name, so from a medical point of view it might not matter which one you prescribe. and when you rock up to the chemist with the prescription they usually ask if you want the generic brand for cheaper don't they?

 

In terms of country Doctors, its not just doctors mate its everyone. Most people don't want to live in the country, especially when you're a young couple. You've just gone to med school, which means you've lived the last 6 years of your life in the city, thats where all your friends are, of course you don't want to move out bush.

 

I agree with what you are saying about the standard of Doctors and medical care declining. I know a surgery that puts a condition that all Doctors have to speak fluent english and it usually wipes out 50% of the applicants. the selection and training of doctors in Australia is a joke.

[RobbieGanjaSeed]

I don't begrudge anyone getting taken care of by the companies they front but I just think it has the potential to create very lazy "doctoring" why bother keeping up with study etc if you can just ask the drug company rep. But as you said it'll only effect the slack ones and they're always going to be piss poor doctors for whatever reason.

 

And the reps! ManI don't know about elsewhere but the drug company reps around here are beautiful women!

 

As for the insitence of a doctor speaking elglish I spoke earlier of a doctor wanting to place me on fentayl believing it to be a less severe opiate!

She's Indian and i mean very Indian. I know I'm no racist so I don't feel this has anything to do with race but it has to do with religion.

She prescribed heavy drugs for 4 months before she took my blood presure and only then at my insistance. Another doctor had examined my eyes to diagnose conjunctavitis my daughter had brought home from school and passed on to me. I had to go to another doctor for this as my indian doctor wouldn't touch me to examine my eyes.

I found my blood pressue had gone from it's normal low side of things to skyrocketed to 158 ove 128!

No wonder I felt ike my face was exploding and a whole variety of weird stuff. Partly from putting on so much weight and partly from having such a severwe withdrawla re-action I was onthe verge of a heart attack for 4 months all the while she was advising me to exersize to loose weight!

Other things happened like she abused me in front of my litle girl who I had taken for a sore throat her telling me I was broke because Ithatw as my "atation" in life. She told me we got what we deserved and things got really wired. The copnjuntativitis returned still wouldn't touch me..

 

In the end she sacked me as a patient. Turns out she could "tell" I was "untouchable" caste. and it offended her to deal with povertyand sickness in someone with such bad karma. That's the abbreviated explanation but that's whathappened.

Man it blew me away. Wouldn't take my blood pressure because she didn;t want to touch me.

So not just speaking english but the cultural differences can cause real trouble too.

 

As it turns out the "journalist" who exposed dr. pattel said at least had a lisence during his investigations with no more acces to things than you or I he uncovered 13 doctors in Qld that were hired (mainly inthe hospital system) that didn't have qulaifications. SOme with none atall.

Most it seems were from continental India so my experiencewas scarey. I'm still wondering if I sahould have her investigated. I would hate to think she caused the death of an infacnt because she didn't like the paremt's karma or something.

 

cheers

rob

 

PS. I took some pics of my lower legs infections if anyone's morbid enough to want to see. But my computer is total crap at present and I'm using my step son's computer to write this and I can't dowload my pics onhis puter. but soon enough I'l get them up.

 

cheers

[RobbieGanjaSeed]

Well I feel a little like the elephant man, but here goes. This is what happens with enough weird nerve damage, and strange brain responses, call it what you may. I had gone almost a year since having a bad re-action on my legs like this, so it took my surpise, and rather co-incideental with it happening while it was being raised in discussion I think. Usually it's just bad pins and needles, with burning sensations on my thighs. But I suppose life's gota keep throwing things at ya to keep ya attention huh?

 

I had thought I'd had an accidental OD the other day, but when the redness and combined darkenss appeared on legs, and the burning began again, I knew I had just gone into a shock type state.

 

People sometimes see this and mistakenly believe it's a sugar diabetes complaint, but I'm frequently tested for sugar levels, and do glucose tolerance tests, because so many GPs have never come across the problem before, which is another reson why these diagnoses all get a little grey around the edges.

My blood sugar levels, and colosterol are better than average, which is re-assuring when ya overweight. Still, here's the pretty pictures.

 

The feeling is like having your lower legs painted with battery acid, or climbing with green ants or maybe cigarette sparks constantly falling on ya. It's hard to deal with.

 

cheers

rob

[RobbieGanjaSeed]

Auspamp, I'm terribly sorry I missed your mention of this originally

 

I reckon it was mostly psycosamatic<sic>, and he was just addicted to opiates

,

but I just re-read your post and realised somthing. You may have menat that your dad was having drug seeking signs, feeling exagerated pain, in an uncontrolled cycle of the begining of addiction, or you may have actually meant he was possibly psycosamatic.

 

Both are legitamate pains/ill-nesses and need to be understood for the patient's benifit, and those that care for them.

 

I always thought psycosomatic meant it was "all in ya head", kinda making it up, but really believing it. So far as I understand it, that would better be described as "hypocondriac" or some such spelling. I'm not saying this applies to your use of the word, just saying what I always thought until not so long ago.

 

But I found it interesting to discover that to suffer a psycosamatic disease is to suffer a genuine disease. Chairman Mao suffered a psycosamatic condition, that caused him to be bed ridden, his legs swelled and he suffered measurable true symptoms.

I don't know much about it all, but apparently it's a condition where-by your body responds to your brain telling it there's sickness in a particular place, and as morpheus explained so well in the matrix, "if what we see, smell, touch and feel are simply electrical responses from our brains- just what is real?" (or words to that effect). So hyperthetically, if ya brain tells ya you have a cancer, even though at the time you don't spycosamatic wouldmean that your brain will grow the cancer there for the sake of it.

i don't know if that's ever actually happened as scuh, but is how I understand spycosamatic.

 

So it's not like hypocondria, where the person simply thinks they have something and interperates any sign at all as a symptom, it is a true and genuine condition that is generated by our brains somehow.

 

This means a person could easily have no physcial evidence of a illness, yet still suffer it and never be believed, and I imagine in the public health system in particular, this happens all the time.

 

On the other hand, if he was recieving opiate injections, and you think the constant trips in were to get another injection, and suspected the intense pain was a trick of his mind, to satisfy an early addiction, this can be understood too. Andnot in terms that some medical workers might describe it unflaterringly.

 

When we feel pain, it's because our brain's pain receptors have responded to a pain message travelling up into our brains and telling us so. The idea of pain block medication, is to fill the receptors of our brains with so much opiate, (which fits the key and lock recptors for pain so perfectly it's just nuts), that when our injury tries to send a signal to our brains that it's being further injured, there simply are no more receptors in our brains to recieve the message. That they're "all filled up" with morphine or whatever opiate of choice, and the pain signal goes by without finding aplace in our brain to call "home" and annoy us.

Kinda like a person wanting to deliver amessage to you, but one of ya kids ranting into each ear, and no ear spare to hear the message trying to get through.

 

Problem though, we're not machines, and our bodies realise something's up, pain being essential to stop us from antagonising the injury, our brains very quickly create new pain receptors (create anew ear to hear the message), hence, making a new home for that genuine pain signal to find a home,and nag us with the awful feeling of pain.

So now, instead of (for arguement's sake) of having a million pain receptors, we have filled them with opiates, and now have one million and one hundred pain receptors. (not 2 ears, but 3!)

So next time we have an injection to stop pain, we need more opiates to fill the extra receptors; this is part of what's known as "tolerance" ie, the need for more to do the same job.

I know this is easily understood by everyone and I don't mean to belabour the point, but there's a side to this that most don't quiet grasp how distressing it is to the patient.

 

Now imagine we have the (no such thing)"standard" amount of pain receptors in our brains, and all day our brains recieve signals to some extent or another that we're in pain. Maybe we've just got a nail through our foot, or maybe we've just sat on the left cheek of our arse tool ong at the computer desk and our brain is telling us to swap cheeks.

 

Now that we have increased the amount of receptors we have in our brains, we now also increase how much we sense the pain. so what wouldnormally hurt to some extent, now is excruiating pain, and needs to be dealt with in all the real sense as if it is real and excruiating pain.

Imagine if the ear senario were real, and your dad had now grown 30 new ears, every single little sound would be amplified and his brain overwhelemd with sounds not normally noticed he'd be going insane. This is very accuate to how it feels. Some would look at a pain patient and withthe same sympathy as they wouldh ave for a sick fish, believe the "drug seeking" that's becoming apparent is a character flaw, but if a person truly had 30 ears and was experiencing the explosions of sounds this would bring, more might be able to relate to what's being experienced and feel more comapssion than otherwise. (Not thinking you, just in general).

 

Unfortunately this just keeps increasing, and each day, regardless of what xrays, or any other evidence is used shows, all sensations previously tolerable are now intolerable and are as real as the day is long. trying to now understand what's causing the pain would be like measuring the decibles in the room, and wondering why the person is disturbed, jsut because they have 30 ears. The sound seems reasonable to me...

 

Understanding this really helped me from loosing my mind, wondering why pain was so intense when I went through my first withdrawal.

 

People think that to stop using opaites and to deal with cravings is akin to desiring food and being hungry, yet not allowed to have any. I know most people understand that "somehow" it 's more "uncomfortable" but it seems that most ignorantly believe it's a matter of simple self denial, "craving" in a head sense.

 

But what's happened to your father, is that as each time his brain has increased the amount of receptors he has grown to again sense the pain, he's made a new style of pain he has to deal with complety apart from the one he began with, i.e. the bad back. So he has not only one pain sensation, and not even two, but three different and indepant experiences now tormenting him.

Very few people who even experience all this know what they're going through, and are simply in agony and confused.

 

Fortunately, as quickly as our brains multiply our receptors to deal with the increase in opiates, our brains also destroy these excess receptors back to a "normal" level when we deny ourselves the opiates. Problem is though, he has to experience pain at the new increased levels, and not give in to the pain with opiate treatment to have the brain destroy the receoptors. So every minute of suffering a person experiences in this withdrawal (which happens daily for a person on opiates), some receptors are "killed off" and you get closer and closer to having a normal amount of receptors and no longer suffer the increased sensations of pain.

 

But what's happening is a very serious re-arrangement of brain chemistry physically, and has little to do with personality, or charatcer, desires or wants. Many opaite addicts I know detest the feeling of opaites, but are ina cycle they can't get off. I'm one of these. I hate the constant "smacked" feeling; but at times I'd crawl over broken glass to stop the physical symptoms; and that's what all this is aimed at trying to explain. It's not just as some try to understand it as "in the head", "imagined" or worse yet as some might accuse "invented" simply to get hold of more junk..

 

Please don't think I feel this is you, it's just what I've had to deal with at times over the years.

Your statements earlier just prompted me to perhaps explain what he was/is experiencing.

 

As you can imagine, destroying brain cells at a rate of millions per minute (and these cells are very closely indicated with all the dopamine, and other depression" cells), the daily downfall (withdrawal/come down or whatever other name used), involves a sitaution where until it's completed, the pain he has in injury form is increased in real terms in accordance to how many extra receptors he's grown (and this is highly individual) AND is in the worst kind of depression you can imagine. So if he's doubled his receptors, then untreated with opaites, he is truly experiencing double the pain. Just like if he's doubled the amount of ears he's grown, then he hears double the sounds. It's terrible to go through.

And this isn't just when trying to completely stop and get clean, this happens each and every day at the end of the last dose that's been used and is now gone. So long as you actually wait untilt he previous dose is completely gone, and if you don't (meaning this is experienced several times a day), then that climb into higher and higher doses happens very quicklyindeed. Higher doses, means more receptors, means more pain, and simply all I said, only happening quicker, higher, heavier.

So you experience this godlessly sick event every 4-6 hours as the dose expires, or you "top up" before going through the drying out and make matters much, much worse in the long run (long run can mean simply a few days time, or can mean several years later, but ultimately when you want to stop altogether).

Drying out involves deep, constant spewing, cramps like you can't believe, anxiety like your nerve ending have caught fire, ...so you can see it's something that people like to put off with another simple dose.

 

"Drying out"/"withdrawing" comming down", weather from years of this, or just days; is also complicated by anything that would normally not be registered as pain, will now be so, which explains why people with no history of back pain often experience debilitating back pain while comming off heroin, and also dealing with the mind bending experience of having your brain re-arranged in real time as you try to live out life, which because of the closeness these recetors have to your depression/anxiety emotions, is realised in terms of feeling like every nerve ending in his body will be feeling like it's being pulled out of his body by a wild cat.

 

He will have suffered all this, not being able to understand it with the simple claims to doctors, family and freinds with " I'm in pain", because as you can see, it's quiet a lot to explain to someone.

 

Anyway, thought I'd just try to shine some light on what can sometimes be seen as psycosamatic, sometimes as hypochondria, sometimes as even lieing behaviour from a more internal view. I hope I didn't complicate matters.

 

Best if pot can deal with a person's condition, that they stay right away from opiates for sure.

That's not to say pot can always replace opiates, but if people were educated at what opiates do in the brain, and what even light opiate treatment means when it's finished in returning to normal (and many GPs themselves don't understand); I wonder how much pain we'd put up with before we took pain killers.

But once started, that cycle is real, and very, very painful. It's very real to say that opiates increase pain levels, which is odd when they're just not understood that way by the general public.

 

My wife or kids go for simle OTC coiede, and I freak out on them. It starts so easy, and is so hard to have even the closest of loved ones understand.

 

cheers

rob

[pacificrim]

my doctor encourages me to smoke weed.

i have such a history of drug abuse that he says it's about the only thing i can take regularily & not have a serious withdrawl from.

if i tell him i've only been smoking weed he gets happy.

my doc' is a drug doctor who treats ppl on methadone/bupe/etc/etc & those who went thru the absolute hell it takes to get off said methadone/etc.(ie>me).

 

i abuse/d drugs from my early teens then had a serious m/bike accident & a yr later an even more serious work related accident.

i'm in constant pain these days & it's hard to work out which pain is from what accident or if i'm just keen to get high,,,again.

 

i chose to get on methadone initially to stop all the pain i was/am in & to stop paying for harder drugs but i found the withdrawl to make heroin withdrawl a (relative) walk in the park.

i'd sooner have 4 m/bike accidents in a row than have to go thru methadone withdrawl.......................i'd have 2 m/bike accidents rather than go thru heroin withdrawl.

one time i got a heroin habit purely to get rid of the methadone habit coz i could kick the gear easier than the meth. (+ it meant a month of heroin).

i found the only non-opiate thing that helped me get thru withdrawl was lots of weed & lots of showers.

i can't begin to describe the pain of a h'core 3 week withdrawl followed by at least a year of feeling just shit..........if u have been thru it u know the score,if u haven't ur very lucky & should stay that way.

 

the reason i'm trying to grow weed now is to stop me using harder drugs to mask pain & make me feel normal.........+ i love weed anyways so it helps me keep my mind busy.

i feel if weed was legal like smokes are i'd be a much saner person.

it's easier for me to score any hard drug but weed always is a chore to get if i want to smoke high quality gear.

i know weed isn't the answer to everything but it has helped me plenty.

 

robganjaseed, dude, that's a LOT of gear u have @ ur disposal.

i'd be a mess if i was to go cold turkey on that much gear.

i knew a guy who had some brain tumour & he had access to the high end pharms u get.

i used to kinda envy him in a perverse way coz he got all his gear for cheap & didnt ever run out or have dealer issues.

w' my history of drug abuse no doctors ever believe anything i say.

i can't get a valium these days.............i suppose that;s a good thing.