Morphine Sweet Morphine

mmmmm. Morphine. My pain management doctor has put me back on the stuff. I have to admit that there is something so surreal about it. I've always equated morphine with icky things, like hospice care or open heart surgery. As much as I wax poetic about painkillers, I've always felt strange about morphine. So today when my doctor suggested I try it again to help get my nerve pain under control, I was reluctant. She assured me it was a low-dose and then she said, "It's much better to go on the continuous morphine then to increase your percocet. The Tylenol in the percocet is what you need to be careful about. Opiates are not as harmful to the body."

Who would have known? I mean, I feel like people are always talking about the dangers of drugs, and particularly opiates. Isn't it insane to think that Tylenol is actually more dangerous? And yet, I can purchase Tylenol over the counter along with a soda and a pack of gum. We live in a weird society.

I was talking with my mom a while ago about pharmaceuticals. Her and I both have problems with severe anxiety. And her and I both have difficulty getting adequate treatment for that anxiety. After my sister passed away, obviously, my mom was having a really hard time dealing with that loss. She asked her doctor for some Xanax and he acted like she was some drug-seeking fiend. My mom was grieving the death of her daughter and that asshole decided to make her feel like shit for asking for some relief. He offered some bullshit anti-depressant instead, which, of course, didn't do anything to help her. That's what my primary doctor has always offered to me for my severe anxiety and panic attacks in the past, some bullshit anti-depressant. I'd be like, "I'm not depressed. I'm anxious." And he'd say, "Well try this anyway." And then I'd try it and I'd end up eating like a fucking pig, gain weight, and then become depressed. So the anti-depressants always made me feel depressed and I'd still be anxious and unable to sleep at night with uncalled for fears swirling in my brain. Why are doctors so afraid to give people real relief from their problems? Sometimes I think the fear of addiction has caused doctors to not prescribe medications when they are very desperately needed.

And can somebody please tell me what the difference is between needing to take a Xanax every day to control your anxiety and needing to take a Zoloft every day to control your depression? My point is that the former is usually considered an "addiction" and the latter is usually considerd a "treatment of a psychological disorder". Why is one thing slapped with a bad label and the other not? I really don't get the difference at all.

Anyway, I'm very lucky to have found an amazing doctor who takes my physical pain seriously and gives me the medications I need to live a full and productive life. My nerve pain from the mastectomy has been excruciating lately, seriously kicking my ass. And to be honest, I can't help but think it is somehow related to, you guessed it, my anxiety. I've been fretting about this ovarian cyst for weeks now and I have to wait four more weeks for any definitive resolution on the cancer question. (My CA-125 levels were very low, which is pointing in a non-malignant direction. Thank God.) Anyway, maybe if I got on some Xanax I wouldn't be so tense and bitchy all of the time and my body wouldn't react by stabbing me incessantly in the chest. Wouldn't that be lovely?

And now my Morphine is tiring me the fuck out. Have sweet dreams, lads and ladies. You know I will.