Opioid Addiction Affecting 8.7 Million Children
What starts “normal” people down the road to opioid addiction? How is it that people from every background have become hopelessly addicted to opioids? Opioid addiction used to be considered a “lifestyle choice” loosely associated with the homeless.
But then in the early 2000’s, a combination of over-prescribing and increased recreational use of opioids quickly grabbed hold of America, eventually becoming an epidemic.
According to SAMHSA, among the 9.5 million people who misused opioids in the past year, 9.3 million people misused prescription pain relievers compared with 902,000 people who used heroin. No longer is there a demographic amongst opioid drug users. Opioid addiction can and does impact everyone. Opioid addiction is currently affecting almost 9 million children in the USA alone. (source: ncsacw.com)
How and Why People Get Addicted to Opioids
- Post Surgical Pain Relief
Prescription pain medications like Percocet and hydrocodone are prescribed to help with post-surgical pain and discomfort. Not long ago, prescription pain medications were dispensed liberally. This was before the medical community truly understood just how addictive these medications are. - Pleasure
Some people start taking opioids recreationally. Maybe someone at a party offers a friend an oxycodone pill. The truth is, opioids are difficult not to enjoy. Opioids provide a sense of euphoria. The definition of euphoria is “a false sense of wellbeing”. That means the brain is being tricked into thinking and feeling that everything in life is good. But that feeling is short-lived. It will require taking more and more opioids to sustain that euphoric feeling. This is known as a “chase”.
A heroin addict I once knew told me that injecting heroin made him feel like he was “floating like a cloud, with air moving through you”. Who wouldn’t enjoy that feeling? - Anyone Can Get Addicted
Who can get addicted to opioids? Anyone. The euphoric feelings opioids provide are so enticing that anyone who continually uses opioids is subject to getting addicted. The newer synthetic opioids like fentanyl and Nitazene (or, “ISO”) make people even more susceptible to addiction. - Fentanyl and Nitazene are More Dangerous than Ever
Fentanyl is 100-times stronger than morphine. Nitazene is 50-times stronger than fentanyl. Fentanyl is so strong that just two grains of salt worth of fentanyl can be a fatal dose. According to the DEA nearly 100% of street heroin is now laced with fentanyl, along with “fake” or “pressed” counterfeit prescription pain pills that look nearly identical to the real thing.
How much fentanyl is being used in heroin? No one really knows. Not knowing means that every street heroin user is literally just one dose away from overdose. As a result, people are dying from fentanyl overdose every single day.
How Do Opioids Work?
Opioids like hydrocodone, Percocet, oxycodone, OxyContin, heroin and fentanyl “bind” to, and activate the millions of opioid receptors in the brain, spinal cord, and other organs in the body, especially those involved in feelings of pain and pleasure. They strongly reinforce the act of taking the drug, making the user want to repeat the experience over and over and over.
What is Opioid Withdrawal?
Opioid withdrawal symptoms occur when someone either stops taking opioids suddenly or due to a reduction in opioid intake. Withdrawal symptoms include drug cravings, anxiety, restless legs, nausea, vomiting, sudden twitches, diarrhea, sweating, inability to sleep, loss of mental focus, increased heart rate and lack of energy to perform even the simplest of tasks are just a few symptoms of opioid withdrawal.
My Personal Experience with Opioid Addiction and Opioid Withdrawal
It was Fall of 2013. I had been taking opioids daily for over 13 years. What started as temporary relief from lower back pain became a full-blown addiction. Year after year my tolerance rose, taking my habit from only 10 milligrams daily to over 240 mg of oxycodone every day. A dose that will easily kill someone without a high tolerance.
My oldest brother had died from opioid overdose in 2005, and yet I was still naive enough to think, “This won’t be a problem for me. I have this under control.” This is the lie many people tell themselves about their opioid addiction.
I tried to taper myself countless times. The stranglehold opioids have over your brain is incredible. Even if I reduced my dose just 10 milligrams per day, I could feel withdrawal symptoms settle in. The mental aspect of addiction can be every bit as strong as the physical aspect. At the height of my addiction I was taking a 20 mg oxycodone pill every hour of my waking day. Taking any less, and withdrawals would set-in in less than one hour.
From dawn to dusk, all I could think about was “Do I have enough pills? Where can I get more pills? Do any friends or family have any pills? What lie can I tell my doctor to get my prescription filled early?” I was in the midst of a vicious, endless cycle with what seemed no end in sight.
I had reached a place of complete hopelessness and despair. I was willing to do anything possible to end my addiction to opioids, but I was also filled with doubt that ANY treatment program could actually work for me. I had no knowledge of the miracle that Suboxone would provide and even if I had, I wouldn’t have believed it would actually help me. I felt I was a special case – hopeless – which turns out is what many people think about their opioid addiction.
Addition had run and ruined my life. I literally reached a place of peace knowing that if I couldn’t end this cycle of addiction I would rather die than continue living my life addicted.
I checked myself into an inpatient treatment center. I stayed for 14 days, medicated part of the time. They stopped my medications just three days before sending me home. I had no idea what was coming next.
The day I came home from treatment the withdrawals began setting-in. I suffered extreme opioid withdrawal for 13 days and nights without any relief. All day and night I shook from feeling cold, sweated from feeling hot, my body twitching non-stop. I couldn’t sleep due to the twitching, and I couldn’t stay awake from the lack of sleep. I couldn’t eat, and I couldn’t do anything that required mental focus or physical effort. My energy level was so low I could barely get out of bed.
Two weeks of my life were completely wasted due to opioid withdrawal. And, I had always assumed that when the withdrawals ended I would feel better, maybe even feel normal again, but I was very mistaken.
It turns out that taking drugs daily for 13 years, drugs that make you feel like you’re floating on a cloud, is a little bit like not feeling the effects of gravity for 13 years. Without opioids I now felt like I weighed 500 lbs. I could barely lift my arm let alone stand up and walk. I couldn’t do anything but try to sit still. I felt like I’d been hit by a truck and the truck was still laying on top of me. Thanksgiving 2013 I watched my son decorate the Christmas tree without my help. My body ached so much that all I could do was watch.
Feeling heavy and exhausted never really went away. After dealing with it for 6 straight weeks I had had enough. My family missed me. My friends missed me. And I missed me.
I just wanted to feel normal again, at any cost.
Back to the Pills
Despite all that I had gone through to get off the pills, I felt so horrible that going back to taking pain pills seemed like a good idea. I actually made the decision that I would rather be addicted than continue feeling this way.
I returned to my pain doctor and got 2 weeks worth of medications. Far less medication than I had been prescribed just 9 weeks ago, but enough to help me feel better nonetheless.
Immediately I began taking too much. I went through two weeks of pills in only 6 days and was again about to experience horrible withdrawals. There I was again, addicted to opioids and no solution in sight. Inpatient treatment didn’t work, so what’s left for me other than death?
Have You Tried Suboxone?
On January 8, 2014 a friend called to wish me Happy New year. He mentioned a friend of a friend had taken Suboxone and gotten great results. She was clean for the first time in over 10 years. She had gone back to work, was back with her family and doing well.
Doing well? What’s that like? I hadn’t been “doing well” in so long I couldn’t remember what doing well felt like. Maybe, just maybe with Suboxone there’s hope for me afterall. I literally had nothing else left to try.
Suboxone Clinic Near Me
That afternoon, I went online and searched “Suboxone clinic near me”, just like our patients do today to find us. I called and scheduled an appointment for the following morning. I had no idea what to expect and no hope that it would work. I just knew that Suboxone was my last resort, my last hope for ever getting clean and feeling normal again.
I went to the clinic the next morning at 9 AM. The clinic I went to was depressing to say the least. From the moment I opened the door I wondered if I had made a bad choice. After waiting in their lobby for over an hour I nearly left. Just as I was about to leave, the woman at the front desk called my name.
My first Suboxone clinic experience was not a stellar experience to say the least. In fact, it left me feeling more doubtful than ever. Regardless, I had run out of pills and was again about to face withdrawal so I had nothing to lose.
I left the clinic and went straight to the pharmacy. I ripped open the box and quickly put a Suboxone film under my tongue. Feeling a little hungry and also not wanting to go home feeling defeated I stopped to eat a light lunch. That’s when something miraculous happened.
About 10-minutes into my lunch, just 20 minutes after taking my very first Subxone film, I realized something felt very different. In fact, everything felt very different. I felt sharp minded, focused. My withdrawal symptoms had vanished. My legs were no longer twitching, I stopped sweating. I no longer craved taking a pill. And, I was hungry, hungry for the first time in many months.
What had happened? Suboxone had happened! The Suboxone I’d taken just 20 minutes ago had gone into effect leaving me feeling better than I had felt in over 13 years. I literally could not believe how good I felt. For the first time in a very long time I felt normal. Even, happy.
Suboxone restored my hope. I had finally found a solution after 13 years of suffering pain, misery, fear, shame and hopelessness.
Suboxone turned a hopeless person who was ready and willing to die, into a person who is happy, hopeful, driven, and excited about living life again. This is what Suboxone can do for our patients. This is precisely why we are here.
Treatment Costs
As you may already know:
- TennCare patients pay $0 for their treatment and $0 for their medications.
- Patients with commercial insurance often pay a small copay fee per visit along with free or heavily discounted medication costs.
- Self-pay patients who opt to pay monthly spend $370 on treatment costs, and can use www.GoodRX.com coupons to save on medication costs. Average total cost being around $550 per month
If $550 Per Month Sounds Like a Lot of Money, Consider This:
- A person addicted to heroin with a 2 gram per day habit will spend between $120 to $200 per day, or $3600 to $6000 per month.
- A person addicted to oxycodone pills taking 120 milligrams per day will spend $144 per day or $4320 per month.
When comparing treatment costs with street drug prices, treatment can literally save a person thousands of dollars every month. Not to mention, many people sell drugs just so they can afford to pay for their drug habit. Treatment removes them from the very real possibility of going to prison.
Addiction Destroys Families
Often, a family will suffer mentally and financially when a parent is addicted to drugs. The parents will spend most of their money buying drugs instead of taking care of their family. I witnessed a family of 4 who were living in their car due to buying drugs instead of paying rent. Addiction destroys families.
Need a Little Nudge to Help Someone Else Get Into Addiction Treatment?
Always remember that when you help someone into treatment you are:
- Possibly saving a life
- Often helping a whole family
- Saving people money
- Changing the course of someone’s life (and their family)
- Doing the right thing
Recovery Care of Columbia – A Unique Place for Opioid Addiction Treatment
All Suboxone clinics are not created equal. Without having other clinics to compare to, you may never know the differences. Here are just a few things that we feel make us different than other Suboxone clinics near you:
- Kindness: We are kind and respectful to our patients and to each other, no matter what. We intentionally hire kind people with a strong desire to help people overcome their opioid addiction.
- Passion Driven: We genuinely want to help people overcome their opioid addiction, just as we have overcome our opioid addiction.
- Compliance: Compliance is key to great recovery. Abiding by state and federal requirements not only keeps our staff and our patients free from risk, following the many state and federal program guidelines to a “T” provides a clear and consistent path, ensuring every patient is treated fairly on their path toward successful recovery.
- Ethical: We will always choose to “do the right thing” and to do what’s best for the patient, unless in conflict with compliance.
- Cleanliness: Our clinics are always exceptionally clean and comfortable.
- Judgment-Free: We are in recovery too! We do not judge our patients for any reason.
- Technology: We use the state of the art technology to bring our telemedicine Suboxone patients the very same addiction treatment program they would receive inside our clinics.
- Suboxone Medication Delivery: Our lab partner’s provide our patients an invaluable option to have their Suboxone medications delivered to their door. This is not only convenient, it often solves issues that arise with local pharmacies who do not have Suboxone in stock, and/or will not dispense Suboxone to telemedicine addiction patients.
- We’re Privately Owned: We have the luxury of being able to make changes as quickly as needed, without the red tape that often slows down larger, private-equity owned firms. This means we can quickly deploy the most advanced systems, processes and solutions possible, without ever having to wait for a board of directors to make a unanimous decision.
Ready to Begin Opioid Addiction Treatment?
You have only two choices to make:
- Would you like in-clinic or telemedicine addiction treatment?
- Do you have TennCare Medicaid, commercial health insurance, or will you pay out of pocket?
Click an option below to begin online opioid addiction treatment today!