Tuesday, March 25, 2008

Not in America

It has been a while since I have posted anything. Lately I have just opened it up and looked at all of the posts I have made night after night and then just close the blog again. Frankly I am tired of being in pain, tired of sitting up until 4:00P.M. in the morning because I am in to much pain to sleep. You will have to forgive me tonight because I certainly don't feel like writing about pain. I keep asking myself over and over, how could this be happening in this country, a country that so many men and women have fought and died for to protect our freedoms.

I myself am a veteran of one of those wars. There have been instances in war where several men and aircraft have been sacrificed just to save one life. Why? Because that is America. That is the country I love and was willing to die for. So why do so many people have to suffer like I do. We have large medical facilities and every day it seems like more new research is discovering some new disease, medication or a better way to take the ones that have been proven to work.
Practically any morning you can turn on the news and find hundreds of volunteers out searching for a lost child, or 2-3 fire rescue engines trying to rescue a puppy. Why do we do this? Because we are a compassionate people. That is the America I know and love.

America has a dirty little secret that most people don't understand and that includes the medical profession for the most part. The ones who do, don't want any part of taking care of people like me because we are to much trouble, or to much regulatory scurnity to bother with it. I always wandered, how can a doctor let someone leave his office, take his money, yet do nothing to help that person. The most delicate part of the human body, the central nervous system, is also the most abused part of the body. Once you have some type of disease, or have an injury that breaches the CNS you are in a for a lifetime of living hell. My own injury was caused by a orthopaedic surgeon using a new procedure, that he had, one days training on.


Chronic Pain has stolen my live for the last 25 years. Not only do I have to live that way but I have to live the humilation of trying to find a Doctor to help me. All over America people just like me by the millions are lying in pain or perhaps sitting up like me because they are in to much pain to sleep. It doesn't have to be that way for the 70 million plus people who live the nightmare of pain that just want go away, that stays with you night and day. No it doesn't have to be that way at all.

You see the drugs that will stop that kind of pain, are the same ones sought after by drug addicts. I know there is a drug problem in this country. Drug abuse goes back to the early Roman Empire. I as a person who now lives in Chronic Pain simply cannot relate to anyone who would want to take these powerful drugs just for fun. I know one thing. With almost 1/4 of the population living like this and several thousand killing themselves ever year, because it just becomes to painful to live, it is time for the politicians to get involved and make some legislation clear enough that people who are dying, get the treatment they need and at the same time not tie the hands of the DEA from getting the real drug abusers. I don't blame the DEA. I blame the Congress and Senate, first of all for not taking it seriously as a problem, and not writeing clear and concise laws so the law enforcement community and the medical community know will know what to do. Wake up Washington, D.C. This is America not some third world country. We believe in saving lives here, not taking them.



I wander if they have ever given a thought to the fact that anyone, even them could go from being perfectly healthy to a vegtable like me in the blink of an eye. I know because that is the way it happened to me.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

My boyfriend has chronic and consisent headaches. He has been to over 8 specialist and no one can figure it out. Do you know of any in patient pain clinics where he could go for treatment?

Jerry said...

No Hon
I don't know of any specialists that I would reccomend for anything. You might ask Siobhan. I believe her husbands problems started out as headaches. I will do some research for you and see if I can come up with someone. So your saying he hasn't ben diagonised with anything.

Saphyre Rose said...

I do not know if you have ever read my blog, but I am a chronic pain sufferer. I live in South Carolina where the very thought of pain care is non-existent. There are "pain clinics", but they are mostly for people who have treatable problems or they can have their symptoms relieved with steroid injections or something similar.
My pain cannot be relieved with any sort of treatment. They can only relieve some of the pain...if they had, pardon my language, the balls.
So many doctors here in are scared to death that they will be sued or closed down if they actually help their patients with pain relief.
The very strongest pain reliever you can get here is Endocet and you had better have a leg cut off to get that!
My whole story is on my blog and I do not want to clog up your comments page.
It took a few years and a lot of calls and a lot of doctor’s visits but I finally have good pain care even though I have to go to another state to receive the care. There are a lot of flights between Charleston and Atlanta.
I understand how the fatigue can just drain what remaining energy we have per day.
I do not understand how we can put make a huge space station and to keep it circling the earth and we cannot get and keep our people out of pain.
How hard is it? Those of us with the medical records to prove we need the help should be given the appropriate care to get us out of pain! If it means drugs then so be it.
But do something for us!

A life once lived said...

This is a great post. I too suffer from chronic pain. It is different than yours. Mine is caused by Rheumatoid Arthritis. The name in itself is misleading. I am sick of the people that tell me about their minor arthritis pain. "Oh, my knee hurts sometimes when it rains..." BLAH, BLAH, BLAH! I have RA which causes intense, excruciating, chronic pain. I never dreamed when I was diagnosed that I would experience such intense pain that I would sometimes wish for a way out.

Just like you I go to the doctor's office and leave feeling that I got no help. It's as though doctors don't believe me or they are scared to give me anything for pain. I truly only want some pain relief, not pills to get high. I've taken Vicoden and Darvocet and I don't get any kind of high. The strength I get is usually so minimal, it barely touches the pain.

I am so frustrated.

Shauna said...

I am so sad to read more Chronic Pain sufferers that are undertreated, angry and they have all the right to feel so.

I was finally blessed with a Pain Doc that is the Medical Director of a Pain Rehabilitation Hospital about 5 yrs ago. Along with an inpatient hospital, they have everything you can imagine to help try and get you back to work, if that is even possible.

Such as, a simulated truck cab for injured truck drivers, a setting for office workers, etc. That way they can see if it is possible to get back to old jobs, or....not. I tried the pain program when I first was under his care, and I had insurance. I was in too much pain to even attend the rehab. I needed to get my meds all fixed, and pain doc has helped me to at least function. I have to go back to work as a nurse and am now working an as independent contractor, and will begin traveling soon. Gotta pay the bills, I now have ZERO for any possible disability due to some new and idiotic law that I am going to write about, they are now using a 'credit' system, based on the most recent years. Well, that was when I was not working, I was having fusions, procedures, etc. and that is such an oxymoron to have THAT be the reason why I can't collect disability.

I have been writing a blog on my life in Chronic Pain, and am glad I found yours! Last night, I lost ALL my blogroll, and am working hard on getting it back. Don't ask me HOW this happened!! Anyway, I want to add your blog to it when I get it re-done.

Thanks for an important blog on a most important issue.

Gentle ((((hugs))))

Shauna :-)