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"How Taking Painkillers Spiralled Into a Secret Drug Addiction In My Twenties"

Sophie* was first given painkiller medication following an injury, but soon found herself unable to stop taking it.

By As Told To Abigail Malbon
21 June, 2019
"How Taking Painkillers Spiralled Into a Secret Drug Addiction In My Twenties"

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As told to Abigail Malbon

It was during a screening for painkiller addiction that I stopped breathing. I was turning blue, but my friend slapped my face and I came round a bit. I was given Narcan, which is a reverse for opiates, and I was taken to hospital. I was so embarrassed. That was the biggest wake-up call I'd had, and it's when I thought 'I've got to stop this'.

11 years before that, aged 20, I broke my knee and ankle. That's when it all started. I was in a lot of pain, so the hospital gave me Co-codamol. I don't actually remember anyone ever telling me that Co-codomol or Tramadol could be addictive. I just thought = they'd take away the pain and that would be it. But I got so much more from them.

I've always been a really, really anxious person, and when I took the Co-codamol it made me feel very relaxed – it's the first time I'd ever felt like that. I was incredibly calm and almost invincible. I felt like I could do anything. I had no idea it could do that.

At the time, I was living in a pub with my boyfriend, and I'd just moved out of my parents' house. I was very isolated, very low, and my boyfriend didn't treat me particularly well. One night, he was downstairs in the pub and I thought 'I've had enough, I can't do this anymore'. So I took a load of Co-codamol and Tramadol. Nothing happened at the time, I felt fine. I went to bed actually kind of hoping that I wouldn't wake up, but I did, and the whole day the next day I just felt so dreamy. Able to do anything. The pain was gone, it was fantastic.

"I thought I'd found the solution to all my problems"

Anxiety has always been a part of my life. Even as a baby I didn't like to be held by men; I'd cry. As a little girl I didn't like going to people's houses if there were washing machines on or noise being made. Throughout my life it became worse and worse, and harder to control. When I discovered what else the painkillers did, I thought I'd found the solution to all my problems.

From there, I just became more and more reliant on the tablets. I started taking more than I needed, because I'd built up a resilience.

The tablets were 50mg standard tablets, and you can have about eight a day. At my worst, I'd take 90 per day. My doctor gave them out like sweets to me. I would make any excuse to get more... I'd make up stories, or say I'd had my bag nicked. Anything, just to get more tablets. I did order online a couple of times, but it was tricky and I wasn't sure if it was legal.

"I'd say it took about a year for me to become addicted to the tablets"

From the first time I was given a prescription, aged 20, to becoming addicted, I'd say it took a year. It lasted more than nine years.

I didn't feel that I could tell anybody, because I felt ashamed. I felt guilty, and I didn't want to put more worry on the people I loved. My mum saw me one morning, and she looked at me and said “You've taken something, haven't you?”I always defended myself, but I think my mum, my dad, my brother knew.

I wasn't working because of the injuries. My ankle was operated on – and again, I was given more Tramadol – but my knee was left, so I was constantly waiting to see if it healed.

When I got back to work, I was taking the Tramadol while I was there, and my colleagues obviously saw my glazed eyes. The amount of jobs I've been sacked from, just because of that. They never said they thought I had a problem, but they'd make up another reason to sack me. I've lost so many jobs because of it, but not one employer offered me any help.

A friend of mine recommended Addaction for help with my addiction, and I started going in 2017. I went for an assessment, and that's when I had a seizure and stopped breathing. I literally woke up and thought, 'Oh my goodness, I am so lucky to be alive.' It was the wake-up call I needed. I was terrified.

Without that moment, it would have continued to spiral. Around the same time I had a job in a hotel in as a receptionist. There was a man who was a night porter, and we got chatting and became quite friendly. He told me he had some Tramadol because his partner wasn't going to take them. He then supplied me with the tablets, and gave me the first couple of boxes for free. But after that he started charging, and it slowly dawned on me that he was a drug dealer. It was scary.

I stopped taking Tramadol and Co-codamol when I found Addaction in May 2017, and I've been taking one day at a time since then. Talking to someone and letting it all out has really helped me; it's pretty much saved my life. I see my counsellor every week now, and I see my key worker once a week, along with groups. I get a lot of support.

I'm not working because of the pain in my knee, and in October I was diagnosed with a prolapsed disk in my back. I've been in a lot of pain – and of course they can't give me painkillers now.

At the moment I take every day as it comes because I'm still in the recovery phase, but I would like to travel more and to own a nice flat. All my family live in Sussex, so myself and my partner are thinking of moving there. We've got dreams together, and I'm looking forward for the first time.


Painkiller addiction: the facts

According to a report by The Guardian, recent data revealed a 60% rise in prescriptions for opioid drugs over the past 10 years, with the number of such medicines dispensed in the community (excluding hospital settings) having risen from more than 14 million in 2008 to 23 million in 2018.

However, the government are working to tackle the issue. Last week health secretary Matt Hancock announced that all opioid medicines will have to carry prominent addiction warnings to protect people “from the darker side of painkillers”.

Dr Rachel Britton, lead clinical pharmacist at Addaction explained to Cosmopolitan UK what causes painkiller addiction, and how she and her team are working with people just like Sophie*.

“Opiates have a euphoric effect, and they make you feel nice," Rachel says. "That's because they release a chemical called dopamine in the brain, which is, in simple terms, a feel-good chemical. But because they make you feel good, that drives some people to take the medication after the pain goes away."For those who have some sort of background anxiety, or those who've had some kind of trauma in their past, these kind of drugs make that feel better. But what they don't do is get to the root cause of the problem," she adds.

"At Addaction, we don't have a one-size-fits-all approach. We do comprehensive assessments with people, and what we're most interested in is what is it in their background that has caused them to become addicted. We often find that people have experienced some sort of trauma, be that physical, emotional or sexual. From that we can start to work around different ways of working through experiences that they've had.

"We replace the medication that they've become addicted to with another drug that we can then slowly taper and wean people off. Methadone is an option – the other dug we might use is Buprenorphine. The choice would depend on the individual and what the clinician feels is the best approach.

"The worry is that people often don't know that they've got a problem, or if they do they don't know where to seek help. I think that there is a stigma attached to addiction to a prescribed medication, and one of the things we want to do is help people get over that so they can seek help when they need it."

 

 

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Credit: Cosmopolitan
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