the reason that the state of things suck is because too many people smoke weed

[MilSpecs]

And, yeah, quite a lot of chronic pain patients use their pain as an excuse to get high on opiates. It's a huge problem that has no easy solution.

Unless they develop some way to see the degree of physical pain a patient is experiencing, doctors can't accurately determine who should get pain relief meds and how strong those should be. And I suspect even if they do invent that, it will be expensive and take time. Easier for the doc to prescribe pain meds (or simply anti-depressents).

Turns out, opiates make a lot of our chronic pain diseases worse. That happened to me.

Pain meds are really good for injuries and recovering from surgery. For long term use. we probably should be more discriminant than we have been in the recent past.

The other dimension to this problem is that doctors are ill-equipped to offer any solutions at all. What I needed was intensive physical therapy, strength and mobility training, for 3-5 days per week, for years.

I have some concept now of what is required to manage illnesses like my own, and there really is little to nothing like that out there. Insurance companies, including government providers, will rather mint another pill junkie than pay for all that.

There are non-opiate medications for nerve pain that can't be helped by physical therapy, like Gabapentin. Peripheral neuropathy can be managed by non-opiates, acupuncture, and mental/psychological/spiritual techniques. The point is that people need to try different approaches and see what works for them. Nothing should be ruled out.

[Speaker to Animals]

Unless they develop some way to see the degree of physical pain a patient is experiencing, doctors can't accurately determine who should get pain relief meds and how strong those should be. And I suspect even if they do invent that, it will be expensive and take time. Easier for the doc to prescribe pain meds (or simply anti-depressents).

Turns out, opiates make a lot of our chronic pain diseases worse. That happened to me.

Pain meds are really good for injuries and recovering from surgery. For long term use. we probably should be more discriminant than we have been in the recent past.

The other dimension to this problem is that doctors are ill-equipped to offer any solutions at all. What I needed was intensive physical therapy, strength and mobility training, for 3-5 days per week, for years.

I have some concept now of what is required to manage illnesses like my own, and there really is little to nothing like that out there. Insurance companies, including government providers, will rather mint another pill junkie than pay for all that.

There are non-opiate medications for nerve pain that can't be helped by physical therapy, like Gabapentin. Peripheral neuropathy can be managed by non-opiates, acupuncture, and mental/psychological/spiritual techniques. The point is that people need to try different approaches and see what works for them. Nothing should be ruled out.

My experience with Gabapentin is that it did absolutely nothing for pain, but it raised my blood pressure so high the nurses on my work campus sent me to the urgent care clinic. It causes weight gain as well.

Nasty fucking drug. It's another scam, like SSRIs are for pain. They don't really do a damned thing for pain. These companies just cooked the research to be able to market those drugs to pain patients.

Also in my experience: the many millions of Americans who have chronic pain conditions like fibromyalgia need to avoid doctors. What they actually need are physical therapists, movement specialists, and mindfulness training.

Look at what Ido Portal does. Take that but make extend the progressions deep down into the remedial level. Add in quite a lot of rehab and prehab work. On top of that, add in some kind of strength training to break down the knots in the muscles and make them stronger.

For most of these people, step one is just to get them walking and losing any fat they accumulated from sedentary behavior.

These drugs are basically taking decades off people's lives without offering much benefit at all.

[Kath]

The Gabapentin worked great for me after I injured my ulnar nerve. Nasty pain, that.

Had to get off of it, though, and manage other ways, because it is a harsh drug. It did help me get over the super-pain hump, though.

[Speaker to Animals]

It might actually work for real nerve pain. Most people who get prescribed it don't really have nerve pain. I don't think hardly any doctors understand what is going on with diseases like fibromyalgia in particular. It is NOT fucking nerve pain. It's only partly a product of your nervous system being trained to generate more pain. That happens to anybody who is in pain longterm and does nothing to treat it physically.

Those knots in the muscles are indicative that it is definitely quite a lot more than nerve pain. That's real fucking pain. The muscles are cramped up and there are crystal knots in the fascia the size of marbles.

You have to fix all the physical problems that led to this. A lot of it is biomechanical. Most of it is just getting stronger so that you can do daily activities without injuring yourself. It's also flexibility/mobility. Lastly, diet. Start thinking about anti-inflammatory foods and supplements.

Drugs don't help.

[Speaker to Animals]

Literally, the moment I realized that doctors are fucking stupid when it comes to these diseases was the day I began to get my life back.

They do NOT understand a damned thing about it. They are not experts on it. They have no idea what is going on.

Imagine you want to become a film director. Do you try to learn from film critics about how to make the good films or do you learn from experienced directors who have learned how to actually produce great films? Doctors have no idea what it is like to have this kind of pain. They also don't listen to people very well. The people who know how to fix it are the people who have it and overcame it. Pretty much all of those people did it with extensive rehab and physical training. You have to figure out how your body works, assess every facet of the pain, determine what exactly is wrong everywhere, and then step-by-step start rehabilitating and strengthening it.

[DrYouth]

Drugs provide temporary relief for pain...

Which is fine if the pain is temporary... and plenty of pain is.

Chronic pain means there is an underlying problem... drugs don't address the underlying problem.

The underlying problem can be any number of things... and medical doctors suck at addressing stress related problems.
They may accurately say it is stress related - but they are piss poor at helping find solutions to those problems.
Many of the problems are psychological/interpersonal/spiritual...
and exercise and diet are not cure-alls to these problems either - case in point anorexia nervosa.

This is where some other disciplines do better... but all of them fall short.

[SilverEagle]

The people I know who smoke weed live in homes and pull down high salaries.
The people I know using the term "nigger" and hating on weed live in vans and shower infrequently.

Think I'll stick with the crowd that has mail boxes, thanks. I'll be sure to reach out for further life advice if I ever get tired of having extravagant conveniences like wall outlets.

lulz

Yep, I smoke and I have a six figure salary and own not one but two homes, multiple cars that are not on blocks, a truck, ski boat, golf cart and this list goes on and on.

Nuke, lives in a van down by the river drinking Milwaukees Best blaming people like me for his lot in life.

[Speaker to Animals]

Yeah, I do not know about the pain from psychological problems. I can only speak about the stuff I experienced.

For me, it most likely happened due to exposure to depleted uranium. It is totally physical, though it can bring about depression just from suffering.

My point was that doctors have no idea how to effectively treat these diseases and conditions precisely because they do not listen, especially to people who overcame the conditions. They think they know better when really they haven't a fucking clue. They just hand out drugs to treat problems. To solve them they'd probably have to listen to patients who figured out how to treat themselves, and doctors will never do that.

Hard pass. Avoid doctors for pain management.

[DrYouth]

The fact that the rates of prescription drug use and non-prescription drug use is at such high levels...
In addition to obesity (emotional eating), and compulsive behaviours of all sorts (financial debt, gambling, sex/porn, video game)...
Hints that we are also dealing with underlying psycho-social-spiritual issues as a society...

It seems silly to believe we will find a wonder drug pharmaceutical, medical or non-pharmaceutical that will sort this out....
Snake oil salesmen will continue to make a killing though.

[nmoore63]

I think people should smoke more weed. Puritan culture is a bitch.

The austere is what built most of generational civilization.

Work hard, play hard.

Nah... a closer examination of those that built the permanent things was mostly just work hard.