I have been a little aware of this restriction of Opioids for some time. I was sorta scared but also ignored it as I am in the process of applying for disability and that is stressful in itself. It wasn’t until my pain doctor, who I thought I had a great rapport with, said some ableist things and tried to stop my opioid meds all together… As upset as I was, it sorta woke me back up that relying on the system without keeping it in check, the system will always choose their own best interest. Though it was reading the article in the petition [and linked above here] that really just fired me so up that I had to do something. Being that I was an activist by way of physical protest and was used to doing things my body can no longer do, this was the only thing I could think of to do. I hope to at least create some awareness on the issue, get some people fired up and hopefully help people understand we aren’t addicts we just want to be able to live.
Will definitely sign and share. I'm allergic to a lot of opiate medications so I can't take them but I know many people who rely on them for pain management.
Thanks for this! My comment on the petition was "I am a chronic pain patient, not an addict. Pain patients are very supportive of getting addicts off of prescription opioids, BUT what we won't stand for is the attempts to throw legitimate patients out with the bath water. Opioids are serious medicine – they've been around for a long time. We have worked closely with our doctors to come to the decision to take opioids. We do not take it lightly, and we look forward to the day when new pain treatments will make opioids obsolete. In fact I go to DC annually (on my own dime) to lobby for increases in funding to the NIH for migraine/headache research. For now, without other options, many of us simply function better with opioids. It's un-American to let pain patients suffer while spending millions and millions of dollars helping recreational addicts. Where's the compassion for us? Where's the government spending to help pain patients? The very least the government can do is NOT take away our medicine!"