Its been 2 years since I started taking oxycodone and I cant remember what life was like without it. I was in a motorcycle accident that crushed my foot and the the oxy numbed the pains.For more than 3 months I was on a 6 a day regimen, a 24 hour oxycodone trip. For about a year after that I regularly took 2-4 pills a day to get through the day. Since then, for about a year now, I have been taking oxy on an as needed basis. I’m not physiologically addicted to the substance any more, but somehow I feel as though my life wouldn’t be the same without it.
The other day I had a familiar yet unusual feeling that I couldn’t identify. It was an exhausted, uneasy, crappy feeling that was centered in my stomach and seemed to spread outwards. I could feel my heart beating and my breathing was unsteady. My hands and legs felt weak and shaky. It took me several hours to remember that this feeling was called stress.
It had become apparent to me that in the past two and a half years that I was high; I forgot what it felt like to be stressed.
Having thought about it for some time I was torn between two competing ideas: 1)the shocking realization that I have an oxycodone problem; 2)how nice the world can be without stress and pain. One side of my brain says that I am doing something illegal, bad, immoral, unhealthy, and wrong. The other side of my brain says that everything is OK and that if I should live life free from pain and stress. I have not yet come to any final conclusions on the matter but at first glance option 2 just seems better.
My main hesitation is that I may be missing out on life. Both pain and stress are emotions and some argue these feelings are part of life and without them life is less precious. Its similar to the debates of whether “love” can exist without “hate” where one loses its value without the other. I once believed that all feelings and emotions were an integral part of what it means to be human however I am beginning to think that I can still appreciate the positive aspects of life while minimizing the negative.
I feel as though I am still a decently productive member of society and I keep a nearly acceptable social life but having been numb to pain and stress for such a long time I sometimes wonder what else I might have missed out on.