America Does Have A Drug Problem, Just Not What Politicians Would Have You Believe - Rev. J.T. Smith

[Full disclosure: On January 23, 2013, I survived a hemorrhagic stroke that initially left me completely paralyzed from the neck down on my dominant side, and reduced my hearing and peripheral vision on the same side.  While I am ambulatory once more and I've regained some use of my dominant hand and arm, I'm still trying to overcome that my stamina is still vastly diminished compared to my former normal, that my thermal-tactile sense is glitchy at best on my dominant side, and that the only time I'm not in constant pain is when I'm asleep.  More recently, I've learned that I have osteoarthritis in both hips, though initially only "presenting" on my non-stroke affected side which adds to the overall pain I experience on any given day.  And that 1-10 pain scale is relative to each person where a 9 for one person is a 4 for another.  (e.g. My accidentally nicking an exposed a nerve in one of my back teeth by biting an onion slice on my hoagie and driving it into my tooth hurt far more than when I broke my left elbow or when I broke my right wrist such that it now has a metal plate and screws installed.)  All of which should be kept in mind when reading my following article.]

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America has a drug problem.  I’m not referring to the “war on drugs” which has resulted in the persecution and disproportionate incarceration of people of colour, I'm referring to a prevalent attitude in America.  And while what I'm talking about may seem like I'm merely conflating separate issues, it needs to be realized that what I'm describing is a multi-faceted series of different drug problems that in reality all together add up to a very large overall drug problem.

 

One facet of the overall problem is the recreational use of drugs.  Not only does this include the use of illicit drugs (in 2013, an estimated 24.6 million Americans aged 12 or older—9.4 percent of the population—had used an illicit drug in the past month. This number is up from 8.3 percent in 2002) and drugs like marijuana (which is gaining in acceptance and transitioning from illicit to legal), it also includes the use of legal drugs like alcohol.  You had a bad day?  You don’t like your situation in life.  Then use your (preferably legal) drug of choice.  It’s almost like Americans are trying to prove Darwin was wrong.

 

But it doesn’t end there.  Another facet I’m referring to the pharmaceutical complex in America often referred to as “Big Pharma” and the ever expanding impact that they have.  While Big Pharma does serve a useful purpose in creating lifesaving vaccines and medications for genuine medical conditions, the reality is that they have absolutely no intention of creating any more actual cures.  Let's face it, they're still kicking themselves for curing polio.  The simple reality is that there’s no profit in curing anything when they can help you to “just live with it”.  If you're taking a medication for the rest of you're life then that's not a cure at all, it's merely living with it!  If you took you're car to the mechanic to fix a transmission, but you still had to constantly add transmission fluid to it, you wouldn't consider your transmission actually fixed now would you?

 To exacerbate this is still another facet: There’s the constant adverts for the latest drug aimed at the general public with the goal of the consumer asking for a certain drug rather than the far more logical approach where your doctor tells you what drugs you should use, if any.  While many countries allow over-the-counter drugs to be advertised, only the United States and New Zealand allows prescription drugs to be advertised on television.  Frankly, Big Pharma has abused this tolerance by pushing drugs that may not be effective or applicable to their conditions on viewers.  In the United States, TV adverts for pharmaceuticals must list the major side effects that were detected during the drug's safety trials; this disclosure can give the false impression that older drugs (i.e. the ones that came out before TV advertising was an option) are safer than all these “newfangled” drugs, when in fact the older drugs tend to have just as many side effects as the new ones do. (e.g. The litany of side effects for aspirin would fill several pages.)  Not only that, but in 2015 there were more than 1 million reports of drug side effects were file, an increase of five-fold since 2004.  These are drugs used to treat diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis, psoriasis, multiple sclerosis, cancer, and diabetes are among those with the greatest number of reports.  What’s more, as demonstrated by the myriad lawsuits resulting from consequent injuries from the use of so many of these “latest and greatest” drugs, pharmaceutical companies rush their latest chemical “miracle” before they’ve properly and extensively tested them.  Between modern knowledge of chemistry and the capability of creating complex computer models capable of creating predictive interaction models, the vast majority of side effects should already be either eliminated before they ever go to market or should keep the new drug in question from getting to market in the first place.

 

Still, that’s just a part of the overall problem.  Another facet is that it seems that for every minor problem there’s a drug.  Since direct-to-consumer drug advertising debuted, Big Pharma’s credo has been: “When the medication is ready, the disease (and patients) will appear.”  Who knew so many people suffered from restless legs?  And they’re effectively creating new “diseases” all the time or blowing conditions like ADHD way out of proportion.  There wouldn't be such an issue if we stopped trying to schedule every nanosecond of a child's life and let them learn naturally through this crazy thing called playing.  I don't mean sports or any other structuralized format but just let them have fun, make it up as they go, and free-form explore the world around them without panicking because of scrapes and bruises. 

 

Furthermore, yet another aspect is that far too many psychiatrists and other doctors are more readily inclined to prescribe drugs for nearly every malady, whether it be physical or mental illness, rather than turning to other means and methods like actually getting people to accept that the universe is an inherently unfair place and to find ways of changing the aspects of your life that you can change and dealing with those aspects you cannot change.  While it’s not easy, doing that without the use of drugs can be done successfully.

 

This particular issue of the push for drugs to solve all of the woes was brought into clear focus for me while I was going through a psychological evaluation at the Penn Foundation regarding the Depression I've been dealing with for decades and was exacerbated by the stroke I survived.  The psychiatrist started not just recommending but effectively pushing "antidepressant" drugs as an answer to the point where I was seriously wondering just how deep into the pockets of their pharmaceutical rep he was.  It took me several times of stating "No drugs!" before he finally got the hint that "No" means "No" even when I say it.  

 

Do people suffer from chemical imbalances in their brain leading to problems like Depression, et al?  Yes.  But throwing drugs at it forever rather than finding and actually fixing the problem isn't the right answer (see aforementioned transmission analogy) unless you think that profits regardless of how those profits are achieved are always the right answer, that is.

 

In this case, I certainly believe that if anyone there has a drug problem it's due to the psychiatrist for so stubbornly refusing to consider other options.  One of the many issues I have with my ever starting any kind of antidepressant regimen is the fact that there's still so much trial-and-error (with far too many errors) and hit-or-miss (again, too much miss) in prescribing the drugs in the first place.  I know this from the various friends who are currently on various antidepressants and who have been for years, a couple of whom I've personally known for a decade and more.  I will not be a guinea pig for something that they should be able to accurately prescribe if medicine once again mattered more than profits.

 

Drugs are nothing more than chemical crutches and like physical crutches should be used only when absolutely necessary.  Crutches are meant to be temporary, not permanent “solutions”.  The big problem I'm describing is a multifaceted reliance on drugs to solve every problem rather than trying to actually repair or cure the medical ailments, and getting active in the political ones. 

 

by Rev. J.T. Smith

Trumpcare explained

Attempted Explanation Of Things That Annoy Me About People & My Current Situation - Rev. J.T. Smith

On January 23, 2013 at approximately 0655 I survived a hemorrhagic stroke that initially shut down and paralyzed the right half of my body from the neck down and limited the peripheral vision of my right eye and the hearing in my right ear.  While much of what I'm trying to explain predates that stroke by more than a couple decades, it's been exacerbated since the stroke.

As I've stated elsewhere, the simplest way to describe what really annoys me about people is laziness in thought and action, the mindset that believes "impossible" is an acceptable answer and allows the notion of “eh, good enough” to somehow be acceptable.  I’ve worked with more people than I care to think about who took that attitude toward their job, yet they’d be among the first to gripe is something they were buying wasn’t to the specifications they needed or desired whether it be a piece of equipment, a repair to their car or something similar, or their meal in a restaurant whether it was fast food or a fancy restaurant.   It was alright if they did it but Heaven help them if they were on the receiving end.

Because I had a stroke and my body doesn’t work the way it should, people seem to automatically assume that I’m somehow fragile like an eggshell.  As a result, my capacity for being able to volunteer at Grandview Hospital would be limited to only performing data entry/clerical tasks (providing I'd be allowed to volunteer in the first place).  While those tasks are within my working background (even if I am out of practice), those aren’t all that I’m capable of.  The only other duties they have open involve a lot of walking.  For me that’s fine as I need the exercise in order to get at least that part of my body working better.  Unfortunately, simply because I could potentially fall (which was actually true even before the stroke) the “walking” positions are completely out because “the floor is harder than my head.”  This both completely ignores and refuses to contemplate, let alone acknowledge, the fact that in 2013 I fell four times and I managed to regain my feet again without any assistance or suffering any injury.  Two of those times involved concrete sidewalks which are both far from level (unlike hospital corridors) and are far harder than hospital floors, the third time involved going down (literally) a gravel path, and the last involved my own room.  Granted, on November 9, 2015, I tripped while traversing an asphalt walking/bike trail approximately three miles from where I live and I broke my right wrist to the point of needing a titanium plate and a host of screws; but before anyone tries to read into that, I hit the ground so hard that I also broke the watch on my left wrist.  All of which should demonstrate that I’m not fragile.

Then there’s the American medical complex and their simply getting people to “live with” whatever ails them as opposed to actually trying to fix the problem.  This (combined with greed) is why we haven’t seen any real cures since polio.  This also extends to rehabilitation therapy and the fact that the staff’s goals so often don’t match the goals of their patients.  Doylestown Hospital’s Therapy Department is a prime example of this.  My goal is to regain 95-100% of my physical capabilities.  I realize that this isn’t something that’s going to happen overnight.  Unfortunately, the therapists I had only set their sights on a 50% improvement in this function and 50% increase in that function, and then were satisfied when I succeed in gaining 45% increase in one and 52% in the other.  When you’re starting at only 30% of full functionality and their goal is for you improve by 50%, that doesn’t take you to 80%; it only takes you to 45%.

Sadly, while this isn’t the only hospital/rehab group that does this, Doylestown Hospital is where I also witnessed minor panic attacks any time I had a balance check (they referred to it as “losing [my] balance” which implies my having fallen over when I did no such thing) or the ridiculous insistence that I must use the handrail while ascending or descending their staircases, yet they themselves were under no such requirement.  This also doesn’t take into account that stairways in public buildings (including hospitals) are nowhere near as steep as those found in houses and old buildings (e.g. the pub that I reside above).

There’s also the concept of “impossible” that I keep running into, especially in places like hospitals.  Supposedly, I should accept that it may be "impossible" to fully recover from the stroke.  Bullshit.  All things are possible; it’s the probability that’s the tricky part.  I acknowledge that the probabilities are not in my favour, but that doesn’t mean it cannot be done.  The probability of my being able to walk at all at the beginning of my second week of Acute Rehab was exceedingly low, yet I still did it.  Prior to the 1950s it was deemed a certainty that the human body couldn’t survive speeds greater than the speed of sound, which is where the term "sound barrier" comes from..  And then the sound barrier was broken and planes like the Concorde and military aircraft like the SR-71 Blackbird that travel at speeds of Mach 1 or more that successfully carry humans faster than the speed of sound.  According to the laws of aerodynamics it’s impossible for a bumblebee to fly, yet it does so successfully.  (The supposed workaround being that the laws of fluid dynamics are used to explain this success.)  Supposedly it’s impossible for anything to travel faster than the speed of light, yet tachyons are particles that travel faster than the speed of light.  If tachyons can travel at those velocities, then it’s possible for other things to do so as well.  All of which I had to point out to the nurse I had to deal with at Doylestown Hospital who insisted that “impossible” isn’t laziness.  It’s nearly always considered impossible until someone succeeds in doing it.

And still we’re told as disabled people (handicapped, whatever) that we should "just accept" that we may never get our bodies back and/or our lives back and just live with our current situation being as good as it gets.  That’s a load of crap!  Disabled people should never be encouraged to simply accept what happened to them and then just live with it.  "Just accept" really means "Just give up."  Disabled people should be encouraged to do whatever they can to get back to where they were before whatever disabled them happened.  Granted, some adaptations may be necessary to succeed in this in either the short or long run, but that shouldn’t be simply “good enough.”   Good enough should never be good enough.

 - by Rev. J.T. Smith

(Author's note: This was originally written in September 2014 for my psych therapist.  It has been updated since).

Maneuvering Through The Darkness - Rev. J.T. Smith

"I'm not crazy, I'm just a little unwell/I know right now you can't tell/But stay awhile and maybe then you'll see/A different side of me"

- "Unwell" by Matchbox Twenty

"We all have a universe of our own terrors to face.”

- the Doctor [Doctor Who: Ghost Light]

 

Every one of us has a Dark side within us.  For the most part, people are able to keep that aspect in check.  Typically, that Dark side is balanced out by what could be considered our "Light side".

 

"Typically" and "usually" are not “always”. For some of us, it's harder to control that Dark side. 

 

Basically, the Dark side comes in three flavours: Our fears, our demons, and our monsters.  Those three basic flavours are completely individualized to each of us.

 

Our fears are our, well . . . fears: both of the present and what's coming in the future and our thorough uncertainty of the occurrence of things that in the future we need to happen, and the fear of things coming to pass that we don't want to ever happen.  Like the "Bene Gesserit Litany Against Fear" from Frank Herbert's book Dune said: "Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration."

 

Our demons are the memories and regrets of our past, things that we want to have done differently or that we can't forgive ourselves for having done regardless of whether or not anyone else has forgiven us, that come back to haunt us.  Our nightmares nearly made manifest.   And anyone who claims to have no regrets lies, even if only primarily to themselves.  We all regret things either done or not regardless of how seemingly inconsequential.  How can you know you have no regrets without knowing first-hand how it feels to begin with?

 

And our monsters are those dark urges we have to be careful to never let loose else we may hurt those closest to us.

 

For some of us, our Dark side can can be a fearful demonic monster in its own right, striking at any time and without remorse.  Always tiring, draining, and dragging down our spirit with varying degrees of success.  And no matter how much those around us may wish to help us, we still have to deal with our own Darkness, especially when we're all alone in the night. 

 

And when we're fighting our monsters and having a really bad day, let's be honest, telling us to “calm down” is the fastest way to piss us off further, and telling us how wonderful things “really are” is just so trite.  And since God is testing us, and we can See and Feel that clearly, saying we need to “find God” as though God was somehow misplaced demonstrates the depths of their lack of comprehension. 

 

 

Letting people in may be, so we're told, the best way to deal with that Darkness of our Dark side, but for some of us that's easier stated than accomplished.  Especially when, no matter how hard we try to make ourselves understood and explain what we're dealing with, even when we're talking with people who're also dealing with their own deep Darkness, we're still having to deal with ours in the middle of the night or alone in a crowded room and the Darkness sneaks up on us and begins to attempt to smother. 

 

And while reality itself can be a hard thing to cope with even at the best times, regardless of how it's presented, or how much we'd rather close our eyes, stick our fingers in our ears, and ignore it because we feel it's uncomfortable or goes against what we want to believe, or the frustrations that are incurred causes our Dark side to show itself or be magnified further, the fact remains that we have to face and deal with reality so that maybe, just maybe, we can bring about much needed change which can act as a Light to drive away, or at least stave off, our Dark side. 

 

And, sometimes, what we need most, more than chemical crutches and understanding confidantes, even when the rest of reality doesn't seem to be going to hell in a hand-basket, is for things to finally start going right for us without our having to scrabble and claw for every micron of progress toward our goals.  Particularly when the primary goal is simply to get our life back.

 

In the meantime, some of us can especially relate to Pitchshifter's song “Genius” when it says: "If dysfunction is a function, then I must be some kind of genius."

 

by Rev. J.T. Smith

I Don't Hate People . . .

I miss being able to drive

This Is Especially True In The Age Of Trump

This Is Especially True In The Age Of Trump