I am starting to wonder if anyone will help anyone they way they used to.

It used to be that a patient could go see a doctor or a pharmacist and receive recommendations or prescriptions of what will help them.

Like take 2 and call me the morning type of thing.

Or buy some ibuprofen and use them "as needed"....

Even when it came to my stronger pain pills, I used to be given a prescription with 30 days supply and it wouldn't be a problem...  If I didn't need any more pills, I wouldn't call the doctor for months... in some cases 9 months or more.

Over the past few years, especially since my arthritis in my knees & hips have been getting worse, I am almost being completely monitored from when the prescription is written to when it's being refilled again at the doctor office.

It's as though they stopped trusting everyone with their own ability to use their medication responsibly.

I've never called my doctor, but in two different times of dire need, to ask for more pain pills.

For me these days, there's no "buzz" or "aching need" or "unquenchable desire" to take more than is needed to get the job done.

The problem right now, is that the pain I've been dealing with for my knees & migraines is getting worse again....

So much so that the use of O2 isn't working anymore.  Maybe 1 out of every 10 times that I use it, I might get relief...

I'm going to call and return the tanks, etc back to the company who's been managing them.

While renewing the "contract" with the doctor, there was an additional "survey" regarding usage of things to determine how "addictive people" were to opioid drugs...  Part of the scoring was if you had family who were addicts or alcoholics...  Or if you are bipolar or depressed etc....
I can see why family ancestry thing might be an indicator if people were addictive my nature... but I'm not.... I can easily say no to things, and can control urges that might drive other people who are addicts or have trouble saying "no" or denying an impulse...

Another part of the "survey" was regarding my "behavior".

• Do I argue with people? (Who doesn't?  Especially if you have teenagers)
• Do you get upset with people? (Who doesn't?  Especially with teenagers)
• Did I take anyone else's meds? (Of course not.. that's something I wouldn't do, unless under extreme duress and nothing else was working and it was a matter of last resort and I couldn't get to an ER...)

There was just a lot more crap like that, that I didn't like on there... did I take more meds that I was prescribed, etc. etc.?

It's getting to a point that I'm afraid to ask or tell the doctors anything.... If I cannot be honest with them about the pain and how I have to manage it, then things are surely going to hell.

Perhaps I need move closer to Canada or Mexico so that I can walk into stores where some of these pills are just "over the counter"...

Well, I'm feel pretty freakin' mellow right now, because of the Xanax I took prior to seeing the doctor...  It helps me to calm down so that I don't shout off and really cause a problem arguing about "simple" things.