In Pain: A Bioethicist's Personal Struggle with Opioids with Travis Rieder

Program cover art by Mariella Mendoza is an undocumented artist, and writer; born and raised in Lima, Peru, but currently living on occupied Shoshone territory: Salt Lake City, Utah. For more information about their work, visit mariellamendoz...
Our 2020 Utah Humanities Book Festival marks 23 years of improving Utah communities through reading, literature, and conversations with authors and each other. The 2020 festival was entirely virtual and feature scores of authors, events, and virtual conversations in six categories. As our annual statewide celebration of literature, we work with partners in many Utah communities. Organizations across the state will again host book festival events featuring both national and local authors, all in a virtual format.
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Travis Rieder’s terrifying journey down the rabbit hole of opioid dependence began with a motorcycle accident in 2015. Enduring half a dozen surgeries, the drugs he received were both miraculous and essential to his recovery. But his most profound suffering came several months later when he went into acute opioid withdrawal while following his physician’s orders. Over the course of four excruciating weeks, Rieder learned what it means to be “dope sick”-the physical and mental agony caused by opioid dependence. Clueless how to manage his opioid taper, Travis’s doctors suggested he go back on the drugs and try again later. Yet returning to pills out of fear of withdrawal is one route to full-blown addiction. Instead, Rieder continued the painful process of weaning himself.
Rieder’s experience exposes a dark secret of American pain management: a healthcare system so conflicted about opioids, and so inept at managing them, that the crisis currently facing us is both unsurprising and inevitable. As he recounts his story, Rieder provides a fascinating look at the history of these drugs first invented in the 1800s, changing attitudes about pain management over the following decades, and the implementation of the pain scale at the beginning of the twenty-first century. He explores both the science of addiction and the systemic and cultural barriers we must overcome if we are to address the problem effectively in the contemporary American healthcare system.
In Pain is not only a gripping personal account of dependence, but a groundbreaking exploration of the intractable causes of America’s opioid problem and their implications for resolving the crisis. Rieder makes clear that the opioid crisis exists against a backdrop of real, debilitating pain-and that anyone can fall victim to this epidemic.
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This event is made possible by the Physicians Literature and Medicine Group at the University of Utah School of Medicine, The King's English, and Utah Humanities

[@gsk5161]

Your description of withdrawing is spot on, depression is the worst. Only thing I would add is that most addicts go through withdrawals many, many times trying to quit, possible hundreds of times, thats how strong the urge to use is!!

[@MiguelOrtega-gz2hh]

I’m 3 days in my recovery, cold turkey and I felt like I was going to die. I finally went to sleep last night and woke up with the shakes gone. I want nothing to do with the drugs any more and flushed the rest. I refused to go. I miss my family whom I’m actually keeping this from. I’m embarrassed. I won’t let this control me. I will improve

[@charlessoukup1111]

AND I'm 75 & bed bound. Can't GET to any inpt treatment place no matter where.

[@joseplaza9442]

Welcome to america

[@amandawaters5041]

Yes lord.. Im going threw it.. Ive been opioids since 2015 and outta the blue my dr cut me off cold turkey and i am so fsr in depression and i am a chronic pain patient.. Now i have nothing so i have pain...restless leg syndrome...depression..cant sleep and anxiety through the roof

[@JohnnyAmerique]

Sorry to hear that, it sounds like you need a different doctor.

[@klh768]

Hope your better now.

[@kristyengle7215]

How are you doing? ☺ You have gone through so much. How are you?

[@eliasflores777777777]

Try gabapentin, high doses help during detox and help you with anxiety and depression

[@JohnnyAmerique]

Okay so I’m not a doctor, but if a chronic pain patient is stable on opioids, what’s the harm in continuing the treatment? I have to take a pill every day for a chronic condition and I certainly don’t feel like I’m a lesser person for it.
I mean aside from the disease of puritanical nonsense that’s rampant in the USA, obviously.

[@fuzzybutkus8970]

Tyler my friend watch his Ted Talk. Stories are let’s say a little different. I watched it 4 times couldn’t figure out what he was leaving out.

[@kristyengle7215]

Oxycodone oxycontinent oil blueets will cause Gastroparesis