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Show 1 v i Cyclops By BRYAN GRAY Ex-addict found it easy to get many and varied prescriptions from doctors When we have a medical problem, prob-lem, we often make an appointment with a doctor. But when one Davis County woman realized she had a problem, she didn't make an appointment. ap-pointment. She sent a letter. The letter is not complimentary. It wasn't meant to be. Nine years ago, the womanthen in her mid-20's began using pQis to reduce ordinary job stress. Several pills each day seemed to workbut not as well as four pills per day. Within a year, she was totally addicted, and, by last year, she was popping an average of 20 pain pills each day creating the need for multiple prescriptions. Receiving Receiv-ing the prescriptions was relatively easy. "I found that doctors are a lot more suspicious of men than women, she told me. "A woman can go in to a doctors office, bat her eyelids and get anything she wants. After all, it should be a red flag when a new patient walks in and gives the doctor the specific name of a drug. But there were very few questions. I'm sure that many of my friends and the doctors knew of my problem, but no one ever confronted me. For the physician, it was much easier just to write out another prescription. The woman, now completing a 29-day in-patient treatment program pro-gram at the Recovery Center at Humana Hospital-Davis North, is no longer visiting four doctors each day. But she is writing them a letter. So far, she has written letters to 75 physicians and pharmacists, all of whom had written her different prescriptions. Why write the letter? 4I just thought they should know,' she says. The letter begins this way: 4 'I am writing you this letter because I want to remain clean and sober and I need your help. I am going to great lengths to tell you this because I also went to great lengths to get my drugs. I have stolen my mother's pills from her house and purse. I have stolen my grandfather's grand-father's pills. I have intentionally cut my palm and my index finger in order to have you prescribe drugs. I have called the same doctor at least three times in one day and used a different name to get three different k prescriptions. I have called doctors I have never seen before to get my drugs of choice: Darvocet, Hycodiphyn, Paragoric, Rutluss Green or any mood or mind-altering chemical. I would see a physician once so that I would be established, then milk him for all I could without having to go back in. Sometimes I would complain com-plain that the original prescription had caused me an upset stomach so that the doctor would prescribe two prescriptions for the same ailment. I have also used many different pharmacies. Although I live in Clearfield, I have driven to other counties in the evening to boost up my stock. 'The most effective complaints the ones that got me the most drugs -were headache, backache, carpal tunnel, bone spur in my right shoulder, diarrhea, cramping or severe se-vere cough. "I am not writing this letter to place blame. I am the one who is responsible. But I hope this letter will help another addict who is doing do-ing the same things I did. You, doctor doc-tor and pharmacist, can help by being be-ing aware and not giving prescrip tions out unless you really know what is going on. According to the woman, the key to her treatment is personal. 4 'I finally realized that I had a disease and that I wasn't just defective in some way. In so many ways, I'm typical of many Utah women. I wasn't addicted to cocaine or marijuana, mari-juana, and I generally stayed away from alcohol. The most common drug problem for Utah women is prescription drugs, and yet the problem prob-lem is not highly publicized. Maybe my letter will help. It might-but even if it doesn't, the letter is her own form of therapy. She intends to return to work and hopefully work as a counselor for other women who pharmaceutical ravage their bodies. That's in the future...For now, she's going to relax and await the delivery of her fourth child. And for that she'll need a doctor. A copy of her letter was mailed to her obstetrician. "I want him to know all about me," she says. "I also want him to know about other women like me. There's a lot of us out there." |