Mixing Medication

As long as I can remember, I have always been on medication for something that was going on in my life, from benzos for anxiety to heart medication and opiates for back pain. However, I was unaware of the dangers they all posed to my health when taken in combination with each other.

I had never taken another person’s medication, maybe because I was always prescribed whatever I needed at the time, but that was a horrible justification I used to make light of my life. I feel like I always needed something to help me get through life; no matter the situation, and since I always had access to a doctor, I always had access to multiple forms of medication to lighten my load.

That’s at least what I kept telling myself to help me get through the day and all of the circumstances I was going through. I could not easily juggle all of the issues I was dealing with, like back pain, anxiety, and hypertension. Plus, the combination of medications I was taking was slowly killing me, but I was also so numb to the world around me I couldn’t feel my body giving up on me. Now I sit here, still in a little pain, but it is manageable. My anxiety is gone, and my hypertension has been handled; to fix my back, I need to have surgery, and there is no way around that.

The last time I went to the doctor, they wanted to operate and, at the same time, they told me I shouldn’t have an operation until I was in my forties. So, all they could do was offer me medication to try and manage my back pain. That was absolutely not a solution for me; I refused to get on any opiate again after my past. So, all I could turn to was Kratom for managing my back pain, which came with its own slew of problems.

To name all of my medications, I was taking Lisinopril and Propranolol, Seroquel, Klonopin, and Kratom. Kratom wasn’t prescribed, but I was taking it three times a day—about a tablespoon at a time—like a medication, to try and mitigate the pain I was feeling. It took a while, but now I am just on one medication for my heart, which is a genetic condition inherited from both sides of my family. My dad had to get put on medication for his heart in his late teens, and I wound up taking something for my heart when I turned 30. I was able to buy myself some time due to how athletic I was growing up, but it eventually caught up with me. I now take Metoprolol for my heart, which helps my heart rate and blood pressure, so I don’t have to take more than one medication at a time.

At Narconon, the medical director was able to get me on the correct blood pressure medication, and I am extremely grateful for it. I haven’t had an issue with my heart in a while, and getting my heart under control has also helped me get my anxiety under control. When I was living in Colorado, it seemed no matter what I took, nothing could help me. I would roller coaster up and down, doing well, then not doing well, then doing well again; the problem was never fully solved until I got the help I needed. My anxiety and heart would play off of each other for the worst, making my problems more significant every day that went by. The doctors I was seeing just kept telling me that it was my anxiety causing all of my problems, and I was just given more and more anxiety medication. I went to the hospital several times in the span of three months, and the prognosis was the same every single time. I have now realized I don’t need medication for my anxiety because my anxiety was caused by environmental stress, and now that I have changed my environment, I no longer have anxiety. If I had just been able to confront my problems in life, I would never have needed to get on any medication for anxiety in the first place.

Being prescribed so many medications at once is no simple thing, and the repercussions it had on my body persisted for a while after I got off my medication. However, now I am no longer experiencing any of the negative symptoms of the medications, and I feel like I can finally live my life. When I was living in Colorado, life felt unreal and hopeless, but at the same time, I couldn’t actually be comfortable in my own body due to all of the external stressors. I had lived in Colorado before with my fiancé, and we had a fantastic time adventuring and living our lives. Then, we had to move back to New Orleans to help my Gigi sell her house. We lived there for about two years, and we couldn’t handle the environment in my hometown. So, after we sold the house, we decided to move back to Colorado, which was one of the biggest mistakes I had ever made.

I was on heart, anxiety, and back medication in New Orleans, but at the time, everything seemed managed. Little did I know I would react adversely to the altitude in Colorado. The city I was living in had an elevation of six thousand feet and some change, and it sparked my genetic disposition in my heart.

Now, I am back in Louisiana, and my fiancé and I have planned to move to Oklahoma, where my dad’s side of the family lives. We have land and are building a home right next to my dad and grandfather so we can raise our own animals and grow our own food. The help I received at Narconon has set me up for the best possible future, and I couldn’t be more grateful for it.

Z.L., Narconon Graduate