Why Is Oxy so Addictive?
Oxycodone changes the way we detect and process physical pain.
Imagine you’re a small child, and you wedge your finger into a light socket and immediately feel an intense, unpleasant shock travel from your fingertip up through your shoulder. You retract your hand instantly and begin to cry.
When our bodies experience some type of trauma–electrocution, a cut, a burn, a broken bone, a fever, etc.,–that trauma travels along our nerve endings. Those nerve endings send a distress signal to our brains. Such signals trigger that reflex in us to remove the source of pain as quickly as possible.
Oxycodone alters that essential neurological signaling. The brain on oxycodone doesn’t register pain. For those who live with intolerable physical pain caused by cancer, injury, a slipped disk in the back, etc., a powerful painkiller can bring tremendous physical and psychological relief.
Unfortunately, too many doctors have prescribed oxycodone without caution. The U.S. has documented over 50 million painkiller prescriptions. People are in pain and they need help managing it. And yet these same people are also getting addicted to the medications that are supposed to be making their lives easier.
Recognizing When to Get Off Oxycodone?
If you answered yes to most of the questions in the survey above, it’s safe to say that an oxycodone dependence has developed. Here’s another list of statements that may help you determine whether it’s time to get off the drug.
- I use oxycodone very often or in higher-than-recommended doses, even when I don’t want to.
- I spend too much time trying to increase my oxycodone prescription, or buying it from an unofficial source, and I spend a lot of time using it and recuperating from it.
- I find myself craving oxycodone.
- I’m starting to develop or have developed a tolerance to oxycodone, so I need more and more of it to have an effect.
- I feel like my body reacts very negatively when it doesn’t have oxycodone.
If any of the statements are true for you, it’s definitely time to decrease your oxycodone use or stop altogether.