Posted by kazoo on May 7, 2001, at 1:56:57
In reply to Re: Whats the best opiate? PACHA, posted by kazoo on May 7, 2001, at 0:51:30
As always, I'm having second thoughts about my previous post re. the use of opiates to relieve depression.
Conventional wisdom, as it is, dictates that opiates, and the synthetic narcotic analogs, are specifically and concisely indicated, via the PDR, for physical "pain" such as a toothache, bone fracture or cancer. With that being the case, one could say that depression is a form of mental anguish, and mental anguish is just as painful as physical pain. So it would follow, then, that opiates would be good for this painful mental anguish called depression. I realize that I'm mixing realities with metaphors, but I *can* understand why someone would use a narcotic to relieve the terrible anguish associated with depression. Morphine has this wonderful quality of not only relieving physical pain, but also providing a "lift" in spirits, whether from the absence of pain or the presence of those chemicals which induce this sense of well-being. So, if we did not use morphine to relieve physical pain, but used it for just this sense of "wellness," is this still a justifiable reason to use type of drug?
The logic (if any) skates on thin ice, and I'm flip-flopping back and forth, which I dislike doing.
I do know that one can build up a tolerance to opiates very quickly, and if you should need them for a terrible physical pain, such as a third degree burn, they don't work as well, if at all, so there goes the "justification."
Opiates may provide a "quick-fix" to relieve the despair in any mental state, and is this so wrong to do? Yes and no, and vice versa. However, the medical community doesn't view it this way, and it is through this very same medical community that any chance of changing their common, status-quo thinking is just as futile as asking the original question.
I'm stumped on this one.
(a flip-flopping, stumped) kazoo
poster:kazoo
thread:61760
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20010424/msgs/61842.html