It's Time Again for Stoid!

The BBQ Pit
181

Oh heavens no. Who has extra?

In what universe?

Yeah, I used to feel much the same, largely because I didn’t really know what it was, which is true of most people.

In my own case, the way in which it first came up as a possibility (five years before I got the actual diagnosis from a shrink) was pretty hard to wave off as something imagined or conveniently manufactured. I had been two things my whole life: an extremely heavy smoker, almost a chain smoker, and a voracious reader. In addition to stacks of periodicals of all kinds, I regularly read at least a couple of novels every month, sometimes a couple every week. For decades. I quit smoking in September 2000. I have read exactly one novel in the 16 years since then, “The Road”. I’ve tried repeatedly, but it’s useless. The day I stopped smoking was very literally the day I stopped being able to read novels. ( I can read non-fiction because I don’t have to read front to back, I can dip in and bounce around.)

My then-therapist, upon being told this, suggested that I had ADD, her reasoning being that nicotine is a stimulant and I had been medicating myself with it for decades, which allowed me to sit and focus on reading novels, among other things. I laughed it off as ridiculous because nothing I had ever heard about people with ADD seemed at all true of me. But as I say, five years of struggling later, I got the news. And since then I have learned exactly what it is, exactly how it really operates, and it explains pretty much every major issue I have struggled with since I entered middle school. And it explains it as in “Holy Christ, has someone been following me around my whole life? Have they tapped into my brain and recorded my mental processes?”

And the meds help, but they have never helped with reading. Turns out about 10% of people with ADD find nicotine to be the perfect drug. And it also explains the startling way I started smoking, which was to go from zero to a pack on my first day, and I never looked back. My brain said YEAH.

I tried e-cigarettes in hopes I could get the benefits of nicotine without having to really be a smoker again, and I also tried patches. But no-go… I was a heavy, heavy smoker and that’s where I would have to go and I’m just not willing.

And as for the fact that ADD issues are common to most people to some extent, of course that’s true, because it’s pretty much true of almost every disorder and disability of the mind and personality, it’s a matter of degree. Everyone gets depressed sometimes,but some people’s depression is profoundly damaging and extreme. Everyone has moments of wondering if they turned off the stove or having to check and re-check things they know don’t need checking, but other people find themselves crippled by the way these sorts of things have taken over their minds and interfere with their ability to be in the world. Almost everyone exhibits the sorts of things that fall under the label of ADD/ADHD, but my life has been devastated by it.

And there’s tons of neurological research showing that ADD brains really are different. I won’t do another Wall o’ Text, but this is a link to the International Consensus Statement on ADHD: Dr. Russell A. Barkley - Dedicated to Education and Research on ADHD

182

Actually, very ON-topic.

And I’m tellin’ ya, Guin, that Google Machine is pretty awesome. For instance, just now I typed “valium for status epilepticus” (which is what it’s used for in dogs, as I explained in the original thread) and the very first thing that came up was the website “American Family Physician” and this is the first paragraph (it’s from 2003):

But I used your terms first, typing “valium as an anti-convulsant” into the Google Machine and BAM, first hit, drugs.com, the visible result without even linking:

And all this:

And so on and so forth… Really, Guin, I can’t recommend the Google Machine highly enough, it’s freakin’ awesome!

183

Sometimes this board is so lame.

184

But will it walk your dog?

185

That was quite an interesting set of cites, Stoid.

So how do you account for the fact that I’ve been getting my Adderall without incident or scrutiny for a dozen years and you have DEA issues?

Could it have something to do with the fact that I follow the law and you don’t?

186

What? Are you serious?

Valium is prescribed as a muscle relaxant probably more often nowadays than as an anti-anxiety med. It’s use in palsy disorders as well as chronic and acute muscular issues is well documented.

187

Of course it isn’t unexpected: really specific details that are critical to the actual point and purpose of the stories and statements containing them are by definition not minor and need correction, which will frequently result in stories that no longer make sense (or are any fun) to tell. Like madsircool’s story that I am a proven plagiarizer and the really specific detail that I was the reader of someone else’s plagiarism designed to impress me - a really specific detail, yes, but definitely not minor.

The detail that I never had any interaction with my vet which in the remotest way resembled the depictions being casually repeated in these threads isn’t minor, since it cuts the legs out from under the rest of the story, the really fun part: Of Course the vet refused the valium because Crazy Stoid the Drug Dealer.

188

First I’ll answer your question: no, not possible. Because the DEA hasn’t the faintest notion that I have “not followed the law”.

And now I’ll correct your question: I don’t have DEA issues. I have Costco issues because they are strictly by the book. (And the book is very fussy. Every state has a Schedule II Prescription Monitoring Program with all kinds of t’s to cross and i’s to dot) Example: I see my shrink at his private office address in one area of LA. Once they refused to fill my prescription because he had used the prescription pad he uses at the free clinic where he gives his time in another part of LA. I don’t even remember how they made the distinction, but they did and they made me go back and get the prescription on the private office prescription pad. Same doctor, same DEA number, total pain in the ass.

189

I wouldn’t want it to because I have too much fun biking my dog!

190

I think you’re confused (again), since in all the discussions regarding my relaxed attitudes about sharing prescription drugs, there was never any suggestion that either me or anyone I “share” with was using the drugs for recreation or using them inappropriately for conditions they do not legitimately have.

Damn details.

191

and you know this how?

I know about 4 separate incidents, and you say that breaking drug laws is commonplace for you. It’s quite possible the DEA does know about your malfeasance and has you marked for extra scrutiny. That would account for both the vet’s refusal to give you valium and the pharmacy’s “fussiness.”

You openly flout drug laws, and now you have trouble obtaining controlled substances.

And yet, you can’t see the connection.

You’re really pretty dumb, aren’t you?

192

Bwahahahaaaaa. Are you serious? Extra scrutiny by the DEA because somebody gives a spare pill or two to a friend in need?

You’re really dumb as a box of rocks aren’t you Green Bean.

:stuck_out_tongue:

193

Wait, you mean I’m on The Master List? The Master List of Prescription Drug Sharers? The Master List the DEA compiles from the information they got from the bugs they have planted in everyone’s houses to pick up non-telephone conversations with? The Master List the DEA delivers to veterinarians coast to coast? The Master List of Prescription Drug Sharers that the veterinarians cross check before they dispense Schedule IV drugs that start with the letter V? (Schedule IV drugs that start-with-P are cool, though)

I’m on THAT list? :eek:

Well, that explains everything!

194

Yeah, I remember. “I ruined my dog and now she’s broken”, wasn’t it? So let’s recap: you had a dog you were too lazy and selfish to train, you were too unfit to walk it, too broke to afford the vet bills, and your vet wouldn’t trust you with its medication anyway, so it died. Remind me again why you think you’re fit to care for anything larger or more demanding than a cactus?

195

It’s situations like this where I really miss the old rolleyes smiley.

Thank you for the information.

196

Cacti can be very hard to take care of.

197

When I came into your original thread, I had no idea of your past, and going entirely off of the way the vet acted in your description I concluded that she thought you were drug seeking. After reading your responses and the links to the ‘lending’ of Xanax, bringing butt valium to the friend who got bad news, and other fun stuff, it’s pretty obvious that anything the doc prescribed would not be limited to going to the dog. What did the vet pick up on? I have no idea. But when someone is as casual about slinging controlled substances around to friends and yard work guys as you are, and believes that everyone does it oh and everyone smokes pot too, it’s a pretty easy bet that you did or said something that tipped the vet off without realizing it. I mean, you don’t even realize how ‘I loaned this guy who was going to do yardwork Xanax’ comes off to other people!

198

I’m curious, what doctor diagnosed a medical condition and prescribed Valium to the friend you brought the dog valium syringes to? In the story it didn’t sound like they had time to go to a doctor. How did you verify the medical condition for yardwork guy, did you get a medical records release or did you just take his word for it?

199

Let’s just say this dog is in a better place now :eek:

200

That is a prickly question.