As a disclaimer, you may have poor liver or kidney function which would contraindicate some of the medications I mentioned, your surgical team will make that call.
I was really annoyed when my wife’s doctor freely prescribed her oxi after her delivery even though my wife never asked for it and never showed any sign of needing it.
Having free flowing prescriptions is how we end up with so many addicts.
Good way to avoid getting addicted.
about 7 years ago my wife got sand in her eye - was problematic enough that we went to a local clinic. she wasn't going to go blind, but it was irritated enough that after flushing it out, it still looked... bad. and she indicated it was a bit sore, that she wanted to get home to just try to get to sleep.
The doctor there offered a prescription for percocet. We said "no, no need - we'll call if there's a problem". They handed us a prescription for... either 7 or 14 pills. we took it and didn't use it.
A few years later I ended up with extreme lower back pain. I could hardly move - was bed/chair-bound for 4 days. Had called around to see if any clinic would see me to prescribe some pain killer. NOPE. Don't want to create any addicts. Clinics all have signs on them saying 'no prescriptions for...' then a list of 4-5 things.
We were basically force-fed a prescription for something way out of line with what was necessary, then when something was necessary... not available.
Yep, just my anecdote, but it's stuck with me, mostly because I don't have that many medical interactions in the first place, so the outliers tend to stick out.
Asking for a referral for an x-ray/ultrasound for your back pain will often make them go "Here, why don't you try this opioid first and see if it gets better?"
one office offered to schedule an appointment for about 4 weeks later, which I didn't take.
This situation has happened to me twice, both times this pain came out of nowhere, and first time it took me out of commission the better part of 4 days. Tried to get any medication (per above story) - nothing. Second time this happened, 2 years later, it lasted about 3 days, and I didn't even bother trying to get anything - just took a lot of OTC stuff. If this happened regularly, I might be able to figure out if there's some trigger to avoid, but... 2x in the last 6 years - hard to pinpoint!
I should add that this gave me a little bit of insight as to how people who live with chronic pain might feel all the time. Just a few days of that was maddening. Thinking it might be the 'new normal' - constant intense pain that rarely lapses - would really have been difficult to cope with, and I probably can emphathize (or is it sympathize?) a bit more with the prescription drug abuse situation.
Oversteer is the norm. Precautionary principle and all that.
Patients with chronic pain have to train their care givers, just as they have to train you. You're building relationships, trust. Just like dating, jobs. Unhappy or uncomfortable? Move on to others you can work with.
But I do remember that, even though I filled the prescription, I never ended up taking it. A few days of higher-dose ibuprofen (taken with food) was enough.
https://media.jamanetwork.com/news-item/no-significant-diffe...
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/04/180417181101.h...
Follow your doctor’s recommendations and communicate how the pain is.
Some people need opioids for relatively minor surgery while others can get by with NSAIDS for relatively major surgery.
Either way, after an operation might as well suck it up a bit, like they did before Oxy and the likes came.
Recreational drug use can be fun but I don't think that's your prerogative here.
1. Make sure we're in agreement as to the things being done. Yes, it's been discussed multiple times, but best to be clear!
2. Ask what kind of pain killers I'll already be on when I wake up.