My battle with bipolar psychosis and drug addiction

Last February, I was sick in the hospital with shortness of breath and heart failure. I always had a bad lower back and was put on up to 80mg of opiates from my pain doctor. I was so addicted to them. The hospital would not give me that high a dose. They gave me 10 mg of percocet a day. I started having withdrawal symptoms. I have bipolar disorder and started getting paronoid. I thought the police were watching me from behind the wall. I called the nurse a fake nurse and the younger guy in the next bed a fake patient.

My mind kept playing tricks on me. I asked to see the hospital psychiatrist and he came to see me. He told me I should go to the behavioral health hospital and into rehab. At first, I didn't want to go. Then, I told him I would go. I had to wait another day until they had a bed for me. I was taken out of the hospital by ambulance late at night and brought to the rehab place. I was still hallucinating and psychotic. My meds were totally off. I was put in bed and had a roommate who was younger. At first I thought he was a kid. I woke up the next day and saw he was a young adult.

I asked him when he arrived. He said a week before me. I was still hallucinating and met the head nurse. There were 24 patients in the unit. It was co-ed. Everyone there had an addiction problem. I saw the head psychiatrist to get my meds adjusted. A social worker was on my case too. We had no visitors. That was due to covid.

There were two college students there, both women. I talked a lot to them. I was too talkative and talked non-stop. My mania was acting up. My roommate went home and I was given an older roommate who was around 50 and a minister like me. We were both ordained ministers. At first I was agitated and told the nurses and doctors that I would sue them. One mental heath aide said to me, "You must be rich to be suing everybody." I didn't answer her. Finally, I got under control and quieted down. They gave me no opiates in the ward. I had given them up cold turkey. Everybody kept asking each other when they were going home. Most went home after 6 or 7 days. I was still there after that time.

We had sessions with the head psychiatrist and head nurse and social worker to determine our release date. They released me after 11 days. My case was worse than others. After they released me, I realized that I was a drug addict. I sought more help. I ended up in an online rehab group with 12 patients per meeting. We had sessions on Zoom once a week for about 2 hours. I also went to NA meetings online. Both groups were very helpful. We also had private therapy once a week. After a few months of intensive out patient therapy, I graduated from the program. I am 8 months sober now. We had to get drug tested once a week in program. Now I am on my own and doing well.

I went back to my PhD studies online and will be taking computer classes online in the graduate school of a state university. I also had my Parkinson's act up and had a lot of falls. My new neurologist increased my meds to help me.

I will continue to discuss my battle with drugs and falling. I don't feel much urge to go back to opiates. I still battle the desire to take some pain killers for my bad back pain. I have spinal stenosis and neuropathy and sciatica down my left leg. I hope I get better soon. The strongest med I take for a bad back now is extra strength tylenol. It seem to help. I can't believe I was on such a high dose of opiates. I am lucky I lived through it all. Thank God I am still here and functioning well.