Accidental Addict: A True Story of Pain and Healing....also Marriage, Real Estate, And Cowboy Dancing

Description

I am well. Completely well. Wonderful. Except, I'm lying. Or was the first time I wrote this, anyway. Month after month, on days when I felt optimistic enough to imagine that surely I was nearly healed, I watched myself nail this story down on faith alone that by the time you'd read these words, they'd be true. And now, thank God, they are. I am completely, confidently well. It feels like a miracle. It almost feels like I've been dead, and now I've come back to vibrant life. I was a happily married mother of three grown children and the author of nine novels. In September of 2012, I optimistically presented myself for total knee replacement surgery-one of 670,000 such patients in the U.S. that year-and, thanks to doctor-prescribed Oxycodone and Xanax, promptly descended into three years of drug-induced hell. Sometimes a writer assigns herself a challenge of experience, deducting her expenses on Tax Form C, then reports back, allowing the reader to decide for herself whether she'd like to embark on some rigorous diet, raise chickens in the backyard, divorce from all screens, sample a new fitness craze, or travel to some trendy eco resort. This book is no such thing. No one would ever choose to experience what I and so many others have gone through in suffering withdrawal from physician-prescribed drugs, but since my life took this horrific turn and I happen to be a writer, it feels like being tapped on the shoulder-Tag, you're it. Speak up. Stories of addiction-related depravity abound; explanations of how people eventually recover, not so much. Mine is the story I longed to hear during my withdrawal: a story of hope, solid evidence that people can somehow live through this and survive. If you read this book some years in the future, rest assured you need not fear Googling my name only to find that I relapsed right after its publication. Whatever lies ahead for me, one thing remains certain: I will not be going down in the flames of ongoing addiction. Because of the powerfully destructive effects of narcotic painkillers and anti-anxiety benzodiazepines on the brain, I was, for the duration of my prolonged healing, a terribly sick, reclusive woman, in certain stretches nearly comatose and, in my bleakest moments, the raging Bitch of the World. Ask my family. Accidental Addict is the story of how it all went down-the white, middleclass, "nice-lady," pharmaceutically-induced trainwreck of my life.

Linda Crew is the award-winning author of the YA classic, Children of the River, as well as others including Brides of Eden: a True Story Imagined, and A Heart for Any Fate: Westward to Oregon 1845. She lives with her husband at Wake Robin Farm in Corvallis, Oregon.

"An excruciatingly tender, necessary work, wonderfully written, so honest. Incredibly personal and filled with love. The many, many people who don't even know this is happening to them will thank Linda Crew over and over." Jane Kirkpatrick, Homestead "Well-written and compellingLinda Crew provides a prescription that all of medicine should heed: "A doctor should never prescribe a drug without an understanding of what it takes to get off of that drug, and a willingness to help his patient accomplish this." Robert Whitaker, Anatomy of an Epidemic "Emotionally engagingCrew insightfully comments on the institutional and interpersonal minefields that sick people must navigatewell told and moving." Kirkus Reviews "I hope this timely book gets widely read. The medical community has accidentally created an epidemic of addiction by overprescribing narcotics, and now everyone, including prescribers, needs to know how easily these drugs can destroy lives." Andrew Kolodny, MD, Executive Director, Physicians for Responsible Opioid Prescribing "Crew's inspiring triumph over addiction and withdrawal is a lifeline for anyone struggling to recover from prescription painkillers or anti-anxiety medications.a riveting roller coaster of devastating defeat, courage, and exhilarating joy." Gretchen Olson, Call Me Hope "An important piece of literature that may help educate many. " Monica Cassani, author and editor of Beyond Meds "A must read for all medical students across America, and physicians who treat pain will find this book very useful as they rethink the way they are prescribing narcotics....a superb book on an enormous medical issue of our time." Mark Rampton, M.D. "A memoir that's as harrowing, honest, and raw as it is timely. Crew writes with a ferocious energy, as though she's determined to finish the book even as the walls of her own home are crashing down around her." Rick Borsten, The Great Equalizer