Addicted To Prescription Drugs
WOMAN'S OWN|November 04, 2019
One in four people in England – that’s nearly 12 million – are taking ‘addictive’ prescription medicines. Miranda Levy reveals how her habit got out of control
Miranda Levy
Addicted To Prescription Drugs

Winter 2015, I was trying to come off tranquillisers, and thought that watching the bland One Direction: This Is Us, would help. My family were away, so it was the ideal time. The shaking and sweating I had done before. And the nausea. But I wasn’t prepared for the agony that overwhelmed me and had me curled up in a ball on the floor by the time the final credits rolled.

Slippery slope

My problems started in July 2010, when I learned my husband wanted to call time on our 13-year relationship.I was distressed and worried – overnight, I stopped sleeping. I’d had insomnia years earlier, but this time I had school-age children and a senior job in journalism.

After a couple of sleepless nights, I saw my GP, who dashed off a prescription for temazepam, an old-fashioned sleeping pill. It didn’t work. Within a month, I was signed off work; within two, I found myself in the office of an NHS psychiatrist. This gently spoken consultant seemed sympathetic to my plight. By then, I hadn’t slept for about eight weeks and was insane with exhaustion. I was begging him for something – anything – to get me some sleep. He prescribed me something called clonazepam. Then an antidepressant called trazodone joined the party.

All drugs have side-effects, but the particular ‘villain’ here was the clonazepam, which belongs to a group of drugs called benzodiazepines (benzos for short). Benzos have a bad rap because of their potential for swift dependency, tolerance and withdrawal symptoms.

At the start, clonazepam helped me a lot. I slept a bit – only in short bursts, but at least I had some periods of unconsciousness. As well as a little insulation against an incredibly stressful domestic situation.

هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة November 04, 2019 من WOMAN'S OWN.

ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.

هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة November 04, 2019 من WOMAN'S OWN.

ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.