Kimm Dora guest column: Opioid backlash leaving behind legitimate patients

In response to Friday’s article “Carson City to Sue Opioid Companies,” I have a totally different take on this and it’s one that is not getting said, and quite frankly I’m a little tired of it.

You see, I’m totally on the opposite side of all of this. I’m tired of hearing of this “crisis,” although I can totally sympathize with it and I can understand it.

I have something to say about the city of Carson City for going after the opioid companies. Why? you might ask. It’s simply like this.

If you’re going to go after this company, then why there? You might as well go after the car manufacturers too, for making the cars that destroy so many lives for the drunk drivers, or the gun manufacturers for the mass shootings of late.

This is absolutely getting ridiculous. But you see my point here.

On the other side of these opioids, I’m also one who has been in chronic pain for more than 25 years with arthritis now in my lower back. Back in the early ‘90’s I had a two-level fusion done and every once in a well it acts up on me and I need some of these opioids just to make it through a few days. But now thanks to AB 474 it’s nearly impossible to get this stuff. There are days when I get out of bed and I literally can’t even walk, I have to crawl just to go to the bathroom. The doctors tell me I have to find other means to alleviate the pain. The other means they are referring to is cannabis — are you freaking kidding me? I’m not even 60 years old. I never did that stuff when I was a teenager and I’m not about to start now!

I’m not one to become addicted to any of these opioids — if I was going to that I would’ve done it a long time ago.

So for Carson City, or any of these cities, counties, or states to go after these manufacturers is absolutely ridiculous. They need to be going after the doctors who are issuing the scripts. They need to be going after the people who are dealing the stuff. Not the people that make the stuff!

See, nobody is speaking out on behalf of the people who really do need this stuff, and quite frankly I’m tired on behalf of those of us who really do need this stuff. It’s the little guy, like me, who only needs it on as-needed basis, who is getting left behind. Then not to mention, the insurance companies that are trying to play God once you do get a legal prescription, that’s a whole different story in itself.

We keep getting shoved further and further in the corner without a care or thought in the world. It’s like we don’t even exist anymore, like no one cares about us.

I hope I’ve opened your eyes just a little bit to the entire different side of this so-called crisis everyone is so up in arms about. But there’s a downside to all of this no one is even talking about and it’s leaving so many of us out there with nothing we can do about it!

Kimm Dora is a 57-year-old Dayton resident who has battled chronic back pain for more than 25 years.