is that Blue Shield wrote to my Dr. (not to me) that he was prescribing too many of certain drugs, namely Percocet and klonopin to me (he received a few such letters wrt other patients too). This is probably a more terrifying prospect than living alone. My first reaction was bed-fetal-position-I-just-want-to-fucking-give-up-NOW.

Y'see, Multiple Sclerosis can be exacerbated by stress, and MS symptoms that are occasional occur more frequently w/ stress. I've already had a flare-up this year for which I blame paperwork and my former neurologist. I have a condition called trigeminal neuralgia, which is pain along the trigeminal nerve which runs around the face--hence the Percocet (nerve pain really doesn't respond well to the run-of-the-mill pain reliever). I have this every day. I have an occasional symptom for which one term is "formication"--the sensation of ants crawling around under one's skin. Basically every little muscle in an area twitching at once. I get it in my legs and backs of my hands, and sometimes all the way up my arms and under my scalp. It is absolutely maddening. You can't keep still for a moment, so I'm simultaneously moving my legs, rubbing the backs of my hands, or trying to figure out how to rip open my scalp. This is one of the things that's been happening a lot more frequently than it did last year--almost always when I go to bed. Sometimes N. has rubbed the backs of my hands for me, and she can feel it when she does, and it's completely creepy from her perspective too--she has to keep shaking out her own hands to get rid of the residual sensation.

Pain and maddeningly creepy sensations caused by MS are exacerbated by stress/anxiety and create more stress/anxiety, thereby further exacerbating the symptom, and causing more stress/anxiety, and you can see where I'm going w/ this. Hence the klonopin. I'll grant I take what some doctors would see as fairly large doses of the stuff and what other doctors would see as moderate doses. But when every muscle in both legs and hands is twitching the ONLY thing that makes it stop is klonopin b/c it breaks into the anxiety-symptom-anxiety-symptom cycle. The fear of running out of my meds before I can get them refilled is another source of anxiety. And given the MS/stress connection, this could lead to an overall exacerbation of the whole disease, not just individual symptoms. I've also recently experienced my first two really full-on panic attacks (as opposed to everyday anxiety), and again, part of the answer is klonopin or a similar medication. If you've never had a panic attack, try not to. Not fun. I won't go into all the politics regarding pain relief (and the undertreatment thereof) in the U.S., but if you're curious, here's an interesting document, esp. considering the sources:  http://www.naag.org/issues/pdf/20050321-Final-DEA-Comment.pdf

And I'm really grateful for the copy and paste function b/c otherwise I wouldn't have been able to post this, but I was writing to a friend of the legal persuasion for advice.