While I have been in a state of chronic pain for the better part of a couple of years now, I believe I am one of the fortunate few who have seen a light at the end of the tunnel where my medical condition is concerned.

That said, I am also perfectly confident, and this is next to impossible to admit even here on an annonymous website that is full of people in conditions similar to or worse then my own, that I stood on the edge of a cliff at point Reyes in California and was prepared to jump to get out of the pain I was in.

Of course I didn't. I just wanted to say that I stood right there, at the end of the service road, doubled over in pain with my younger brother standing right beside me telling me that he didn't want to see me do this but that he understood and hated seeing me in so much pain.

For me it started with one 7mm Kidney Stone that took four days to pass. I went to the ER and was propperly medicated until it passed. After it did I was sent home with some pain medication to ease the pain that is normal after passing a stone.

After two weeks, nothing changed. The pain was still there. Not quite as bad as it was while passing a stone but still there. My doctors had no idea why. Every test imaginable was done.

To make a long story short, they found that my kidneys were full of stones and that I was in a constant situation where I was continuously passing kidney stones and would be for a long time to come as far as they could tell.

They went in and removed 14 stones from my right kidney and 11 from my left. They removed my gallbladder as it had stones in it as well and they thought it might be a contributing factor.

They damamged a ureter while doing the proceedure. I have constant pain from that but it is a pain I can tolorate and will do so when I am finished with the rest of my medical problems.

I have had several surgerys to block the nerves in areas of my genitals and kidneys.

Before this, I was a professional athelete who hadn't had a drink of alchohol or anything else since 1979, when I was a juniour in highschool and became a christian. I kept myself in perfect health. Due to my profession, I had to stay in the best possible physical shape I could in order to stay competitve.

During the course of my professional life, I had broken 4 ribs, both of my arms and legs and had broken my neck (c4) while in Malaysia and since they didn't have the best x ray gear, I didn't find out until recently.

I went through all of those experiences without taking a single narcotic medication as I didn't want to risk failing a drug test and no longer being able to compete.

I have needless to say, I very high pain threshold.

Still, I was on the verge of suicide due to the amount of pain I was in from my condition.

Why? Because my doctor, while he agreed that I had a genuine need for the medication had said that he felt it was too dangerous for him to continue providing me the needed medicines to keep me functioning in an acceptable level of pain.

He sent me to a PM doc who told me that I needed to have surgery to block the nerve endings, which I did and to use "biofeedback" and other techniques but he felt that using any narcotic medication would only hurt me due to the fact that I would likely have this condition for the rest of my life and he didn't think I would want to go through it on narcotics.

Since I was niave I agreed. And after all of the surgerys and biofeedback a human can handle, I was standing on a cliff with my kid brother crying and talking about how desperately I wanted the relief that would come by not being here any longer.

My brother of course made me understand how I could never do that and I have never thought of it since. Of course, I probably would never have done it though who knows.

I went back to my doctor who gave me a prescription for pain medication and told me about OPs. He told me what he would prescribe if he could do so with impunity and told me to find a site that could help me with that specific medication.

That was about 6 months ago. I found this site and some great people here who helped me find my way. I can honestly say though that I wouldn't be here today without having the option to go to come here and find an alternative place to get the medical support that I needed. Today, I have 16 stones in my right kidney and 4 in my left. All are small enough that I should pass them. My left side has been recieving doses of an experimental medication that is working amazingly. I will keep us updated.

Unfortunately, every state is different in the way it treats chronic pain suffers and I happen to live in one that is makes it very difficult for any patient to get any sort of long term help with any medical condition that requires pain medication long term.

This place on the online ops found within saved my life and I bet many others since it has been here.

Does the industry need regulation? You bet it does.

Does it need to be taken away because of a handful of criminals? Not even close.

As I said, I have had a significant breakthrough in my condition and believe that within the next few months that I will no longer need these pills to get back to normal. I am lucky, many aren't.

Remember me and the rest of us when you vote on issues concerning pain management.

I handed a very similar version of this letter to my congressman at a fundraiser. He actually read it in front of me and said "thank you for this, I am still looking into the matter but believe there are more people like you out there then there are the bad guys".

Thank you so much for your letter and the contents within. I would loved to have read it before I wrote mine, yours is much better.

To those who have yet to write,call or anything else to contact your elected officials, you need to. It matters. It is your responsibility to each other to make our voices heard.

In my opinion.