The Sackler Family – A Secretive Billion Dollar Opioid Empire

This month marks my 10 years of being clean 💯

My brother had back surgery and was prescribed oxycontin enough for 3 months, took one pill and complained it made him itchy left the rest in the safe. I was 19 at the time and saw on the internet it made you feel good so I started to use it. Used the whole prescription in a months time and ended up moving to cocaine to stop the withdrawal. Lost almost two years to that crap, my cousin ended up helping me quit. Proud to say I have been clean 5 years and 6 months.

Not one member of the Sackler family will see prison time. Sickening how broken the world is and that " white collar " criminals never get punished.

I had a miscarriage last year and the doctor prescribed me oxycodone. It was 6 pills in that bottle. I tried my hardest to not take any of them because I was afraid of getting addicted. I've never even smoked weed before. The idea of getting addicted to drugs terrifies me. But that pain hit so hard, I gave in and took 1. I will never forget, once it kicked in, how good I felt. I remember laying in the bed and staring up at the ceiling when I said, This is amazing. I gotta throw this shit in the garbage! And that's exactly what I did the next morning. I don't want nothing that's going to make me feel that good. Hell naw! I preferred dealing with the pain than getting hooked on them.

This August I'll be 7 years clean without this shit in my system, horrible stuff. Great video sir.

I should have ran out of the examining room in Louisville, KY in ’96 when a drug rep from Purdue came in & said he had the answer for my chronic pain. Yes, it's was OxyContin. After being addicted for 20+ years, I broke the chain of addiction as of March 2019. I'll never let anyone or anything take me back to the place I prayed my way out of!!!

My mom lost her leg in 94’ instantly was prescribed…. She battled the addiction until November last year when she overdosed 😢😢😢 My whole family is broken behind this….

I am so glad to be able to say that it has been 9 years since I took my last pill, bought my last bag, used my last hit. I lost my brother to addiction, but I refuse to lose my own life to it.

My uncle hung himself on Christmas because he was on shitloads of oxy. He was a veteran with grenade shrapnel in his chest and took oxy for the pain. He was a good man.

My withdrawals were a trip through hell for two weeks. I went from taking 15 pills a day to zero in 2 days. But I quit and never looked back. My doctors didn’t want to help me at all. No sleep but so exhausted, severe anxiety, skin crawling, body twitches, freezing and burning up, sense of smell so messed up, nausea and vomiting, no appetite at all and zero energy., I felt like I was in a nightmare and somewhere else for those few weeks. Never again. It’s been five years and my kids and Husband got their Mom and Wife back. Thank God!!

A good friend of mine was burnt badly at work and was prescribed OxyContin to deal with his burns. Like so many others, he got hooked and died from an overdose about 2 years ago. I miss you, Cody. The world’s a sadder place without you. I wish we could go golfing one more time.

My friend has serious chronic pain. The opioid crisis was really scary for her, and she was always really careful about her painkillers. Then for some reason her doctor suddenly changed her meds. My best guess is that the opioid crisis had scared him, he didn't want to risk her getting and addiction or overdose. Unfortunately, the new painkiller wasn't strong enough, she was in pain almost all the time. She started taking more, she just wanted it to stop hurting. She ended up accidentally overdosing, and was extremely lucky to have survived. If her brother hadn't been visiting when it happened, I'm absolutely certain she'd be dead. Opioids are dangerous, but until we have efficient painkillers for people with chronic pain, then some people have no choice. (It's important that people understand that my friend was NOT attempting suicide, she just wanted the pain to go away.)

Being a drug dealer is fine... as long as you're a corporation

Been clean from heroin 23 years , if your struggling just know I love you .

I had an issue with one of my reproductive organs. It was at risk of twisting due to some inflammation. I was in so much pain that I took the morphine that the ER offered to me. It was an uniquely horrifying experience, but not in the way you'd expect. I got it through IV, so it hit all at once. It felt like my chest was being crushed by an elephant. Then... a scary type of bliss hit. You don't realize how much pain you carry day to day until it's all gone. For 30ish minutes, I felt less pain than I'd ever felt before in my life. The reason I say that this is scary is because I took it once, over a year ago, and whenever I think about how it felt, I almost want more. It's not an addiction, but I know that if I ever take it again, it will be. I never want to touch that stuff again, and I will never blame the people who fall down that path. It's scarily easy.

I got prescribed oxy after my wisdom teeth surgery at 15 years old, can’t remember the dosage, but I just remember my dad only giving me half of the dose I was supposed to take, and even that knocked me on my ass. Addiction runs in my family too, and I’m very thankful that my dad controlled when I took it and how much I took. I’m grateful it was able to do its job of helping pain, without becoming addicting.

The practice of using sales reps for pharmaceuticals should be extremely illegal. Doctors recieving perks from drug reps should have their licenses taken away. Unqualified salespeople with no regard for the patient should not be responsible for selecting the drugs to be used.

a patient cured is a customer lost...

People with severe legitimate pain can't even get temporary pain control. This is insane.

I'm one of the victims of the Sacker family's kill for profit scheme. I was diagnosed with degenerative bone disease which is inherited. I suddenly started breaking down and spent over a year in a wheelchair. The pain was unbearable even with the high dosages I was prescribed. But after I finally got both hips replaced the doctor didn't try to wean me down. I had so much money and so many possessions stolen from me because I was too out of it to realize it. My former pain doctor got shut down which put me through the worst 8 days I've ever spent. And now I have to have a small amount of medicine to have any quality of life but it's so much less and I think better but the damage was done and I can't get my life back I was robbed of and live on disability in subsidized housing while they live like royalty. It isn't fair.