When Mark Sullivan Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at the University of Washington tweeted this the other day: “It is possible to taper #opioids without an increase in pain or activity interference”, it set off an interesting reaction on Twitter.

Chronic Pain Patient advocate Claudia Merandi—who founded the Don’t Punish Patient Rally movement–challenged him on Twitter saying : “Really? Let’s ask 500 chronic pain patients: “When you were forced tapered, did your pain magically disappear?”

In fairness to Dr. Sullivan, he wasn’t necessarily talking about a forced taper, but the topic begs some questions we’d like to ask our readers.

Would you tell us your taper story?

If you voluntarily wanted to taper off opioid medication, let us know why you decided to do it and importantly how you did it and how you are feeling today.

To Claudia Merandi’s point—if you have been forced tapered, tell us how and why it happened. How did it occur and how are you doing today?

Use our comments section to leave your story—and we may reach out to you for more detail.

Try to keep your “story” as short as possible—although we fully realize that this is an emotional topic and some of you may vent (it’s ok),but while you’re sharing remember to talk about the cause of pain, how long you’ve had it, and any other details.

We all know that the forced tapering has intensified as a result of what some are calling a “overreaction” to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Guideline issued in 2016. That overreaction was fueled by the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) cracking down on doctors who they alleged were over prescribing. The resulting fear has chilled prescribing habits of many doctors and hospitals.

In the meantime, real people, many of you perhaps have been impacted.

Tell us your tapering story.

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