Photo credit: wakingtimesmedia.com

Kratom is a South East Asian plant related to coffee that has been used for centuries as a natural remedy. For years, the FDA and DEA have been attacking the availability of this plant that thousands swear by. There are those who would paint the plant kratom as if it were some dangerous, new, legal high. In actuality, many of the people who are using it are doing so because they are tired of the lack of clarity associated with opiate and opioid use.

The reasons for using kratom vary. Some studies suggest it may be useful as an adjunctive therapy for depression, anxiety, PTSD, fibromyalgia, Lyme disease as well as for weaning off opiates or opioids used for chronic pain. I am familiar with many members of the kratom community. Many of them I consider good friends. What follows are unedited testimonials from just a couple people whose lives have been improved greatly after they discovered this plant. Their stories are unique, but the situation of having found a new lease on life after choosing natural, healthy alternatives to pharmaceuticals is by no means rare.

Dijon Evans' story reveals how new guidelines related to pain management may result in certain people in extraordinary pain falling through the cracks. Dijon was actually thankful for that. If not for new guidelines, she wouldn't have been forced to seek an alternative and having found a safer, natural choice, her concern is that it remains available to her and others in the same position.

<img src="https://media.8ch.net/file_store/afc4a8ca9f10933b9315db07230a525549526f30b9e3ce44c88e2eff684ff7e0.jpg" style="max-height:640px;max-width:480px;">

<strong><h4>Dijon Evans</strong></h4>

You have taken away my pain meds. Put me through withdrawals, without a thought of what that may be like.

I am not a slacker. I am very educated and if I had things my way, I wouldn't be taking anything. I used to be extremely active, I had plans and goals for my life.

But when I turned 16, my first real job was a lifeguard. I got my foot caught on the outside of the pool, as I went in to get a little boy. I dislocated my ankle. I had a cast put on too tight and it cut off the circulation and killed the nerves.

My leg was allowed to remain on too long, and the nerve damage spread, it's now full body, including trigeminal and ocular nerves- as well as now being documented in my brain.

It's shutting down my organs one by one and it will eventually kill me. It has caused me to have gangrene, pulmonary embolisms (2), 9 bouts of osteomyelitis. I have such brittle bones because of the nerve damage that I have 9 broken/compression fractured vertebrae, an artificial hip and my other hip and knee need to be replaced.

That's not even mentioning the amputations…

It's called CRPS 2 w additional complications, that's what the cast caused.

There's not one aspect or person ( family/ friend/ co-worker/ or even doctors) that hasn't been negatively affected by the pain that I deal with every second, of every minute, every hour of every day - week- month and year since I was 16.

I am now 54 years old.

However, you actually did me a favor by helping me find other methods of pain relief through your false opioid prescription action.

Until now…

Yes, this nerve damage is going to kill me, and I've been on death's door far too many times to count!

Because of your "new guidelines," I don't fall into your terminal cancer pigeonhole. So

even if I wanted to be back on the opioid, I wouldn't be able to.

Because my doctor and medical coverage just dropped all of the pain management patients, I found something " other than opioids."

Kratom lets me have a clear head. Helps with the pain, (far more than the "opioids"!).

I am able to get myself out of bed [the past 10 years I've been primarily stuck there]. NOW I can get into my wheelchair and into the front room.

I have been sincerely smiling. Laughing. Trying to find a way to do a hobby or something.

At least I have a desire to try, instead of arguing with the doctors about quality of life/ vs no quality of life.

I take a total of 1 1/2 tsp a day, of kratom. Not all at once.

No, it doesn't get rid of all of the pain, but I am able to tolerate what I have. I tolerate it far more than I ever could have on the pills!

Now, because big pharmaceutical companies are backing the ban- you are going to try and take away what life I have been able to get and appreciate since April.

I'm just wondering how long it's going to be before you are willing to be paid to look the other way while " us troublemakers that are responsible for the opioid crisis anyway" are just done away with altogether!

There's not one valid certification of death that kratom (alone) is responsible for.

We've already seen suicide rates rise since people have had their medications stopped.

Each day more and more people are finding themselves in that place of not having any medications.

Cold turkey. No warning, just stopped.

I had lost all hope.

I had a plan, and I was putting everything in place.

That's when I heard about Kratom.

I learned, I researched, I had incredible help from JJ, Kym Brown and Jessica McNiickle as well as a very supportive group of people, I listened and became overwhelmed with fear.

When I realized what I was afraid of, I cried. I cried that deep gut-wrenching cry; because I was starting to feel "HOPE."

I didn't recognize it at first because I'd lost all sense of hope.

I started kratom, very doubtful of what I'd been hearing, but I didn't want to die. So what would it hurt to try.

I found I HOPE.

I found laughter.

I discovered this mystical "quality of life" and now you want to take it away.

So a billion dollar industry can put more billions in all of your pockets…

At the cost of how many lives????

Really?

Is it worth It?

I know that you don't have to worry about not being able to function.

To sleep.

To eat.

To just live, find some semblance of a life.

To laugh.

Smile. And To Find HOPE.

To once again see beauty, feel joy and experience the intense differences between colors.

Why don't you do an experiment: for one month… Just one.

Put yourselves in a wheelchair, tie your legs together so you can't use them.

Get up, get dressed, fix your food, go to work ( no servers, no drivers, nobody doing anything for you….) It's only 30 -31 days.

In fact: get by on 876 a month… take buses, go from pharmacy to pharmacy, and doctors office - pay copays, rent. You know that kind of thing.

Do it while you're in so much pain, you have to remember to breathe

.. all the while remaining by yourself because you are just as tired of talking about the pain and "what now" things, as everyone else is, hearing about it.

Only 30 days. ..

It's Not a lifetime, like, we are subjected to.

<iframe width="782" height="470" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/u3DJrcDzo5s" frameborder="0" gesture="media" allow="encrypted-media" allowfullscreen></iframe>

The following testimonial was submitted by Nina Ajdin. Nina learned the hard way how FDA approved treatments can wreak havoc on your life. Topical Steroid Withdrawal is a painful and debilitating condition. Because of prescribed medication for her skin condition, she has spent years trying to recover. Kratom may be under fire currently from the FDA, but thousands of the people who are using it do so because they don't want to have to resort to medications that have upended their life.

<strong><h4>From Nina Ajdin:</strong></h4>

Imagine for a moment being someone who's skin feels like it's on fire twenty-four hours a day. Your entire body feels as if acid has been poured over it. It looks like you've survived third-degree burns. Your skin is raw and leaks a fluid that smells much like decomposing flesh. Your room is covered in your own skin that's fallen off of you as if someone took a cheese grater to it.

You can't leave your home due to the pain, embarrassment, shame, and fear of infection (which by the way, happens often.) It’s terrifying to look in the mirror because you don’t recognize your own reflection.

You sit in the bathtub for up to ten hours a day to try to cool your skin down. Even then, the agony is indescribable. The pain is so horrible all you can do is scream and cry. Life is unbearable. There's nothing helpful doctors and medical professionals can do to relieve

your suffering. In fact, these symptoms are caused by the medicines they prescribed and that are so readily available over-the-counter.

This has been my reality for over 3.5 years. My name is Nina Ajdin. I'm 27, and I live in Illinois. As young as I am, I have

literally been near death countless times. I'd been in and out of hospitals with life-threatening infections and seizures and was admitted as an inpatient to a psychiatric hospital for suicidal ideations three times. I suffer from a condition called Red Skin Syndrome/Topical Steroid Withdrawal. This is an iatrogenic condition caused by the use of topical steroid creams, such as hydrocortisone. I'm currently in recovery and doing better, but there is still a long road ahead of me. I still suffer both physically and emotionally. The anxiety and depression can be crippling. The thought of another flare is never far from my thoughts.

My memories for the last few years have been primarily things I'd rather forget such as the pain, the isolation, the despair. The

thought of going to a doctor knowing the result of living this way is caused by their medicines is frightening. It's frustrating knowing

there is nothing that modern medicine can do to help. To help deal with the pain, anxiety, and depression I turned to alternative therapies.

Out of the many alternatives I tried that didn't work there were some that did.

One of these is Kratom (Mitragyna Speciosa). Kratom is an herbal supplement that I'd found through research after I was diagnosed with TSW. It comes in different forms, but it is mainly sold as a powdered leaf that is made into a tea. It helped support a sense of calm and promoted a sense of well being. It's been a great tool in my fight against

TSW.

After a long uphill road, today, I have a chance at life. I'm going back to college to earn my bachelor's degree, and I have come leaps and bounds from where this condition had me.Thanks to a strong desire to get better, support from my parents, and botanical supplements like Kratom, skullcap, mulungu, etc, life seems more positive now. I believe overall, Kratom is a remarkably safe plant. Please don't harm the Kratom consumers in this country by taking it away.

It is as nature intended, a plant, available for our use to improve our quality of life. Everyone should be given the chance that I was given, to choose nature over synthetics.