In 1977 I was on an army Chinook helicopter on a night exercise, hot LZ, which meant that being a machine gunner my job was to get out first upon landing....or not.....and lay down a line of fire to lessen the danger of everyone else getting out. A Chinook helicopter has three points of contact when its on the ground, the way I can tell when it's on the ground in blackout conditions is when I feel the front wheel hit, like bump, bump,........bump.....that's the front wheel, and I'm firing out the door in a spray pattern..........til we're all out or the barrel melts off. Well, I'm 17 years old, all fired up, scared to death....and I feel the third bump. I'm out the door firing and spraying, one problem......the bird was thirty feet off the ground. I hit the ground with both knees locked and felt an electrical shock travel through my body accompanied by a bright flash of light that permeated my everything. I lay on the ground and momentarily I began to get my vision back............I had terrible pain in my lower back.....but I began to move with the squad. I finished the
mission and was medivaced out soon after I got back to the company. I went to the hospital and got xrayed, examined, everything. They told me to go to my barracks and lie down and rest. I did just that and around thirty minutes later, an ambulance showed up, two medics were in my room with a litter instructing me not to move....my back was broken. I went back to the hospital in the ambulance, all taped to the board, and now scared shitless. After more xrays, the dr. told me that there was a mistake and my back wasn't broken, to just take 2 days bedrest for a strain.....a profile. For the rest of my short military career I had back pain.....we all had back pain........ After going to work in the private sector I had a back injury at work...a strain....lifting heavy things. I went to the doctor....got xrayed...and he asked me when I broke my back. I told him the story and he said I had in fact broken my back....in two places at some point, and that some healing had taken pkace and my back was going to suck for the rest of my life. I was only 19 years old at the time and I had to work to live, injury after injury my whole life. When I was 50 I was at the dr. for a kidney stone and the xrays they took showed my lower back, the dr asked me if I was ok, I said yeah...I guess...why? He said; " your back is messed up bad"...basically " does it hurt?", I said it hurts all the time. He said I can give you something for that, I said I'd try it. That was the beginning of the pain pills, oh, they work great!........little to no pain. Well, after a while the pills weren't quite strong enough and he gave me some stronger ones...then some stronger ones....til I was taking 180 a month...........and still having pain. I was unable to use weed for many years because of my job, I was around it all the time, I even would go outside when smoking was going on.....I took my job seriously.....not just being drug tested.......my job was very critical.....no room for error......ever. The pain became so bad, and I was on the pills, I could no longer work at my job. After becoming 100% disabled, and I wasn't under scrutiny anymore for drugs I decided to try the ganja and see if it helped. I got super high grade weed from a grower I'd known for years....it helped...that was five years ago and I am OFF the pain pills completely. My quality of life is much higher, I feel better, and my liver loves me. A little something to think about; while I was being tested for drugs under DOT
guidelines, I was taking 180 norcos a month........I worked on
mission sensitive aircraft....which means the standards are way higher than private or commercial aircraft., these were govt. and military aircraft. I was drug tested periodically, and those kind of drugs I was taking were never mentioned in test results.......I passed every time, and I assumed it was ok to take them and work.
