Another conclusion of the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) study, published earlier this month, showed that forced tapering triggered more mental health crises and overdoses. I hear this and can’t help but remember how many times — since the 2016 Opioid CDC Guidelines were published — I said this would be the outcome.

I suffered from the first waves of opioid cuts and tapering. I was denied opioids despite suffering from severe back pain that was eventually diagnosed as degenerative disk disease. At the time, I turned to marijuana, which is approved for medical use in my state. It wasn’t enough, and I considered seeking out black-market opioids. Fortunately, I was given access to opioid medications after a few months and did not have to go down that road.

When you’re disabled you often have a lot of doctor appointments, and when the 2016 CDC Guidelines were first announced I couldn’t help but comment on it. I said that the guidelines will drive more pain patients to illicit drugs. Some agreed; some didn’t discuss it; and one nurse said, “I hadn’t thought of it like that.” That response was the most frustrating of all. Shouldn’t a nurse know that taking someone off a medication based on a guideline and not their health means these patients’ need for pain relief has not abated? They’ve been stripped of a pain regimen that helped them live their life with less pain; yoga won’t help. Many will continue to want the same level of pain relief — as they should — and yet access has been extremely limited.

Furthermore, being in pain is in and of itself a mental health crisis. If you do not suffer from chronic or constant pain, you can’t know how changing and life-altering it is. It seems to me that without question, reducing one’s pain medication inevitably leads to more crises.

In a world that likes to assume anyone seeking help is just “crying wolf”, so many find it easy to deny people pain relief. Especially by labeling us as drug-seekers, as if they can easily and objectively distinguish between people in desperate need of high-level pain relief and someone acting for a high. I’ve personally been kicked out of a hospital and called a drug-seeker because the nurses and doctors thought my actions, due to pain, were drug seeking. Pain patients that don’t fit a perfect mold are often labeled drug seekers just because they asked for an opioid that they have used before, safely and effectively.

While the study is small and limited in scope, I feel it vindicates something I have said for five years now. I don’t doubt further studies and analyses will continue to show a similar result. I believe addicts deserve help, but this study shows me that society’s current attitudes towards addiction and opioids are killing addicts and chronic pain patients alike.

The CDC has claimed they will be updating their 2016 guidelines, but for better or for worst? They lost my trust a long time ago.