fucked up question, I know - but ultimately it’s a question about suffering and experience of personhood - did “you” really experience the torture for an hour if you don’t remember it later?
What about the hour where you were awake and present, before the memory is wiped? How much does that suffering matter? Does the fact that after the torture you won’t remember override the suffering you will experience in the present during the torture, relative to suffering you will remember the rest of your life?
I think for the sake of the thought experiment, we will consider the torture method as being some fictitious method that causes great pain, distress, and suffering but no risk of death or injury at all. The idea here is that the hour isn’t meant to be more risky in terms of injury, we’re strictly focused on the pain and suffering you will experience - you either experience an hour of it and then forget, or you experience a minute and don’t forget.
I’ve also been through a lot of physical pain. Recently, hair removal has had me thinking a lot about pain and suffering, and one of the methods I have been using have been to take a large dose of CBD, which is known to reduce negative and traumatic memory formation, and since I started that I don’t get as anxious before sessions even when my memory was that there was a lot of pain last time.
I also get an hour of electrolysis once a week, and I never found a way to sufficiently dull the pain enough that it’s tolerable, so I have introduced taking a benzodiazepene in a large enough dose that I actually have memory issues later, mostly to help keep me calm - which also reduces my sense of anxiety and suffering later even if I do remember that in the present moment it was painful.
This relationship of memory to suffering and distress is interesting to me, because there is a sense that my perception of my self as a person extends through time, and memory is the way that hangs together, so messing with my memory seems to mess with the sense of suffering I experienced, even though I know it’s an alteration.
Anaesthesia drugs block memory formation but also block experience in the first place, and it’s pretty important a patient not be awake and experiencing the pain and suffering for various reasons like physiological changes such as adrenaline being released and going into fight-or-flight, etc.
Makes total sense. I’m a chronic pain sufferer, so I’ve gone down some similar paths of thought. Can’t do cbd personally; tried it and it hits me the same as weed itself does, which is unpleasant in my case. But I’ve had access to the usual combinations of pain management options, and that includes stuff like benzos that can alter memory formation and retention.
So we’ve maybe not been on the exact same path, but we’ve got similar mud on our boots, so to speak. I guess anyone that’s had prolonged treatments that hurt, or repeated acute pain causing injury/illness, and chronic pain patients all end up having the same basic options at some point. It isn’t like there’s hundreds of possibilities (yet).
Surprisingly, there are circumstances where the mix of anaesthetics can be chosen so that consciousness isn’t fully suppressed. There’s also a clinically significant percentage of people that, while unable to move or react even on an involuntary level like heart rate, come to periods of consciousness during procedures. So the mixes sometimes get adjusted with the memory blocking agents even when the goal is total suppression of consciousness.
It definitely isn’t a super common thing, but it does happen just often enough that there’s been some research into it, though without much in the way of results that explain what’s going on in a useful way. Which is both interesting and terrifying to me.
I was hit by a car and had some physical trauma that resulted in permanent muscular-skeletal damage. That left me in pain for a couple years, though at this point I consider it a 0 / 10 most days now. Either way, I really can grok that chronic pain life, even though I tend to feel my situation was not that bad overall compared to most.
Have you tried Kratom?
Re cannabis: I should say, I use full spectrum hemp flower, not a CBD isolate. I did find hemp was more psychoactive before my transition, but I actively sought out hemp that had higher THC levels and I didn’t mind the effects. After a few months on estrogen CBD has a more mild effect, even with larger doses like 60+ mg I mostly experience some mild to moderate sedation, but it’s much less dramatic than it used to be.
Also, cannabis with THC impacts me significantly too, esp. pre-transition it led to anxiety, paranoia, and psychedelic mental spaces (even open-eyed visuals, geometric patterns, etc.). Post-transition I have to take higher doses to get to that same space, and I notice much less anxiety and paranoia.
Either way, I feel you about side effects - I don’t know what it’s like for you, but I understand anyone not wanting to mess with cannabis. It’s only my experiences with much stronger stuff that gave me the mental skills to cope with and even enjoy cannabis.
I’ve read about this and it terrifies me too, lol. I’ve been under general anaesthesia once before, I remember the moment I lost consciousness, and the moment I woke up - was very happy to not be an anomaly that way.
Kratom is hard to find up here in the mountains, and I’m wary of buying online since it would require using a card. The currently upheaval here in the US makes buying things that governments might latch onto and focus on more of a cash transaction for me. So I haven’t tried it yet. Plan to, eventually, though.
But the info about the difference in response to cannabis products pre and post transition is very interesting. I’ve seen and heard folks mention it a few times. Often enough that I plan on trying whatever is legal as I age and testosterone levels start to dip. I’m holding out hope that it might change how I respond enough to tolerate low doses just to take the edge off of things.
Similar to what you experienced, thc and cbd both spike my anxiety levels, and trigger some flashbacks once the anxiety hits panic attack levels. It isn’t as bad with cbd, but it’s not pleasant.
ah, I usually just hit up whatever head shop or kava bar is around - though I’m always suspicious about the quality.
I have used kratom a bit, but I haven’t found it that effective for the hair removal pain (which is more like being burned, very acute and momentary pain), while I have found it more useful for chronic pain. I sometimes wonder what others’ experiences are, I’ve heard it’s dose-dependent and lower doses are more stimulant and higher doses are more sedative. I dunno, I never feel bold enough to take larger and larger doses unlike with cannabis.
And I’m sorry to hear about your experiences with cannabis :-(
While it’s a useful tool for me, it’s certainly not the best pain management tool in moments of acute pain, it’s more a way for me to stay chill and mentally cope with the pain, but the pain itself is just as bad. (Unlike with opiates like Dilaudid for example where there can be a real sense of the pain not mattering.)
I mostly used cannabis to help me sleep through the night when struggling with pain, but otherwise it’s a mid-tier pain tool, really.
I’m way out in the boonies. Nearest place that even sells kratom is an hour away. Well, other than a truck stop, and I’d rather hire a lot prostitute than buy a drug at one of those.
Unfortunately, for acute pain, opiates are really the only reliable option unless it’s a surface only pain. If it’s at the surface only, lidocaine can work wonders. But anything much deeper needs injections, and most procedures that cause acute pain are contraindicated for lidocaine. I’m not actually sure if electrolysis is going to respond poorly or not, I’m not seeing anything that says injections are contraindicated, though I don’t know if the places that do it can provide injections.
But! I know it’s safe to use topical creams post electrolysis. It doesn’t fully kill all of the burny, lingering pain, but it does reduce it. Can’t use it before getting the process done I don’t think, though I never actually thought to ask when I tagged along to appointments (had a friend that was scared and wanted a hand to squeeze the daylights out of). But she used an aloe and lidocaine topical with the approval of her provider.
oh, I apply lidocaine before electrolysis and laser appointments, it’s more a problem with laser than electrolysis though because any contamination on the skin can cause the laser to burn you - you have to clean all the lidocaine off the skin really well right before the appointment. (A challenging task with lots of areas covered, while on lots of drugs.)
I find the lidocaine is more effective if I put it on hours in advance (very dangerous, if enough gets into your bloodstream you can die), and ultimately with electrolysis it’s not better than nothing but not as effective as I would like. Meanwhile, lots of my laser sessions are relatively easy now as the combination of fewer hairs and lidocaine result in much less pain.
To be honest, the pain after electrolysis and laser both are basically nothing, I would rate it as a 1 - 2 / 10 at most. It’s like having a light sunburn, or some general swelling and discomfort - I wouldn’t bother with lidocaine for that (or recommend it to anyone).
Doctors and physical therapists have consistently told me that I have a high pain tolerance, so I underestimated the pain involved in hair removal, and that was a mistake.
And wow, that is way out in the boonies. I’m not sure you’re really missing out on anything with kratom anyway, so I wouldn’t necessarily recommend it - more just curious if you had any experiences to share.
I wonder what opiates would be like for the hair removal session, I haven’t heard much about people using them but I would feel 100% justified in using them for that level of pain.
It’s good to have your perspective to confirm opiates are the only reliable option, that pretty much accords with my experiences unfortunately.
Hope your daily pain isn’t too bad, it’s upsetting to hear you have chronic pain. 😰
Eh, I’ve adapted to the pain mostly. Thank you though,for caring :)
Most days, I can just “box” the pain and shove it in a corner of my mind. As long as I don’t do anything too stupid, it stays there and my conscious mind pretends it doesn’t exist. A little Tylenol and the threshold for it rises. There’s days it either just won’t go in the box, or breaks loose without any provocation, but I’ve got an incredible family and group of friends that help me keep things going on those days. Lucky as hell.
And, I would agree with your providers. If electrolysis is a 1-2 for you on the acute scale, your tolerance is good. Well, or mine is bad. I had a little test patch done as moral support, and it felt like a second degree burn for me, which is a solid five or six on my end. Everyone perceives things a little different, obviously, and burns tend to bother me more than some people. I once had a small burn almost to the bone, and I was just curled up screaming and crying. The spot was maybe a half centimeter across, but it felt like my whole hand was lit up.