# R.I.P Adam (apoplexy)



## freezeup (Oct 1, 2016)

For those of you who don't know a member of this site has passed away (apoplexy). He did so by his own choosing and was heavily involved in the right to die for those inflicted with mental illness.

thanks for all the good times on tinychat, adam.

rest in peace.


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## Surfingisfun001 (Sep 25, 2007)

Wow. Thanks for informing the community. R.I.P.


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## ThoughtOnFire (Feb 10, 2015)

RIP Adam!


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## Newchie97 (Sep 11, 2016)

R.I.P


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## Billy D.P. (Apr 12, 2016)

I'm not sure if people remember but as freezeup mentions Adam posted an article from about a year ago in which he argued for state-sanctioned suicide:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/health-and-fitness/health/as-a-person-with-mental-illness-heres-why-i-support-medically-assisted-death/article29912835/

It's so crazy because I actually remember reading his article when he first posted it last year. I was going through the absolute worst period of my life and had been heavily contemplating suicide for over six months. A few weeks prior to reading his article I even planned my own suicide. I was going to hang myself in my apartment on a Wednesday with a rope my father sent down to help hold my couch together while moving.

Fastforward a year later and I'm in a completely different place. I don't even think about suicide anymore and have made so much progress that I'm already making future plans again, which I haven't done in years. But I was in the same place as Adam. I was going to kill myself not because I was simply depressed or hopeless (although those did play a role), but rather because I could not tolerate the pain any longer. As Adam states in his article, this disorder brings about a level of psychosomatic pain most people didn't even know was possible to experience, which is why though I'm saddened by this news I also understand it completely.

Every person on this forum and with this condition must make their own decisions. Though I wish Adam were still alive I cannot lie and say I'd rather see him suffer than be at peace, even if that means he is no longer with us. No person on earth should ever have to go through what any of us have, especially not Adam nor I, and so none of us should judge what we ultimately decide is best for our pain management. But I will say this: I have been to darker places than I ever dreamed existed on this planet and experienced enough negative emotions and pain to power the city of Los Angeles for a year, and yet I am still alive and so happy for it. If I can crawl out of my hole I'm very confident others can as well, and so I would encourage people to keep pushing, keep plugging away one day at a time, keep trying new things and living a healthy lifestyle, and to never ever give up. I and others here are living proof you can improve, but that said, what you chose to do with your life is always only up to you.

I hope Adam has found peace. God knows he needed it.


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## Pondererer (May 18, 2016)

Billy D.P. said:


> As Adam states in his article, this disorder brings about a level of psychosomatic pain most people didn't even know was possible to experience, which is why though I'm saddened by this news I also understand it completely.
> 
> I have been to darker places than I ever dreamed existed on this planet and experienced enough negative emotions and pain to power the city of Los Angeles for a year,


It eats me up inside how true this is. Everytime i try to just imagine explaining it (to someone other than my therapist) it would be like explaining quantum physics to a dog. Like there is no common ground, no way to explain the un-explainable to someone who has litterally no idea what you are talking about. Most importantly, coming forth from a place of such inexplicable pain and darkness, and they can't even see it, it just goes right over their head like air.

To be fair tho, i've never even tried to explain this to someone other than my therapist.


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## Pondererer (May 18, 2016)

Shit, i even remember reading this article when it was new. I briefly talked to him in the chat.

R.I.P


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## nikki6788 (May 2, 2013)

Rest easy Adam.


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## dope (Aug 31, 2016)

R.I.P Adam. Hope heaven treats you right.


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## TDX (Jul 12, 2014)

A tragic aspect of his case is that he might have had at least a few chances left to help his chronic pain, which was the major reason why he ended it all. I found out that electroconvulsive therapy was used successfully in several cases of chronic pain, which were even resistant to opioids and where a significant dysfunction of the brain may be involved (fibromyalgia, Complex Regional Pain Syndrome, peripheral neuropathy, central pain, so-called somatic symptom disorder, burning mouth syndrome and phantom limb pain). The other treatment was Ziconotide, which is a non-opioid pain killer, that is 1000-times strong than morphine and seemingly may help in patients who do not respond to opioid. I also found that Tropisetron might work in fibromyalgia, where it is assumed that the nervous system is more sensitive to pain, but also in other pain conditions.

I informed him about these last-resort options. He also read the message, but did not respond to it. I don't want to say that these approaches were a great hope. Electroconvulsive therapy and Tropisetron would have been purely experimental, but Ziconotide is approved to treat pain. Unfortunately it is hard to use, because it has to be given intrathecally, so the use may not be widespread.

Another problem is that he was diagnosed with somatoform pain disorder, which resulted in his doctors refusing to let him try opioids, because his pain was "not physical". In my opinion this is a scandal. Even if the pain was "not physical" I don't see why they should be refused opioids, given that they also work in the brain. In my opinion the medical community is to blame for his death. He may have had a few last chances, but the doctors did not let him use them.


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## Pondererer (May 18, 2016)

TDX said:


> Another problem is that he was diagnosed with somatoform pain disorder, which resulted in his doctors refusing to let him try opioids, because his pain was "not physical". In my opinion this is a scandal. Even if the pain was "not physical" I don't see why they should be refused opioids, given that they also work in the brain. In my opinion the medical community is to blame for his death. He may have had a few last chances, but the doctors did not let him use them.


"physical pain" is just another signal inside the brain.


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## Phocus (Feb 8, 2017)

Rest easy Adam.


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## dissoziation (Aug 20, 2015)

Rest in peace, Adam. We didn't talk a lot, but I hope that you're at peace now.


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## Photogenic_Potato (Mar 16, 2016)

damn. im just seeing this. I hope adam has finally gotten the peace and silence he was looking for. We will all miss you


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## M1k3y (Sep 19, 2016)

I just hope no one looks at this as a way to do it.. RIP Adam and I wish his family the best, it sucks it went that far :/ Nobody should quit fighting, even myself i think about suicide on a daily basis, I wont stop til its over, I do everything I can to get better, at least I try, I just got into an army program, even tho they look at me a lil weird.. they dont really but im sure they can tell im anxious or a little off or whatever, my sargents can tell, anyways, its a good thing to keep my mind away and a good work out and a good thing to look towards in life, make goals guys, strive to them


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## TDX (Jul 12, 2014)

> "physical pain" is just another signal inside the brain.


It might still make sense to make a distinction between "physical pain" and "non-physical pain". You are right that both activate the pain system in the brain, however in the former this is caused by actual damage to tissue, while in the latter this may not be the case. The way how pain works in the brain seems to be more complicated than people thought and involve a network of several areas of the brain, which might open up many ways for this system to malfunction and so to cause chronic pain without damage to peripheral tissue. This could be caused by tissue damage in the brain, but would not require it, just like a computer can malfunction without damage to it's hardware.

The point is that in my opinion in cases of pain caused by a malfunction of the brain, that is not a "hardware error", it might be conceivable that this can be caused by psychological reasons, but something being conceivable does not also mean that it actually exists. Even if it was caused by psychological factors, this may not imply that it is maintained by them, which would render psychotherapy useless. And even if this condition was satisfied, there does not need to be a psychotherapeutic treatment, that can address this issue. I think it could also be possible that brain damage could arise due to psychological reasons, just like you can also break your computers hardware by using it wrongly (for example by switching it on and off constantly, constantly writing on your SSD, overheating the CPU). Again, this would render psychotherapy useless and the disorder was not maintained by psychological factors.

In my view all of this does not only apply to chronic pain, but to all "somatform disorders" and even mental disorders, of whom many can also be caused by organic reasons (for example drugs). I also do not see if it is possible in the real world to exclude brain damage, just because it does not show up on MRI. The damage could be large enough and at the right spot to cause problems, but too small to be detectable with todays tools. In the case of physical symptoms it seems questionable if todays modern methods are sufficient to even find all damage to peripheral tissue. In the real world another problem is that doctors frequently don't properly diagnose physical diseases.

Although it is commonly assumed, there does not seem to be good evidence that "somatoform disorders" are caused by psychological factors or maintained by them. According to a cochrane review psychotherapy also does not really work for these disorders. In the case of pain there are medications that can work for it, which often also act in the brain. So even if pain was really psychosomatic, one would assume that pain medication might be effective for it. As psychotherapy does not appear to work well for "somatoform disorders" I do not really see an alternative to prescribing even opioids. But instead Adam was denied opioids, while a person with proven physical pain would have gotten them if they had the same symptom burden and failed as many treatments. The thing was that an opioid he got illegally even alleviated his pain to a small extend. Perhaps a stronger one would have been better and prevented or at least delayed his suicide. As I mentioned in my previous post a few other treatments might have been possible, too.

For me Adam was close to being a man who only had 2 options: To serve another 60 years in a prison of relenteless agony without parole (like many of us) or to die. In my opinion assisted suicide is clearly justfied in such cases and should not only be legal, but should be a duty for doctors. However I believe he had a few chances left, but the medical community did not allow him to use them. In my opinion the doctors in general and especially psychosomatics are to blame for his death.


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## Chicane (Oct 8, 2015)

This is really surreal and fucked up, guys. One minute he's posting underneath you and the next he's just gone. How many more do we need to lose to this horrible condition? It's time for the psych world to pull its head out of its ass and step up.

Rest in peace, Adam, God bless.


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## kamil (Aug 24, 2014)

Rest in peace Adam.


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## Nirvana (Jan 25, 2016)

-.-


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## Ezio (Nov 24, 2015)

Rest in peace brother ..


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## Ezio (Nov 24, 2015)

Never forget you brother ❤


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## ThoughtOnFire (Feb 10, 2015)

This is from Jeff who can't register on the forum but wants to say the following...



> "I truly hope he's found his peace and I'll never regret cutting myself off from this site, but forever will regret cutting myself off from him, I know he made his choice and there's no debating that, but I should have been around, I'll have to carry that forever, RIP Adam."
> 
> -Jeff


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## Psychostein (Nov 3, 2016)

this is sad.. he had a lot of potential and was highly intelligent.
This horrid condition has stolen many lives...

Rest Easy Adam????


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