When Fentanyl Works

Having terminal cancer means managing pain carefully and consistently. And it means taking a dangerous opioid that has long improved the lives of people like me.

- Teva Harrison

THE FIRST THING I do each day is look at my phone. flat’s how I keep track of medication. I use an alarm to ensure that I take my pills—some with food, some without—at consistent times every day. For my fentanyl patch, however, which I change every other day, I use a calendar reminder.

Timing is important because I can’t allow the baseline-level dose of fentanyl to vary or my pain returns. My patches are a thin, clear plastic with discreet blue lettering. They’re individually packaged and come with a stiff plastic backing that makes their application easy. There are ve in each box. I’m not supposed to change patches immediately after showering; the drug can be absorbed too quickly when applied to freshly cleaned skin. And to ensure fentanyl is evenly distributed, as well as to avoid contact dermatitis— there’s something about the adhesive in the patches that irritates skin—I can’t put a patch in the same place twice in a row. I move them around the at parts on my upper body: just under my bra line, on my pelvis, my back, my arm or my chest.

This wasn’t always my life. I can remember when I didn’t know my way around all the downtown Toronto hospitals. I can remember turning down ibuprofen because I wanted to feel my pain, to track my body’s healing through its diminishing noise. That was then, and this is now.