"A bioethicist's harrowing memoir of opioid dependence and withdrawal--and a clarion call to challenge the status quo of healthcare and of medicine itself--[this book] reveals the lack of crucial resources and structures to responsibly manage pain in America. Travis Rieder's terrifying journey down the rabbit hole of opioid dependence began with a motorcycle accident in 2015. One month and several surgeries later, Travis was on painkillers around the clock. The drugs he received were both miraculous and essential to his recovery--for a time. But the most profound suffering Travis would endure arrived months after the accident, when he went into acute opioid withdrawal while following his physician's orders. Over the course of four excruciating weeks, Rieder experienced firsthand, all day long and through the night, what it means to be 'dope sick'--the absolute physical and mental agony that is opioid withdrawal. Clueless how to taper off these intensely powerful painkillers, Travis tur