From 'Pop' to Painkiller Addiction: My Journey to 22 Stone and £6,000 in Debt, Battling Suicidal Thoughts

AMY Richards stood in her kitchen clutching a pencil case full of prescription drugs and she felt she had reached the end of the road.

“I honestly believed my husband and family would be better off without me,” says the 47-year-old, from Queensland, .

Amy Richards was addicted to painkillers after a back injury (pictured with husband Matt)Credit: Cover Images Her agonising pain robbed her of the chance to have childrenCredit: Cover Images

“I was exhausted, broken and completely numb.”

Amy was in the midst of a , and she couldn’t see a way out – other than .

She’d spent the past 14 years on a cocktail of that were no longer working to numb her pain.

She couldn’t live without them, but she couldn’t carry on with her , either.

Her agonising pain robbed her and husband Matt, 48, the chance to have children, and saw her balloon in weight.

Amy’s nightmare began in March 2011 with what should have been an ordinary workday.

She had recently taken a job as an account manager for a software company, travelling to car dealerships and supporting clients across .

Just three months into the role, while driving to Noosa on the Sunshine Coast, everything changed.

Over the years, Amy was prescribed a cocktail of drugs to manage her painCredit: Cover Images

“I turned in my seat to check for traffic and I heard my back pop,” she recalls.

“I’ll never forget that moment. I had excruciating pain and nerve pain shooting down my left leg into my foot.”

She called her husband Matt in tears, barely able to drive the two hours back home to .

“I didn’t know it then but my pain-free life had ended,” she says.

Scans revealed a life-changing diagnosis; she had on three levels of her spine – L3, L4 and S1, which were impinging on nerves.

“My life completely changed,” she says.

“It became physio, hydrotherapy, psychology appointments, scans and specialist visits. I tried absolutely everything to get better.”

Desperate, Amy sought help privately, undergoing a three-level spinal fusion in May 2012 involving titanium cages, bolts and screws.

The surgery took six hours. She spent 10 nights in hospital and faced a brutal six-month recovery.

“I remember waking up and feeling relief from the nerve pain,” she says.

“But it didn’t last. Over time, the pain came back and got worse.”

A cocktail of drugs

What followed was a descent into prescription pain medication.

Over the years, Amy was prescribed a cocktail of drugs to manage her pain.

But she says: “My pain was getting worse and my mental health was deteriorating.”

Though the drugs were designed to make her feel better, she had become stuck – dependent on them, but desensitised to their effects.

On top of that, withdrawal symptoms make quitting the drugs too difficult.

The medication affected every aspect of Amy’s life. She gained a significant amount of weight, eventually reaching a size 26 and weighing 22 stone (145kg).

In 2021, she underwent gastric bypass surgery in the hope that losing weight would help reduce her pain.

“I only lost about 2.8 stone (20kg) at the time and put all the weight back on,” she says.

“Prescription pain meds played a massive role in my weight gain.”

The medication affected every aspect of Amy’s life – including her weightCredit: Cover Images She gained a significant amount of weight, eventually reaching a size 26 and weighing 22 stone (145kg)Credit: Cover Images In 2021, she underwent gastric bypass surgery – but it didn’t work very wellCredit: Cover Images

‘I couldn’t live like this anymore’

Rock bottom came on an otherwise ordinary day.

“Matt [an accountant] was working in his office with our dog Teddy,” Amy says.

“I stood in the kitchen with my pencil case of pills and thought, ‘I can’t do this anymore’.”

She swallowed handfuls of medication, believing she would not wake up.
Instead, she slept for hours and later collapsed at home, unable to hold a glass of water.

Matt called an ambulance, and Amy was taken to hospital, where she initially denied trying to harm herself.

It was a nurse’s gentle question in the middle of the night that changed everything.

“She asked if I’d done it deliberately,” says Amy. “And for the first time, I said yes. I will never forget that moment.”

The next day, Amy told her GP she wanted off all pain medication.
“She asked how I would manage the pain,” Amy recalls.

“I said I didn’t know. But I couldn’t live like this anymore.”

What followed were the hardest three months of her life, tapering off medication while managing withdrawal and chronic pain.

New hope

During that time, Amy began using medical cannabis under medical guidance.

can be both a recreational drug (to get high), and used for medicinal purposes.

The Cannabis sativa plant contains more than 100 cannabinoids that interact with the body’s system – THC is the most commonly known, which causes a person to feel high.

Many governments across the world have legalised medical use of cannabis, including the UK, New Zealand, Australia, Canada, Ireland, Denmark, Germany and more.

is one condition for which, in some countries,

In Australia, where Amy is from, medical cannabis has been legal since 2016 but is still tightly controlled.

A major 2026 Cochrane review, involving 21 studies, found that for chronic nerve pain, there is still “no clear evidence” that cannabis-based medicines provide meaningful pain relief (of at least 50 per cent) for the majority of people compared to a placebo.

There is still a lot of caution about its recommendation. But Amy is one of many positive anecdotal cases.

Amy, who has been clean of prescription drugs for 16 months, says of medicinal cannabis: “It has been life-changing. Prescription pain meds barely touched the pain and destroyed my mental health.

“Medical cannabis fuzzes out the pain without messing with my mind.”

Amy has suffered long-term damage caused by years of medication, including severe dental issues costing more than £6,300 ($12,000) to repair, and permanent liver damage.

But as she detoxed, Amy found positives in walking daily, cooking again and growing food.

“Those little rituals became the foundation of changing my life,” she says.

Over 17 months, the weight began to fall away naturally.

She lost 7.8 stone (51kg), dropping from a size 26 to a size 14, and now weighs 14.7 stone (94kg).

Amy began using medical cannabis under medical guidanceCredit: Cover Images Over 17 months, the weight began to fall away naturallyCredit: Cover Images

“The focus was never weight loss,” she says. “It was about getting clean. But once I stopped the pain meds and started moving, my body healed.

“I haven’t had a pain-free day since my injury. But pain no longer controls my life.”

After years of being unable to work, Amy recently returned to employment, working two hours every morning as cleaner, a milestone she once believed impossible.

“I work casually as a commercial cleaner as the movement is better than sitting for my back,” she says.

She also began sharing her journey on TikTok.

“I knew if I showed up publicly, I would stick to my goals,” she says. “Now I get messages every month from people thanking me for giving them hope.”

‘Counting pills and watching the clock’

She credits her husband Matt as the “hero” of her story, saying he stood by her through addiction, illness and recovery.

“He never judged me,” she says. “He supported us financially for years without any government help and never walked away, even when he could have.”

Now, with nearly 13 years of marriage behind them, Amy is looking ahead to the future with optimism.

Her message to anyone still trapped?

“I know how it feels to lie in bed counting pills and watching the clock,” Amy says.

“But prescription pain meds are keeping you sick.

“Getting clean was the hardest thing I’ve ever done. And it’s the greatest achievement of my life.”

She credits her husband Matt as the ‘hero’ of her storyCredit: Cover Images