"Feelings of helplessness and hopelessness growing by the day," Bowen wrote in his journal. "Feeling so scared. I wish I could close my eyes and not wake up." While taking OxyContin, suicidal thoughts were common for Bowen, a former champion motorcycle racer, greyhound dog breeder and vocational teacher. "I spent six months thinking about suicide," he said. "I would sit in my re-loading room with a loaded pistol." Fear of causing undo pain to his wife and four teen-aged children stopped him from pulling the trigger. Bowen's wife, Robin, grew so worried she moved the guns out of their home.

Physicians call OxyContin a miracle drug. But James Bowen has a different term for the over-prescribed painkiller.

"It's the Devil's Alternative," Bowen said two days after he emerged from the Cleveland Clinic and a two-week stint in rehab to kick his addiction.

"It's nasty, nasty," he said. 'It's terrible. God help the people who are on this medication."

Early concerns about addiction

Bowen kept a journal to chronicle his OxyContin experience. The entries range from descriptions of his body sweats and vomiting, to thoughts of suicide.

"Starting to really worry about my health," he wrote in late February. "Especially those OxyContin pills. Getting scared about being dependent on this. Don't know what to do."

A later entry from mid-March was more ominous. "Feelings of helplessness and hopelessness growing by the day," he wrote. "Feeling so scared. I wish I could close my eyes and not wake up." While taking OxyContin, suicidal thoughts were common for Bowen, a former champion motorcycle racer, greyhound dog breeder and vocational teacher.

OxyContin use led to persistent thoughts of suicide

"I spent six months thinking about suicide," he said. "I would sit in my re-loading room with a loaded pistol." Fear of causing undo pain to his wife and four teen-aged children stopped him from pulling the trigger. Bowen's wife, Robin, grew so worried she moved the guns out of their home.

"He was not my husband," she said, referring to the way OxyContin changed her chatty spouse into a brooding loner. "He really became a stranger. He was negative constantly, very uncommunicative. And that is not him; he's the type who can talk your ear off."

Problems began when he sought doctor's help for pain due to injuries

James Bowen's road to OxyContin began following a devastating crash on a motorcycle track in 1988. The spill beat his body to a pulp and broke his back.

A drunken driver doubled his wounds two years later. He broke both legs, his back, three ribs, a collarbone and his left ankle. Numerous surgeries followed. Bowen managed the pain with Vicodin and Percocet. He's been on those milder painkillers for years and never developed a dependency or addiction.

Everything changed in 2001 when a family physician prescribed OxyContin for Bowen's body pains. "He called it a miracle drug," Robin Bowen recalled of the doctor's description of Oxy.

Doctors steadily increased OxyContin dosage

A familiar pattern began as Bowen's prescription jumped from 10mgs a day to 240mgs of OxyContin by the time he quit the drug in 2004. "At first, OxyContin was like a miracle drug," Bowen said. "It killed more pain than I ever imagined. I felt so good; it numbed me so much." But soon he had trouble remembering things.

"He'd be in the middle of a sentence and forget what he had started to say," Robin Bowen added. "It was like a computer locking up. He'd just stop talking, and not realize he had not finished his thought."

Worse yet, he began to rely on the drug to feel good. "It draws you in," he said of Oxy's lure. "It makes you feel so good while you take it that soon you are taking more pills, because you want to be able to bounce out of bed in the morning. Before long, you need it to be happy, to think clearly and to function."

Nightmarish cycles of addiction and withdrawal

Bowen began to load up on the pills when his prescription first arrived. He'd take an extra dose at the start of each month, then suffer withdrawals when the bottle was empty.

"I'd wake up with cold sweats and start to throw up," he said of the mornings when the Oxy cupboard was empty. "Pick out the worst flu you ever had and multiple that feeling by 10. I had projectile vomit and I'd lose 10 to 15 pounds in a week from the cold sweats."

Naturally, Bowen worried about running out of his supply. "He spent so much time worrying about how much medication he would have for the end of each month," Robin Bowen said. "That is all he thought about." "If you run out, you will have the worst withdrawals you can imagine," Bowen added. He'd lay in bed and cry for days on end, during the dry spells.

"I'd be in a ball for days with withdrawals," he said.

Doctors at first unable to recognize signs of addiction

He wanted off the drug. Even begged his doctor to help get him into a detox center. Instead, the physician prescribed more pills.

Bowen shared his concerns with a psychologist, who gave him a prescription for anti-depression medication. In June of 2004, Bowen threatened to sue both doctors unless they helped. "It is not that I need more drugs," he told the doctors. "I need to get off this medication, because the medication [OxyContin] is causing all my problems."

His two-week stay at the clinic went well, thanks to a new drug meant to help wean addicts off opiates like OxyContin. "Within a week [inside the clinic] I smiled and laughed for the first time in five years," he said. "I was not suicidal anymore." He is, however, dead certain OxyContin led to financial ruin, job loss and near suicide.