oh my god a while ago i was thinking about who eddie’s pill taking as a child would delve into a Serious substance abuse issue and it’s kinda wild that nobody talks about it
Yes! I had a huge thing written for this on my phone then it vanished. I hope I remember everything.
Eddie is hands down the most vulnerable to substance abuse in the entire book. He is basically raised to abuse substances. I see so many dismissive jokes about his hypochondria or Sonia but...this is a kid who literally thought he would DIE if he did not take his medication. He was raised to be fearful for his literal LIFE if he did not take medication. People forget that he is just a child, eleven in the book and this behavior from Sonia began, as far as we know, when he was an infant. This weight of importance and life threatening consequences is what Eddie was raised on.
Eddie is convinced through ABUSE and FEAR that he needs medicine. He doesn’t even consider it an actual health benefit ever. There is no “oh I take vitamins because they are good for you.” No, for Eddie every single thing he takes is directly associated with the only form of “control” he has ever felt he has had. “If I take my medicine I won’t get these diseases/problems my mom says I will.”
When he discovered his inhaler is fake in the book he has a complete identity crisis. His entire life is exposed for being a controlled lie from someone that is supposed to love and care for him. Eddie cannot wrap his mind around why his mom would do that to him, and he even says as much to her face when he confronts her in the hospital. In this moment Eddie says he will keep taking his medicine in exchange for his mom allowing him to see his friends. Again, Eddie uses medication as his only grasp at control. He uses his medication to possibly free him and allow him to be with the only people who care about him.
Eddie has this extreme sense of awareness and how he wants to get better, desperately, after this confrontation. But then he doesn’t. He doesn’t because he, like the others, forgets that summer and it destroys his life. Eddie says as much himself with the whole, “if i had remembered what happened that day bowers broke my arm I wouldn’t have this stupid fucking inhaler, I wouldn’t be married to Myra...i would be free.”
Eddie knows he has been trapped by medication and that association has always been through fear and dependency fostered from severe emotional abuse. And it is clear that by the time Eddie is an adult for the reunion, he has allowed himself to be caged and shackled by his mom and his medication. He forced himself to marry a toxic awful woman who encourages his drug use, and he lets himself overstock on intense medication. This is literally LITERALLY how we meet Eddie:
By his medication. I have highlighted the sections of this in particular that stand out as obvious allusions to possible substance abuse from multiple angles.
Not to get personal here but I am on many controlled substances. I do not have an addictive personality nor do I have association w medication like Eddie does. I do however suffer from very similar psychological issues. I have paranoia, anxiety, chronic insomnia, hallucinations, PTSD, and was also raised by an emotionally abusive mother. I also have chronic severe pain. I bring all of this up because I need to emphasize on the fact that having all these issues and having so many controlled substances around? It can be very difficult not to accidentally abuse or accidentally misuse. It is why they are called controlled substances. I have dangerous moods where i feel i need to use multiple pills at once.
Eddie has a LOT of medications that on their own might be okay, but together can quickly lead to accidental abuse and possibly eventual actual abuse/addiction/unhealthy dependency. I am going to be explicit and honest in the details of these drugs and how to misuse them with these various problems so pls proceed with caution.
Excederin PM is a sleep aid that on its own is p fine. However I have definitely popped one or two for a “deeper sleep” with my ambien on bad anxiety nights because I cannot mix xanax with ambien because it can make you sick. Having multiple problems means you figure ways to combine drugs for desired effect and that can lead to misuse.
Next are the amount of laxative/digestive medications. At a glance this seems like a funny thing, but laxative medication and meds for digestive issues are one of the most common ways people use to lose weight/get things through their systems faster. Eddie is almost forty, not almost eighty: unless he has chronic digestive issues it makes little sense why he would have this so stock piled. I say this as someone who literally has three erosions in my gut and several internal issues in my digestive track. I don’t even have the extent of this stuff. Adding onto this i know a legit theory is Eddie struggles with image issues and might have an eating disorder which tbh I can fully see. This particular part of his medicine cab supports that theory quite well.
Next are the cold medications. Cold meds can nuke you. There is a reason you legally can’t overbuy this. I have had a horrific experience because of cold medication that I will not explain here, but it can fuck you up. Again this is not concerning on its own, but plug it into everything else and it adds to this possible suggestion of abuse. Especially since he, again, has multiple medications for this.
Now we get to the hard stuff. The stuff that Eddie himself acknowledges as “can get you high.”
Valium, percodan, darvon are all intense pain killers. Elvail is used for an anti depressent/anxiety and mood disorders. All of these are intense and eddie having THREE prescribed pain medications is wild. Then there are the quualudes aka the Date Rape Drug. Yes he literally has roofies in his med cab. I have always theorized he used these to have sex with Myra which is very dark but honestly....quualudes are intense and he even has them hidden. I feel between that and the point where he elaborates on how much he does NOT want his wife? Hm yeah. Quualudes were originally to help treat insomnia and serve as a muscle relaxant but obv it was discovered that the drug was way more intense and had bad side effects.
Elvail was also discontinued. Eddie has an enormously concerning medicine cab and King draws a large amount of attention to it. Perhaps the most concerning part of this scene is where Eddie packs *all of it* for going back to Derry. That is.....he is not just having a quirky hypochondriac moment. That is straight up desperate dependency.
I do not think it is even remotely a stretch to discuss his abuse of pills. I am shocked the fandom almost entirely ignores this when it clearly is a huge thing. I know the movies does nothing with this but you would think it would at least crop up in discussion sometimes. Eddie is a tragic character and as an additional note, he was written during the 80s and at that time, an awareness of severe drug abuse within gay communities was being brought to attention and With how gay coded eddie already is, I find it interesting that he additionally struggles with substance abuse (same with Richie). These aren’t stereotypes: it was very much a reality during that period and something many young gay men struggled with especially when you consider how many gay men lose families and homes once they come out and are forced to the streets. It is a tragic cycle.
Eddie def struggles with pills and has a complicated and intense relationship w medication. Im glad someone brought it up and that I could flesh this out. I would enjoy seeing people acknowledge this more since I feel it is an underdiscussed form of substance abuse, and clearly Eddie is struggling with it even when he is at his reunion (whereas Richie seems to have his shit more together). Thank you for the ask! Sorry for the mile long ramble.
I will be exploring a LOT of these themes in my upcoming fic that I have been writing so I hope to be able to touch on some sorely underrepresented ideas that have been discussed here. It will be called the Perfect Pill and I look forward to posting it soon (I have finals right now so!)
Everyone stay safe and be kind to yourselves.
jacobvanloon
