Nicola Zawadzki: Derby mum almost died after 20 years
Says a miscarriage led to long-term codeine use and a 20-year dependence on painkillers. In May 2024, her teenage son found her blue and unresponsive; she…
Nicola Zawadzki, a mother from Derby, says a 20-year dependence on painkillers nearly killed her after she developed severe pancreatitis. In May 2024, her teenage son found her blue and unresponsive in bed, and she spent a month in a coma.
Her account shows how a painkiller prescribed after a traumatic miscarriage became a daily routine, then shifted to over-the-counter tablets after her codeine prescriptions stopped. Zawadzki says she sometimes took a whole box of 32 tablets at once.
Zawadzki, 46, said she first received codeine after losing her first baby while three-and-a-half months pregnant in 2002. She described the miscarriage and its aftermath as traumatic, saying she haemorrhaged in hospital, lost consciousness and needed blood transfusions.
“I took these tablets and it felt like someone was just wrapping me up in a warm blanket,” she said. Her prescription initially lasted a week, but she returned to her GP for more. She said she was self-medicating because she felt low and that repeat prescriptions made access easy.
Within a year, Zawadzki said, she had become dependent on the medication. She spent around £80 a week on 32 pills a day. After her GP stopped prescribing codeine in 2006, she switched to an over-the-counter painkiller combining 200mg of ibuprofen and 12.8mg of codeine, which she continued to buy for the next 18 years.
She said she went from pharmacy to pharmacy to obtain a daily box. The tablets made her feel energetic and able to keep up with household tasks, but she said she never went a day without them and had to plan around access to medication, even when considering a holiday.
The consequences grew severe. Zawadzki developed stomach ulcers and said scar tissue on her stomach led to an operation. She later suffered pancreatitis, an inflammation of the pancreas, and was also treated in hospital for aspiration pneumonia, a lung infection caused when material such as food or liquid enters the lungs.
Her teenage son found her unresponsive in bed during the medical emergency in May 2024. Zawadzki said her oxygen levels were dangerously low and her heart stopped for about five minutes. She underwent an emergency tracheotomy and remained in a coma for a month.
She survived. The experience led her to stop taking painkillers for good, she said. Her story also carries a direct warning about long-term use: the NHS says codeine belongs to the opioid family, can be addictive and should be reviewed regularly with a doctor when taken over an extended period.
Zawadzki said the tablets had made her feel normal, even as the habit became difficult to manage. For years, she took 32 pills a day.
