Just got the word from the hospital: lost a patient to complications of alcoholism.

[Aristus]

I hadn't seen him in over a year, but before that, he was a regular. He'd been through our de-tox and alcohol abuse treatment programs several times, and it never took.

He was supposed to start another round of treatment today.

I remember him as a pleasant guy who just couldn't climb out of the bottle.

I hope he's at peace now...

[MaryMagdaline]

1. So very sorry. I have a sister who refuses treatment

It’s painful to watch

[cilla4progress]

2. Beating addiction is the longest lonely

journey!

Not only the addiction, but whatever got you there.

So sad. May he go in peace.

VA hospital, right?

[Aristus]

3. No.

As far as I know, he wasn't a veteran.

[cilla4progress]

4. Sorry -

I don't know why I thought you worked VA, Aristus.

Oh - you are a vet, I think that's why.

[Aristus]

5. No. I work for a not-for-profit community health organization.

The clinic where I work is primarily for our homeless patients. (The mainstream clinic is just a few blocks away, but I see some mainstream patients, too.)

Every once in a while, we'll get some patients that the VA contracts out to us, usually due to overcrowding at the local VA facility. (It was really bad back when everyone was coming back from Iraq and Afghanistan all at once.)

[ailsagirl]

6. I'm sorry to hear that, Aristus

I've heard my share of horror stories about alcoholism and even know people who are caught in its web. It saddens me greatly but it's really up to them to make the decision to stop, and so far I'm not seeing any effort. Tragic.

[uriel1972]

7. I have an addictive personality...

and type II diabetes. giving up chocolates and my other comfort foods has been hell. I'm gonna die from my complications, I'm sure in about ten to twenty years.
I guess I see it from the other side.

You know it's killing you but you don't care. The pain is so strong and facing it is so hard, you need an escape.

I'm so sorry for your loss, but I have little that I can do except listen and offer compassion. I guess in a homeless clinic you get to see too much. I stand in awe.

[Laelth]

8. Complications of alcoholism? I would like to know more about these.

I am assuming he was a COVID patient. I have heard that the combination of COVID and alcohol addiction leads to worse outcomes in COVID treatment, but why is this so?

I would be appreciative if you could shed any light on this subject.

-Laelth

[Aristus]

10. No.

If the cause of death was COVID, they would have listed it as COVID.

The complication in this case was hepatic encephalopathy.

I try to avoid falling into the trap right-wingers try to set for us that COVID is a hoax, and that we diagnose everything as COVID in order to boost the numbers and strengthen the 'hoax'.

COVID is COVID. Complications of alcoholism are complications of alcoholism.

[Laelth]

11. OK. Just curious.

I have heard that COVID patients who were alcoholics had generally poorer prognoses. I was interested in knowing whether or not you could shed some light on that phenomenon.

I understand that, in this particular case, COVID is not implicated in any way.

-Laelth

[ismnotwasm]

9. I'm a transplant RN

What a surgeon told me a while back was that there is data showing a near epidemic of young people, people under 30, drinking themselves into liver failure. There is often polysubstance abuse so they are untransplantable.

I see these people all the time and it kills me. I hate losing people period, but losing them to addiction twists the knife.

[Niagara]

12. I'm sorry to read this.

[Rhiannon12866]

13. I'm so sorry. I've been in AA since 2008 and to more funerals than I can count

Alcoholism is cunning, baffling and powerful - and wants you dead.