December 31, 2010 Blog

This is the tenth anniversary of my alcoholic bottom.

I could still be drinking. I could still be waking up every morning with self-loathing, ashamed that I didn’t have the strength to give up an addiction that was ruining my life. Perhaps more than any day, New Years Eve is the holiday of drunken revelry. I thank God every day that He humbled me in the desert ten years ago, that he humiliated me beyond the limits of my denial, that I could no longer go on drinking and retain a shred of dignity and self respect.

I could be preparing for an alcoholic evening.

I never blacked out. I think I was lucky that I got sick and threw up before my central nervous system alcohol level got high enough to shut down conscious awareness. Blacking out is dangerously close to passing out, and that is dangerously close to respiratory arrest, the most common cause of death in acute alcohol poisoning.

Imagine blacking out. Imagine waking up in the morning in a strange bed with a strange person whom you don’t know. Imagine not knowing what you did with that person, what you said, how you got there. Imagine not knowing where your car was or how it got there. Imagine the look of your spouse and children when you arrive back home.

I am very grateful that I never blacked out.

The psychological-sociologic literature on alcoholism asserts blacking out is fairly common in young adult drinkers, especially males, and is not a serious sign of problems. My experience and my common sense responds, “B____ S_____.”

Perhaps if I had experienced black outs in my drinking days I would have come to realize that I had a serious problem much sooner than I did.

Denial being what it is, perhaps not.

I am wishing you a safe and sober New Year’s celebration and New Year.

December 28, 2010 Blog

December is National Drunk Driving Awareness Month. It seems appropriate since people are partying heavily this time of year. A CHP friend of mine told me that the period between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day is the peak time for people to be on the road under the influence. His estimate was that, in the evening hours, about one-third of drivers have been drinking, and five percent, one in twenty, would be legally over the 0.08 percent limit. Think about that as you drive down the highway: One in every twenty cars that you pass is being piloted by an intoxicated driver. Of course, you probably have observed drivers you thought were drunk. They have a difficult time staying in their lane. Sometimes, they are driving excessively slowly. Those slow drivers are either super seniors or they have been drinking and are being cautious, too cautious because they are conspicuous.

When I suspect a drunk driver next to me, I want to get in front of them. If they lose control and hit another vehicle or swerve into another lane, I want them behind me.

Alcohol is involved in fifty percent of all traffic fatalities.

In my alcoholic prime, I was a very good drunk driver. I personally agreed with my good friend, Pete, who said he was a better driver drunk than most people are sober. I never drove with a blood alcohol of more than 0.1 percent because I never got really drunk. I carefully kept my blood alcohol hovering in that range because that’s where it felt good, that was my sweet spot. That’s one of the reasons that beer was my drink of choice for many years. In those early years, I could keep myself in that wonderful place of  “feel good, no worries” for most of an evening. At that level of intoxication, I did not feel impaired, and I got home countless times without incident.

When I was in my alcoholic-in-training days in college, I learned to navigate with a much higher blood alcohol. We drank too much and drank stupid stuff with too high an alcohol content (like 180 proof “white lightning” mixed with lime Kool-Aid). If I had the “whirlies” where everything was spinning, or I was seeing double, I found that if I closed one eye, I could see normally and the spinning went away. Sad as it may seem, I drove home from many a party with one eye shut.

Young people, as I was then, have very flawed judgment. That especially applies to young men. Besides having a sense on invincibility, it has been shown that young male brains mature much more slowly than we once thought. The cerebral cortex is not fully mature until the mid-twenties. Young men simply may not have the brain maturity to make sound decisions. It has also been shown that the younger a person begins drinking, the more likely he is to become alcoholic. Incredible as it may seem, twenty-five percent of all alcoholics are under the age of twenty.

It is these young people that I am trying to reach, early in their drinking lives or even before they begin. It might save them decades of painful experiences and a lifetime of addiction.

It might save their life.

December 14, 2010

COLON AND RECTAL CANCER AND ALCOHOL CONSUMPTION

My maternal grandfather died of colon cancer. So did my maternal uncle. Neither was particularly regular at seeing a doctor and both were diagnosed when the disease was widespread and untreatable.

Both were alcoholics.

Colorectal cancer can run in families. There is a genetic predisposition.

Strike one.

Alcohol has been associated with increased colorectal cancer.

Strike two.

Since December is Colorectal Cancer Education and Awareness Month and since colorectal cancer is something that is potentially a really personal problem for me, I thought it would be appropriate to discuss the evidence for the link between Colorectal cancer and alcohol.

First and foremost, alcohol has been shown to increase the risk for cancers of the entire alimentary system: mouth, throat, esophagus, stomach, colon, and rectum. When alcohol is metabolically degraded, the first breakdown product is acetaldehyde. Although alcohol itself has not been shown to cause cell mutations leading to cancer, acetaldehyde is a notorious carcinogen. Bacteria throughout the gut can create acetaldehyde from alcohol and so it is no wonder that cancers are increased there.

This relationship is not theoretical; it is proven. There is a tumor-suppressing gene known as p53. One of the more common alterations in colorectal cancer cells is a mutation in p53 which renders it less effective in preventing tumors Alcohol, especially in the form of beer, has been shown to increase mutations in p53.

A recent study showed a 21% increase in colorectal cancer in moderate drinkers (12 ounces of alcohol per week) and an 85% increase in a subset of colorectal cancers deemed to be more aggressive.

When I was drinking, I had two strikes against me. Sober, I have greatly reduced my colorectal cancer risk.

Just one more sound reason to re-examine our cozy relationship with alcohol and realize it is not the benign habit that we were led to believe.

References:

Scattery, ML; Dis Colon & Rectum, August 2010

Poynter, JN; Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prevue, August 2010