Originally Posted by Lautca

On May 13, the day before my 70th birthday, and on my 8238th day of sobriety, I was in the process of getting ready to have glucosteroid and long-lasting local anesthetic injections performed in the area of my sacroiliac joint in my lower back, where the spinal column passes through the pelvis. Some years earlier I had already had a colonoscopy, and a similar nerve block procedure done before back in December just before Christmas, so I was familiar with the routine that involves total anesthesia using propofol. Propofol is the same stuff implicated in the death of composer and singer Michael Jackson, if you recall. Propofol causes intense pain when it is first injected into a vein, so to prevent that, a local anesthetic is introduced first, lidocaine was used for me, and the last time on May 13, according to the anesthesiologist, an ethanol solution was also used in conjunction with the lidocaine. I don't know what the ethanol solution strength was, or how much ethanol was injected intravenously, but it was enough for me to have alcohol on my breath, which I noticed almost immediately, and told the anesthesiologist, which he confirmed. I never had a conversation with the anesthesiologist about it because in about fifteen seconds I was unconscious, and I never saw the anesthesiologist again.

Now, before anyone gets too excited, let me explain something for those of you who haven't had anatomy. The first place blood goes that is in veins (not arteries) is to the heart, where it gets pumped through the lungs to get oxygenated. The circulation of blood from my arm carrying a relatively and momentarily high concentration of ethanol to my lungs would be very noticeable on my breath for only a few seconds. Afterward, that blood would be gone from the lungs and mixed in with the general circulation before it got to my brain, so if I had been conscious, I never would have felt its intoxicating effects.

Well, I never thought I'd have alcohol injected into me! I know I get a little here and there in foods, like yeast-raised bread, a little from pure vanilla extract when I have cookies and cakes. I'm a chemist, and it is not true that alcohol "cooks out of food", Alcohol forms a constant boiling temperature mixture with water below the boiling point of water at 173ºF or 78ºC, and when all the alcohol is gone out of the soup, or whatever, all the water will be gone, too! I don't worry about small amounts of alcohol found in food because in reality, we can't avoid it, plus our own body makes the stuff as part of our metabolic processes, which is why we have the very specific enzyme in our liver to break it down and metabolize it.

But this was dirty pool, I had asked what all was going to be used for my procedure, and they wouldn't tell me!

I'm not going to start counting my days over for two reasons. First, I didn't go out and knowingly and intentionally obtain alcohol to consume it. Second, I saw the syringe that contained the ethanol and lidocaine solution, and it contained about 5 milliliters of solution (1/3 of a tablespoon) that was obviously not pure anhydrous ethanol that would have done serious damage in that form, and I probably get more ethanol when I have several pieces of vanilla cake with vanilla frosting with vanilla ice cream after eating some French cooking.

So, as of June 28, 2020, I've still got 8284 days, or 22 years 8 months and 5 days, but just barely.