I should have listened!
 

When i first joined this site I did not listen to those who told me not to quit cold turkey without a doctor. i thought I could do it on my own. I was extremely wrong. I suffered from DT's in the most extreme way. My mental state broke down completely. I had no sense of reality. I saw people who weren't there, I did not know who my family was, and in the end I ended up running thru the woods thinking people were chasing me to kill me. i was convinced that my family had been murdered, and when the police found me I was naked and bleeding from the waist up and really thought that I had been running thru the woods for 3 days. I had been gone from my house for 2 hours. I told the police my family had been murdered. They took it seriously. I was taken to the hospital where I told the staff the police had a plan to rape and kill me. I was convinced of all of these things. Turns out my electrolytes (potassium, magnesium) levels were depleted. I was about a day away from going into cardiac arrest. I have been in the hospital since Thursday and am feeling much better, but were still trying to get my levels to normal. Definitely listen when people tell you to detox with a doctor. This is dangerous business. And I would like to say thank you to those who gave me advice. :)

OMG! How scary! I had a couple of very difficult nights where I thought I would die but nothing like what you experienced. Here's what I did the next morning when I woke up drenched in sweat and feeling like I was hung over even though I didn't drink. I asked myself, "Well, do you want to go through that ever again?" My answer was no.

You have made a difficult decision and you have taken the first step. Don't ever put yourself in a situation where you have to go through that horrible detox again. It's one day, one hour, one minute, one second at a time now and this forum will help.

Lean on us and read our stories and each day you will feel better and better. Glad you are here.

Blessings...

Glad to hear that you are doing better now.
Getting and staying sober are both serious business.
Hopefully the worse is behind you now.

Good luck,
Bob

Glad to hear you finally got the help you need ElleSki, hope we can help in your sobriety quest.

Welcome Elle. It definitely is dangerous. I'm sorry to hear you went through all that but glad to hear you are in good hands now. Stick close to SR and get well soon.

Thank you everyone. This was the scariest thing that has ever happened in my life. I will never pick up a drink again. I know that now. This was my rock bottom.

I had a friend similier situation he lost about three days time and he can figure as he ended up 50 miles away is that he walked because his feet where swollen he also remembered hitting his head at one point but doesn't remember anything else.

So glad you're ok and getting help. May I ask, was your BAC still pretty high when you were experiencing the psychosis?

Elle - I'm happy to see you posting. I'm sorry you went through that horror. I hope you'll keep posting - you're never alone.

Elle, I'm really glad that you're safe and getting the care you need. I hope you come up with a plan for recovery that works for you.

That some scary stuff. I'm glad you're OK. It sounds like the worst of it is over, so now you can work on your recovery and staying sober.

I'm glad you're ok and back with us Elleski :)

D

I'm glad you survived this. So what's your plan to stay sober now, and never go through this again?

I'm glad you're alright now. :hug: Formulate a recovery plan to guarantee that this never happens again. :hug:

Elle, I know when you wrote this it was the absolute truth, that ou mean it with every fibre of your being. I don't doubt your sincerity for one moment.

The thing is I have known several people who go through this kind of extreme withdrawal again and again. They seem to lose their resolve somehow, the memory of the horror fades and is replaced with the delusion that next time will be different.

I don't know why that happens, but maybe they are in the process of discovering that a bad experience alone is not enough to bring about permanent recovery. It is so important to find a plan and act on it. The sooner the better unless you have some way of knowing how long your present determination will hold up.

I wish you well.

So glad you are recovering. Very dangerous stuff indeed. People should be educated about the deadly potential of alcohol as they are with other drugs.

I'm glad to hear that you are doing much better! I hope your health continues to improve.

My stepson went through two serious 'cold turkey' detoxes. The first in a hospital where he suffered from DTs, had hallucinations, thought his family members were space aliens, thought he was watching long-ago cancelled television programs on the walls of his hospital room, had to be strapped to his bed.

During the second, he was found wandering the streets in the town where he lives. He did not know his friends when they found him. His father, my late husband, received very strange phone calls from him and called his friends who were out of town at the time. When they returned to town, they found him and took him to the ER.

My only hope is that no one here has to go through all of that ever again!

A friend of mine has a permanent seizure disorder due to going off booze on his own.

Hi Elleski

That sounds terrifying! Glad you are doing better, Elleski. Alcohol withdrawl is no joke....