kudzujean

The way Alzheimer's patients do?

suki44883

What do you mean by late-stage? Just prior to death or a year or so out?

kudzujean

About a year or so before it finally kills them.

suki44883

Well, some alcoholics that we believe are very near death sometimes go on for long periods of time. But yes, they can have bad days and not so bad days. After a while though, they can become bedridden and then most days are pretty crappy.

kudzujean

The reason I ask is that we were living with my father until a few months before he died of alcoholism. I was a little kid then.

I have no pleasant memories of him.

suki44883

I'm sorry you don't have any good memories of your father. My father also died from alcoholism...cirrhosis of the liver. Ugly way to die. I was out on my own by that time though. I do have some good memories of my dad, even though my mom and him split up when I was about 9 years old. I saw him sporadically after that and as I look back, I know he loved me, but he really wasn't dad material. Some people just weren't meant to be parents. It's kind of sad when they have kids anyway.

Taking5

I had a friend - and old drinking buddy - that was apparently healthy, but everyone knew he drank a lot. He actually ran a 5k, at age 62, with a respectable time. One week later he went into the hospital, jaundiced. While there they diagnosed him with renal failure too. 17 days later he died.

Sometimes they don't really have bad days, they just die.

suki44883

Yep, anything is possible. Some have more mental problems than others, too, since alcohol has a definite affect on the brain. More than just the liver is affected, too. Some go on and on for years in poor health and others just drop dead seamingly over night. Very strange, indeed.

Justfor1

Do you mean do some days they drink a whole bottle of booze & other day they drink a 6 pack of beer? I believe alcoholics can drink less in short periods but in the end they always go back to all day drinking/benders.

williamj

Had a friend who was an alcoholic and dropped dead at age 35.

MY AFIL, however, is 74 and has a perfect liver but has stage 3 kidney disease, has broken pretty much every bone in his body from alcohol-related falls, has "wet brain" from the alcohol, lost most of his hearing and sight from alcohol and alcohol-related accidents, has an artificial aorta, has had bleeding ulcers, strokes, and on and on and STILL he drinks 1.75 liters+ a day warm, straight from the bottle and survives it all.

Recently he had blood clots in his legs, heart, AND lungs and after taking blood thinners (whilst drinking insane amounts of alcohol), the clots were gone within three weeks.

So yes, I imagine it depends largely on their gene make up by way of end stages but the "good and bad days" come with every alcoholic.