Alcohol Neuropathy

Anyone drinking large amounts of alcohol on an almost daily basis should be taking thiamine. It doesn't really help your central nervous system. It's main benefit is to stop alcoholic brain disease, memory and cognitive skills.

Constant alcohol drinking just washes vitamin B out of your system. Thiamine helps if you are still drinking. Don't expect a few vitamins to sort your problems out in a few days. It took a lot longer for them to manifest themselves.

However, if you manage to stop drinking for a time, do not underestimate the body's ability to repair itself.

Hi

It seems u have done thorough study of various medicines. Not easy to get prescribed nd procured. Moreover not totally safe. Easy and best thing is to create will power, bear the shaking hands for few days, learn breathing exercises, try to sleep well without alcohols and with help of some sleeping pills, do some breathing exercises and meditation regularly. Morning walks are very helpful. I have benefitted and sure it will work. All the best. Rishi.

If you have ever done full blown cold turkey before (I have) you would not make that statement. Shaking hands I can deal with, but nausea, muscle spasm, cramp in the feet, being sick, sweating but cold like a bad flu, legs not functioning - having to use everything to try and stand up as you bounce from wall to bed to get to the toilet to be sick/wee, unable to even hold a cup to pour liquid into to rehydrate from the lost fluids.

Morning walks would involve falling down the stairs as all co-ordination is lost, you would never make it out the front door. Forget breathing exercises, your heart and blood pressure are racing, along with palpitations. In fact everything bar a full seizure and DTs.

If you are able to do all the things you claim to do, you are not alcohol dependent.

Hi RHGB,

I think everyone is different when it comes to stopping alcohol, I also take thiamine which I have been told by my gastrointologist your body loses all vimitamin minerals from Alcohol abuse, also I was in hospital for nearly 2 weeks without no shakes sweating I was fine in fact, I have been drinking 3 quarters of bottle of wine 13% every night for 30 odd years not proud of it still trying to get help, this is why I have chronic pancreatitis I've been told.It is such a hard addiction to stop

Emma

Hi. I'm with you on that one RHGB. But maybe the others persons comments could help others who haven't be to hell and back, yet?

I can't do anything but be in bed puking, shakes etc after a binge, for at least 3 days

It's ideal to use Benzodiazepines during withdrawal....willpower will not stop a life threatening seizure from coming on. As long as you don't drink while taking them there is no harm in using them for a week. Of course it is much easier to do this in medically supervised inpatient detox(assuming you want to wait forever)...but if you have a good doctor they will prescribe them for you to do it at home...

Emma, please take this in the way it is meant. 3/4 of a bottle of wine a night is nothing. I could drink three bottles of wine a night (I'd want 14% though) without batting an eyelid and still get up every day and do a job.

Your gastro is correct, you wash out all the vitamin B, you stop decrease production of Vitamin B and you don't eat well whilst drinking, thereby inhibiting new production of vitamin B by drinking too much alcohol on a daily basis. Thiamine will help your short term memory.

I'm not sure what you were in hospital for, but if it was alcohol related, they probably gave you a course of Librium. But even so, your drinking is not in the cold turkey division.

It is hard to stop, but if you get the right medication it is much easier to stop over a period of time.

I have lots of lovely scans & x-rays of my pancreas and all my organs on CD from when I was in hospital, along with my notes, the descriptions always usually said something like - enlarged.

Well said! Waiting forever? Yes, been there,  done that. Also contacted a website who said they were there to support relatives of people addicted to alcohol but their final comment/suggestion was to book my husband into their £9,000 per week rehab. Which kind of ended the conversation!!!!

Maybe Rishi is becoming too dependent on alcohol so took those steps to help in controlling what could have turned into a very serious problem?

Good luck to everyone, by whatever method you use - becoming unaddicted is slow and difficult.

Rishi, I hope your doctor has been helping you with your problems. All the best.

Hi

Thanks for ur comment that if I am doing breathing exercises, morning walks etc I am not dependent on alcohol. I have tried all the good methods, abstain from Alcohol for weeks together, still I face shaking of hands whilst writing in frint of somebody. May be it is psychological problem. Initially I was hiding this problem and my life worsened day by day. I want to get out of it. May be u or someone can give me some good advice. Rishi.

Well, it sounds like you use alcohol to control anxiety. Shaky hands are a sign of the central nervous system not function and/or anxiety.

Alcohol affects the CNS, hence people have what they refer to as the DTs, the shakes in the morning due to a heavy night on the alcohol.

From what you say and what I read between the lines, you were never a heavy drinker and dabbled with it in moderation to see if it could cover up anxiety, which many people do.

Yes, it may be a psychological problem, then a psychiatrist may be able to help you. It may be a neurological problem (physical) in which case it is more difficult to treat. There are so many reasons that can cause shaky hands, medication you are taking, incorrect blood sugar levels even other problems with parts of your body that have a side effect of shaky hands.

From what you describe you have, your walks, breathing, meditation would help. A test to do and you probably know the answer, sit in front of someone at work and write, then sit at home in a room with nobody about.

If the problem remains, it is probably neurological, but if it disappears as I think it will, then it is psychological. Either way, a visit to your GP is in order to find out what it is and the possible solutions.

It maybe medication in the short term may help your anxiety, but the underlying cause needs to be sorted. If you go to your GP, write every thing down, so if he tries to dismiss it as nothing and everyone has shaky hands at some time, you have a list of reasons to hand, why it is more than that.

Do you know that some surgeons take a specific medication to steady their hands? You can't exactly turn up to an operation and say, sorry guys, got a terrible hand tremor today, no can do. Or, cut and hope they steady up before you cut something you shouldn't.

I doubt if you'd get a doctor to agree that (especially a woman) drinking three quarters of a bottle of wine every night hasn't got a problem. Just because you drank/drink a good deal more doesn't minimise Emma's problem with alcohol.

I hope your recovery is going well and thank you again for all the help you've given me.

Yes, well a couple of things, read it in context. Where did I say that she didn't have a problem? Putting words in my mouth that is.

First, emma was responding to my post about me saying that cold turkey was bad, and Rishi's post about how going for a walk helps (amongst other things). I was stating that I didn't feel that this drinking levels were at a level to warrant cold turkey withdrawal symptoms, something that he has since confirmed.

She said it effects us all differently and that she didn't have withdrawal symptoms whilst in hospital. I was merely pointing out at that level, she was unlikely to have withdrawal symptoms with that consumption.

Quite frankly I'm not to bothered about what doctors think, most of them don't understand alcohol addicition and seem to think that a bit of willpower will do the trick. I have caught quite a few out and taken them to task over not doing their job properly. And that includes in the past week. Don't get me wrong, I have tremendous respect for medical staff, just not when it comes to alcoholism.

My recovery is going well thank you, just come back from the hospital from phlebotomy to give samples for 12 tests. Fortunately they can do nine of them from one large tube, so they only needed to take four tubes. I am one of the lucky ones, willpower with a little medication seems to work for me.

And stop thanking me for help, really, I realise you appreciate it. But the real thanks for me was when you made peace with your husband and seem to be getting on a bit better. Nobody needs to spend their life rowing like cats and dogs.

I don't know where you got the idea that my husband and I spent all our time having rows, because we don't. I was reaching out on this forum for information to hellp me to understand why I tend to get angry with him if I think he's had 'enough' to drink and he says he hasn't.

Now I realise that there is no such thing as 'enough' and because of that i feel better able to fathom what is happening to him.

We've never spent our lives rowing like cats and dogs! We get on extremely well, apart from the sticking point, which of course was me saying all the wrong things and expecting him to be able to do things which are, at the moment, impossible.

Some good news is that because I've backed off on that and acttually apologised to him about it, he's agreed to go and see the liver specialist, so maybe once he's there at the hospital they will explain that he needs to be admitted urgently for treatment.

We've been married for thirty five years and this was making both of our lives unnecessarily complicated. We are happily married but i certainly needed a push in the right direction to aid me in figuring out that I was making things worse.

I also, at the time I started the new discussion, needed some calming down, which many people gave me.

I will keep you all up to date - I am hoping so much that he'll accept treatment.

 

Hi RHGB,

You do give good advice to everyone on this forum and I read posts daily, after work or before. I wish I had your willpower to stop my alcohol consumption, my GP will not prescribe nalmefrene or selencro in my area, I even printed off information from Joanna from C3Europe I think it's called, Apparently I don't drink enough according to alcohol drug centre, but Hospital Consultant tells me that's why I have chronic pancreatitis from drinking wine every night. I am now just turned 50 yesterday I so wish I could stop this dreaded addiction, also I have to take lots of painkillers everyday for pancreatitis Co Codamol 30/500 which is more problems to the liver so maybe I have an addictive disorder

Alright Tess, I didn't mean to upset you.

Good luck.

I'll answer this a bit later, I must go and watch Emmerdale, sad git I know, but I like it.

You didn't upset me at all - I was just dismayed that you thought we had a miserable marriage, which is not the case. Looking back at what I wrote, it seems to me now that people may have thought we were very unhappily married - the truth is that I just wanted to know how to deal with my anger in a healthy way.

Enjoy Emmerdale. I delivered the late Shirley Stelfox's grandson, by the way (Edna.)

Hope your blood tests are ok.

Seriously?

I'm really glad that you've got something out of this forum,we are a messed up happy family lol

Oh yes. So are we. But all extremely supportive of one another. We haven't hidden things from our children - well, not until they were grown up, anyway, so they are incredibly helpful. Good luck, Nicole. Your posts always make me laugh.

Yes, seriously. I have been watching it since the mid '90s with a break when I moved around the country with my job and spent most of the working week living in hotels.

C'mon, you probably have your foibles, you're probably in to country dancing or crochet or similar. I've done the adrenalin things, I played professional level ice hockey when I was younger (RIP Richmond Flyers). Taken a motorbike up to 170mph on a public motorway (not my proudest moment), taken a Press & PR motor bike to France and stuffed it and spent the weekend in Boulogne sur Mere hospital with a broken arm and two pins in it - Plus I've been to Mombasa hospital (scary).  Did despatch riding in London for 18 months.

I have my RYA Level II Offshore Power Boat licence and raced the odd power boat doing 70 - 80 mph. I think I deserve the odd calm moment in my life.

I used to watch it when it was on in the daytime and called emmerdale farm,about the same time the Sullivan's was on (Aussie soap)

Hi Emma,

Yes, willpower is strange, not a constant, that we can say we have that percentage. Some things we are good at and some bad. Alcohol just happens to be your weak point.

I feel for you, with the response of your GP and the ARC. It is a typical reply and pretty much par for the course. You go to these people that are meant to have your best interests at heart and your health. You bare your soul, you give them the information they need and effectively the answer is 'the computer says no'.

Sometimes you just want to rip their arm off and beat them with the bloody end until you knock some sense into them.

A belated happy birthday to you, 50 is a good age to be, I like it. Although you probably are thinking about it for different reasons. I am because there was a chance I would not see it, you because nobody likes to enter another decade.

Your hospital consultant, I take it he is a gastroenterologist. Can he not write a letter to your GP or/and the alcohol centre to nudge them along? Have you asked the question? I know it is easy for me to say and not the same for others, but it is worth a try.

The alcohol centre will get its funding from the NHS and government grants. For this reason it is responsible to the county DAAT (drug alcohol action team). You can complain to them that you are not being offered approved NHS/NICE medication.

If you need help with putting the letter together or even want me to send the letter, I am glad to help. The best way forward would be to get a supporting letter from the consultant that medication is required as your current drinking is leading to serious health problems.

Use the PM if at any time you decide on help.

Right, so you're laughing at me, whilst you admit daytime watching it and trying to watch an Ozzie soap at the same time.

I know you start work early, are you back in time to watch Jeremy Kyle & Judge Rinder?

God no,hate that crap,I'm more your come dine with type of daytime girl

Oooh, double dipping and picking dropped food up off the floor and serving it to guests, yum.

The narrator is funny though.