Liver awareness month

[Axel P]

Guys,

the month of January is my traditional liver awareness month. As we all now, we enjoy Port for the Port, for all the flavour, bouquet...

But, please answer this question just for yourself: Could you really stop drinking from one day to another?

Five years ago I talked to a Professor for internal medicine who explained to me, that the liver is an organ which totally recoveres if you give it enough time to recover. Meaning: either keep up the drinking habit 3 times a week and stop for the consecutive 4 or stop drinking one month per annum, which Im doing now.

It is a very good experience since you can really get a hand on how important alcohol, i.e. wine or port, really is to yourself.

Axel

[KillerB]

Generally give my liver a complete break once per year. Last year it was Lent, year before it was most of October (except the bit with my birthday in it), often it is January, but not this year.

[DRT]

This is very good news. I had no idea the liver could completely recover. can anyone corroborate this evidence?

My plan for January is to only drink 1 day per week. The only problem is I am going on holiday for a week in January and also have the 1966 horizontal to tackle. All in all I think I will drink on 50% of the days in January and be alcohol free for the other 50%. I like the idea of the 3 and 4 day split as a means of allowing the liver to keep on top of things. That may be my new long term strategy, although I would prefer to reach the level of 2 days on 5 days off as being the norm.

Derek

[Alex Bridgeman]

So taking the 4 days / 3 days idea to the next logical step, does that mean that if I drink for 4 hours and then sleep for 3 hours that my liver will have recovered and that I can drink again when I wake up?

Is this the tactic that Derek was employing at that infamous Fonseca offline where he slept in the corner of Conky's kitchen?

And to answer the question - could I give up drinking from one day to the next? There are times when I do this, although never for a month at a time. Usually it happens for a week or two when I am travelling although it also happens when I am working like a dog and just can't be bothered to open a bottle or even pour a glass for myself when I get home. I don't know if I could give up for a month, or would even want to!

Alex

[DRT]

I have been surprised how easy it has been not to have a drink. I am one of those people who has one or more drinks almost every day in life. Circumstances have to consopire against me for this not to be the case, like having to drive from one end of the country to the other in the evening and arriving home too late and only fit to sleep.

I have often wondered whether or not I am adicted to it but, given my experience of the last week, I think I am not. I just seem to have conditioned myself through force of habit to exist in a world where it is normal for me to have a drink. Unexpectedly, I have not craved after it on the days this week when I haven't had it. So it shouldn't be too dificult for me to change the habit if I want to. It also means I only need to be a member of one club known as the AA

One thing that has been worrying me is the ability of my internal plumbing to get rid of the alcohol efficiently. I and some others here attended an offline some time ago where we had the benefit of a device which tells you how much alcohol is in your system. The morning after the event I was surprised that my body had retained significantly more alcohol than the others and they seemed to reach Zero much more quicklly than I did. This is why the liver re-generation thing is attractive to me.

I'm sure someone will remind me of this conversation when I post 31 TN's in March

Derek

[uncle tom]

Nothing will do your health more harm than worrying about it!

Among down-and-out street alcoholics, only one in three has cirrhosis, and of the few people I have known who have seriously damaged their liver (among scores of heavy drinking friends) all have been serious drinkers of neat whisky.

The liver does mend itself, and there was a recent announcement of a medical treatment that can greatly accelerate the process.

Last year it was admitted that the 'unit' system for alcoholic consumption was no more than inspired guesswork, and was not backed by any scientific evidence

So drink and be merry, worry not. Avoid imbibing beverages with a strength above, say, 21%, and avoid getting paralytic more than 30 days each month.

Tom

[jdaw1]

Uncle Tom is surprising hard on January, March, May, July, August, October and December.

[jdaw1]

My wife, reading some BBC stuff on drinking and health, asked me how much a “unit† is. “Oh, err, something like 100cl pure alcohol†, said I, “maybe a mite less†. I wasn’t challenged!

[Alex Bridgeman]

Brilliant. So a 75cl bottle of port at 20% proof is only 15cl of pure alcohol equivalent.

How many units can I drink a day?

[KillerB]

My wife, reading some BBC stuff on drinking and health, asked me how much a “unit† is. “Oh, err, something like 100cl pure alcohol†, said I, “maybe a mite less†. I wasn’t challenged!

What with 100cl being one actual litre, you could get through quite a lot of Port. It is, of course, a single centilitre of pure alcohol.

Somehow Al B still managed to work out the right answer.

You are allowed 21 per week, two bottles if you remove the sediment cough!

[jdaw1]

The miracle of modern medicine:

“Are you sure you have authorization for your experiment?†

“Well, he’s fully recovered, except for a few minor kinks.†

“Has he asked for anything special?†

“Yes, this morning for breakfast he requested something called wheat germ, organic honey and tiger’s milk.†

[ laughs ] “Oh, yes. those were the charmed substances that some years ago were felt to contain life-preserving properties.†

“You mean there was no deep fat? No steak or cream pies or hot fudge?†

“Those were thought to be unhealthy, precisely the opposite of what we now know to be true.†