| Lloyd,
My husband was 38 when the doctor told him that he had cirrhosis
of the liver and to quit drinking or "the next one might be
your last". He "quit" but decided the non-alcoholic beer would
be okay. If you read the label, non-alcoholic beer still has
some alcohol content. He drank those for about six months
then went on the road as a long haul truck driver. I thought
he was not drinking during that time. One night in 1993 he
calls me from an Illinois police station. He had been arrested
for DUI. He had parked his rig and went in to a restaurant
to eat. He enjoyed a Long Island Iced Tea with dinner. He
had an altercation with another truck driver who called the
police. When the cops went to the truck where my husband was
sleeping, with the rig running for heat, he was arrested for
DUI since the keys were in the ignition and the truck was
running. He almost lost his happy home over that one. Not
so much because he was arrested, but because he had been drinking
and I trusted him not to drink. Did he want to die? After
that he was "good" and didn't drink to my knowledge.
In 1996 he called me from the road right before Christmas.
He was bleeding internally and was really out of it. He ended
up in a hospital in Indiana where they diagnosed him with
esophageal bleeding. He was close to death by the time he
reached the hospital. They stopped the bleeding and diagnosed
cirrhosis of the liver, hepatitis C, and possible liver cancer.
We brought him home on Christmas Eve 1996. He never went back
on the road.
He was diagnosed with liver cancer on January 13th and given
2 months to live. We went home and lived the best we could.
In the meantime I went for a blood test and liver biopsy and
found that I also had "a very low level of circulating HepC
and "a very low grade chronic hepatitis".
My husband died on May 28, 1997. He was 43 years old. At
the time of his diagnosis he weighed over 220 pounds, muscular
and strong. At the time of his death he weighed 189 pounds,
most of that was fluid retention in his abdomen, he had lost
all of his muscle and his strength. He died at home with his
family with him.
You can use any of this story you want to use. If it helps
just one person realize that this is not a game, it will be
worth it.
Life is good and so worth living!
Linda
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