end stage liver disease

my friend died recently, she was a chronic alcoholic and turned very nasty in the latter stages of her drinking, i received a phone call from a member of her family to come see her, that she was not good, on arival i was led into her bedroom, what i saw will haunt me for the rest of my life. lying in the bed, barely concious, heavy irregular breathing was my friend, whom i hadnt seen for some weeks, was surrounded by nurses from the hospice, with a bag of horrible brown stuff comming from her catheter, sores all over her mouth where she had been dribbling, her stomach, legs and arms were horrifically swollen. she was given days to live, what came about from the nospice nurses was that she knew the end was near but had instructed dorctors and nurses that no member of her family were to be informed of the seriousness of her condition, why, there was so much i wanted to tell her, talk to her about, i stillcant get over the shock, how bad is the suffering of someone in late stage alcoholic liver failure, she died some three and a half hours after my visit, i have so many unanswered questions, i remember her taking all her tablest with a glass of lambrini first thing in the morning, why didnt she just stop drinking, she would be in hospital for weeks and go without alcohol, only to start drinking again days after she came out, the day i went to see her, her son was there, he was only 13 years old, and i will never forget his cries for her not to leave him, how can she have been so selfish to not involve us all to prepare for what we were all going to witness, i feel sad and angry and very very confused, when i first went in the room i spoke to her and she briefly opened her eyes lifted her head and looked at me as is she knew me but her head fell back onto the pillow, the nurses were trying to make her comfortable by lifting her up slightly but the moans from her were just tooo painful, she was only 32, but looked 82, sorry if i am rambling, but i just needed to get all this out. marg

so sorry to hear that, she died on mothers day, i just hope in time it does get easier, some times i am overcome with needing the answers it almost consumes me up, marg xx

also, i feel terrible, that she was aware of her son crying at her bedside, did she have any regrets, would she have changed anything, what she must have gone thro, as i said she became a nasty drunk, there really werent that many people around her, just her son, really, she had been estranged from family and friends for a long time, as one by one they gave up, i myself only saw her irregularly, if only we could have hindsight. thank you for your kind works.

Hello Marg and welcome to HealingWell.   So sorry about your friend.  

Probably most liver disease patients don't have a clue about what may lay in front of them in the death department.  I am pretty sure that the doctors aren't telling them much.......what they are probably telling them is that if you don't stop drinking you will die........they don't explain how they may die.   If she had any clue about how she would die it may have had an impact on her drinking.   But then alcoholism is a powerful disease, so maybe not.  It did my husband.  Once he got a taste of what liver disease had in store for him.....he was able to quit drinking.  But some people just can't .

Take care.........