She Could Drink Me Under The Table

Here's what I'm reading about today:

A woman drinks so much alcohol, she starts to shake. She has a seizure, vomits, and gets rushed to the hospital. At the hospital, they give her water and a few mild medications to help prevent more seizures as her body gets rid of the alcohol. She's released the next day, perfectly fine. This behavior continues once a month for several months (more than 7). During her alcohol-induced seizures-- which are 100% preventable as long as she does not drink alcohol-- she will often bite off parts of her tongue or hit her head to the point of it bleeding. When the woman drinks, she tries to kill herself. Once, she even cut her own wrists. Another time, she tried to overdose on pills. When she sobers up at the hospital, she is grateful for the help given to her in saving her life and she states she never actually wanted to kill herself.

She is 37 years old.

I'm older than that, and I like to drink. But I've never even thrown up because I've had too much to drink, let alone had a seizure. I've passed out a couple of times, but never bitten off chunks of my tongue because my body couldn't take any more alcohol and seized up. It takes a sizable commitment to drink like that. And that kind of commitment is something I just don't understand.

It also renews my bafflement about why pot is illegal.

As soon as I can, I'm moving out of America. We're all stupid here.