Re: [Harp-L] Self-inflicted disease, addictions and 'reaL'tragedies.Long.
With all due respect to all concerned, can we let the man rest? Let
us state our grief at his passing and praise him but leave his
entrails and his habits for the tabloids.
Rex T
On Sep 28, 2007, at 9:04 PM, sean stephens wrote:
Hello and good evening to all ,
I just felt that I might pipe in on the subject of cause/effect
discussion stemming from the sudden and shocking death of Mr Freeze.
I possess only one of Maestro Primach's works, namely ' Company
Man', but it was enough to flag up to me the man's gargantuan talents.
I spent weeks,nay months, listening to and trying to unravel the
instrumental colossus that is 'varmint'.How does somebody compose
such a perfectly constructed , swinging, and in the pocket tune
like that??? It is perfect!
I post in response to a listers query re anyone who might have a
medical insight into addictions etc and to the Butter/Primach vs
Clarke.. self inflicted or otherwise question.
Speaking as a failed Doctor(well, dropped out in intern year,I
think thats what a junior doctor is titled in the states?) and
sincerely not wishing to sound patronising etc ,I still possess a
basic med school knowledge and because I like a drink myself I am
fairly well versed in the cons/deleterious factors re C2H5OH (BOOZE).
As far as I understand it,Bill had a problem with the drink,now I
may well be well off the mark with this assumption re Bills death
(for thats all it is!) however one of the well recognised
pathophysiological effects of alcohol excess (chronic), is
cirrhosis of the liver,this is where normal hepatic/liver cells die
due to poisoning (eg alcohol) only to be replaced by fibrotic
tissue,that is, collagen,scar tissue.The cirrhotic process in turn
leads to a condition known as 'portal hypertension', the portal
vein which carries all your ingested nutrients from the gut to the
liver becomes congested as a result of forementioned scar tissue
tightening.This congestion results in a back pressure which
usually ,but not always, if unchecked results in a bursting of the
veins associated with the lower part of the oesophagus (gullet)
known as oesophageal varices and presents symptomatically as
haemotemesis (the vomiting of blood).This is one well known cause of
'internal bleeding' along with the fact that the stomach itself
may have become ulcerated and prone to bleeding.Either individually
or together,the effects can be catastrophic and again I don't know
the specific facts re Bill's surgery but given that he also was
treated for congestive heart failure sometime prior to his death
( dilated cardiomyopathy,an enlarged but weakened heart often
associated with alcohol abuse) and that the liver itself
manufactures all the components necessary for effective haemostasis
(blood clotting) and thus, folk with a damaged liver will bleed
longer,I feel that alcohol was a major contributing factor in his
premature and tragic death.
I don't know if he had any genetic/familial predisposition to
thrombophilia (easy bleeding) and if so I stand humbly and
respectfully corrected and I also post my thoughts in defiance to
the wishes of the harp-l owner whom I totally accept as being
correct in his opinion as to refrain from speculation re
deceased ,however I felt compelled to give a view and state that
IMHO chronic alcoholism is in many ways just a slow suicide, as
effective ultimately, as a narcotic overdose (intended or otherwise)
Deepest respect to
Maestros,Clarke,Primach,Delay,Butter,Pastorius,Parker,et al.(The
good often die young)
Sean.
___________________________________________________________
Want ideas for reducing your carbon footprint? Visit Yahoo! For
Good http://uk.promotions.yahoo.com/forgood/environment.html
_______________________________________________
Harp-L is sponsored by SPAH, http://www.spah.org
Harp-L@xxxxxxxxxx
http://harp-l.org/mailman/listinfo/harp-l
This archive was generated by a fusion of
Pipermail 0.09 (Mailman edition) and
MHonArc 2.6.8.