Alcohol induced Blackout & consciousness

Alcohol induced Blackout & consciousness

Author
Discussion

otolith

56,078 posts

204 months

Friday 17th January 2020
quotequote all
My experience of anaesthesia and amnesia is having sedation for a camera up the bum. I remember the drugs going in. I remember waking up back in my room. I have no recollection of anything else, although I was told that I started to complain during the procedure and was given more sedation.

My wife had her wisdom teeth out with sedation. She was quite distressed when she came out, the procedure was pretty unpleasant. Within about ten minutes, she couldn't remember any of it. I've often wondered whether we are truly insensible during surgery with general anaesthetic, or merely don't remember it - and whether that would matter.

Roofless Toothless said:
Going back to the point of the thread, ever since I have been interested in the nature of knowledge and consciousness, philosophically speaking. I have been much affected by the thoughts of Spinoza and Kant about the nature of reality and what it is actually possible to know. I do not believe in any religious sense about the afterlife, but I sneakily suspect there is something going on with the mind that is not explainable in any purely physical terms.
I think for me the profound effects of psychotropic drugs point to the physicality of mind - I don't believe there is anything else there.


AshVX220

5,929 posts

190 months

Friday 17th January 2020
quotequote all
thatsprettyshady said:
Whilst we're on monkeys:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pSm7BcQHWXk

I wonder if these ones have problems with short term memory hehe
biglaughbiglaughbiglaughbiglaugh

AshVX220

5,929 posts

190 months

Friday 17th January 2020
quotequote all
With the stories of medical procedures etc I have a couple.
I had an Op in 2009, don't know how long it lasted (only a couple of hours tops), it was under general and like others I have no recollection of it at all. Went in, given drugs start counting and have no idea how far I got before I next remeber waking up afterwards.

Next one was a tooth extraction under sedation (I think), again, I have no recollection of anything at all until I remember my wife and a nurse helping me into the car to go home. However, apparently under sedation you can talk to them etc and maybe even hold a coversation. When I was told this can happen I apologised in case I said anything in-appropriate! biglaugh

Although it makes me quesiton things like this I find it remarkable that from a self perspective both experiences were the same, but as an outsider both remarkably different.

Also, thiking about it further, I imagine sedation could be used for some form of interrogation technique, although maybe even under sedation we're still aware enough to actually know what we're talking about and what we're saying, even though we have no recollection of it.

otolith

56,078 posts

204 months

Friday 17th January 2020
quotequote all
AshVX220 said:
Also, thiking about it further, I imagine sedation could be used for some form of interrogation technique, although maybe even under sedation we're still aware enough to actually know what we're talking about and what we're saying, even though we have no recollection of it.
Most certainly has been done;

https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-o...

Kawasicki

13,079 posts

235 months

Saturday 18th January 2020
quotequote all
I‘ve never been under general anaesthetic. I hope I never need to. Local anaesthetic and even pain killers seem to have disturbingly little effect on me. I may as well eat a smartie as take a painkiller.

I‘ve had days that I have spent drinking a lot of alcohol with friends. After a few hours they all start to slur their speech and become unsteady on their feet. I‘m drunk too.. but it’s a different kind of drunk. People ask me if am I on driving duty. Once I drank a hell of a lot, the main effect I noticed was that I could no longer control my vision smoothly.

I go to bed bombed, and can’t fall asleep. The next day I‘m still drunk but I can remember everything about the day, at least as much as if I had been sober. My hangovers are brutal and last at least 2 days.

So alcohol isn’t consistent in it’s effects. Probably like anaesthetic.

The Wookie

13,946 posts

228 months

Saturday 18th January 2020
quotequote all
The strangest one for me was getting knocked out briefly in an Evora GT4 several years ago

I got turned around at the front of the pack on the first corner of a Euro GT4 Race at Assen. The entire field missed me except the last place car who hit me full tilt up the back when I was virtually stationary

I felt the hit, banged my head against the bulkhead and was a bit dizzy, but soon got straight again and started to try and restart the engine. Then it dawned on me that there was a Marshal banging on the window telling me to stop (mainly because the car clearly wasn’t going anywhere!)

I got out of the car and realised that the Marshals post was bloody miles away, probably getting on for 100 meters.

So basically I just ‘lost’ the amount of time it took for a podgy Dutch marshal to run 100 meters, and I wasn’t even aware I’d been knocked out!

ETA for anyone that’s interested, here’s the footage

https://youtu.be/MRi1o5usBCk


Edited by The Wookie on Saturday 18th January 09:49

Kawasicki

13,079 posts

235 months

Saturday 18th January 2020
quotequote all
Wow...that hit didn’t seem that hard. Obviously you were wearing a helmet too. Hitting reset on the brain can be a lot easier than you think.

The Wookie

13,946 posts

228 months

Saturday 18th January 2020
quotequote all
Kawasicki said:
Wow...that hit didn’t seem that hard. Obviously you were wearing a helmet too. Hitting reset on the brain can be a lot easier than you think.
Yeah it was very strange. Had much bigger shunts than that in the past (MUCH bigger) but never been knocked out.

That said was a pretty savage impact from inside the car, I remember that much, and it did a massive amount of damage, it split the bellhousing if I remember rightly

In fact, I have a photo of it being repaired...


Kawasicki

13,079 posts

235 months

Sunday 19th January 2020
quotequote all
Probably a very high peak loading. I got kicked under the chin once in a martial arts contest. Not hard, but down I went! I regained consciousness thinking how nice and comfy the floor was and I remember looking at the guy who just knocked me out celebrating with his friends.

hotchy

4,469 posts

126 months

Sunday 19th January 2020
quotequote all
Kawasicki said:
I‘ve never been under general anaesthetic. I hope I never need to. Local anaesthetic and even pain killers seem to have disturbingly little effect on me. I may as well eat a smartie as take a painkiller.

I‘ve had days that I have spent drinking a lot of alcohol with friends. After a few hours they all start to slur their speech and become unsteady on their feet. I‘m drunk too.. but it’s a different kind of drunk. People ask me if am I on driving duty. Once I drank a hell of a lot, the main effect I noticed was that I could no longer control my vision smoothly.

I go to bed bombed, and can’t fall asleep. The next day I‘m still drunk but I can remember everything about the day, at least as much as if I had been sober. My hangovers are brutal and last at least 2 days.

So alcohol isn’t consistent in it’s effects. Probably like anaesthetic.
At the vision blurred stage that's when you hit a tray of shots. The next stage is the blackout stage. I have faith you'll get their next time.

Kawasicki

13,079 posts

235 months

Sunday 19th January 2020
quotequote all
hotchy said:
At the vision blurred stage that's when you hit a tray of shots. The next stage is the blackout stage. I have faith you'll get their next time.
I‘m in my mid 40‘s. Last time I drank a lot was 2 years ago. The hangover was so bad I just wanted time to pass, that‘s all I could focus on. Just nasty... Never again. I don’t hate myself and I have no suicidal tendencies.

Derek Smith

45,648 posts

248 months

Thursday 23rd January 2020
quotequote all
Roofless Toothless said:
Wow, Derek! That was quite an adventure.

At least my operation all went to plan, even if it was long. I had a cancer in my lower jaw under my back teeth, and they chopped out a whole section of jaw (plus lymph glands from my neck) and built me a new face using my shinbone and a pound of flesh attached thereto.

They invited me to meet the surgical team before the operation, and when I walked into the room I was surprised to see more than a dozen of them there. It was explained that there was a team for my leg and a team for my face, comprising two shifts for each team. Until this point I had been thinking along the lines of, "it's a bit of a big operation this, it could take two or three hours." Then I was told it was an estimated 12 to 14 hours!

It was only at this point it dawned on me exactly what I was in for. Like a fool I just said, "well, I hope you've all brought sandwiches." Where that came from I don't know because I was starting to brick it, and I genuinely was grateful I was sitting down.

Intensive care lasted a week, as they had to monitor a lot of joined up blood vessels to make sure the plumbing was working alright. Plus I had tubes going up my nose for food, and the same at the other end. Together with drains, drips and so on there were tubes everywhere. I couldn't think too straight on waking, and no exaggeration, I spent most of the first two days trying to count how many, but I always lost count at about ten and had to start again! Still, it was something to do.

Now you know where part of my user name comes from!

Going back to the point of the thread, ever since I have been interested in the nature of knowledge and consciousness, philosophically speaking. I have been much affected by the thoughts of Spinoza and Kant about the nature of reality and what it is actually possible to know. I do not believe in any religious sense about the afterlife, but I sneakily suspect there is something going on with the mind that is not explainable in any purely physical terms.
I've just seen this, RT. Sorry for not replying sooner. I've been a bit busy.

That's one, or rather two I suppose, hell of an operation. Glad it was successful. As for there being more, I hope there is, but I too don't believe in any religion.

All the best.

Derek Smith

45,648 posts

248 months

Thursday 23rd January 2020
quotequote all
Back on subject; I am tee-total. I was the permanent designated driver. I’ve sat in corners while others have got drunk and, in theory at least, enjoyed themselves.

One thing which I’ve noticed is that in post-event discussions, some people will remember doing things they did not do; in particular, something that someone else did. Other times they would not remember the ‘outstanding’ event of their evening, let alone the more insignificant incidents.

I’ve been asked why I didn’t run them home, when I did. I had one bloke vomit into his glove locker – I used his car as it was bigger than mine, and there were five people to run home. He didn’t remember doing so and so, two days later, when his wife was driving the car and he was in the passenger seat, he investigated a strange smell and discovered that the heater pipe ran behind the glove locker.

He had a go at me for not telling him, yet he was, of course, there.

‘I can remember everything,’ was always, but always, wrong.

Two things about being tee-total. I have a reputation at darts. They generally say I start slowly but once I get going, I’m unbeatable. That’s because later in the evening I see just the one board.

The other thing is that, by about midnight, when all the blokes are falling over, many girls are more or less sober. When I was a kid, I met some girlfriends that way.