Alcohol Withdrawal Symptoms

Many people who stop drinking experience a variety of alcohol withdrawal symptoms if they suddenly totally bring to a halt the use of alcohol following prolonged or chronic ingestion. Granted, not everyone goes through having those symptoms, but many do.

Having to go through single or many alcohol withdrawal symptoms is the reason why you should at the very least inform your physician of your desire to stop suddenly commonly referred to as “going cold-turkey” here in the United States.

There are psychological and there are physical alcohol withdrawal symptoms. The milder psychological symptoms encountered may comprise of having bad dreams, and difficulty in thinking clearly. The person may have depression and fatigue, and sometimes elicit hasty emotional changes that can only be described as volatile at times. They also will feel irritable and have a feeling of shakiness, nervousness and jumpiness.

The milder physical alcohol withdrawal symptoms may include eye tics, hand tremors, headaches, sweating, insomnia, heart palpitations, clammy skin, nausea, paleness, vomiting, dilated pupils and finally loss of appetite.

There are, of course, more severe physical and mental withdrawal symptoms, some of which will require hospitalization depending on the severity of those symptoms, and unfortunately it can lead to fatal results. Some will go through what is called “delirium tremens,” which is what results when alcohol abuse has been extreme and particularly long-term.

One of the hallmarks of delirium tremens is the possible intense hallucinations the subject may go through. Visions of rats, snakes or insects are common in this list of alcohol withdrawal symptoms, and at times the hallucinations may comprise of seeing things crawling on them complete with tactical hallucinations that may be horrible enough to cause panic attacks that then result in heart attacks.

Due to the severity of many alcohol withdrawal symptoms as described above, more often than not the person will be heavily sedated and perhaps even the possibility of severe hallucinations will be curtailed by putting the patient in a well lit very plain room, devoid of anything that could be misinterpreted by the brain as things crawling on the wall when all that’s really there is a pattern in the wallpaper. Unfortunately also, the patient may suffer from seizures during the detoxification process.

A drug called benzodiazepine is often very helpful when severe alcohol withdrawal symptoms occur. It is a sedative, and muscle relaxant that causes sleep inducement, and is also an anti-anxiety drug. It is also thought to minimize the possibility of seizures and various convulsions that are sometimes associated with alcohol withdrawal.

This drug, however, can only be prescribed for a very limited amount of time, because many develop either a tolerance or even dependence to the medication itself. Thankfully, though it can be useful to reduce the “emergency” alcohol withdrawal symptoms that can arise during detoxification.

Also, check out my other guide on heroin withdrawal and what is alcoholism

Alcohol Withdrawal Symptoms

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