"Long term alcoholics, talking decades+ <...> become incredibly tolerant and can consume huge amounts in ways that would make a normal person wretch."
That I can attest to. Only two weeks ago a longtime friend of mine died of cirrhosis of the liver and it was doubly horrible as it was very difficult to visit him in hospital due to COVID restrictions (although he wasn't infected as such).
The amount of alcohol he could put away horrified me. I'd often see him at functions and if I poured him a drink and I didn't fill his glass to the brim then he'd get irritated. The amount of alcohol he could consume and still remain coherent staggered me (if I'd consumed the same amount in a single sitting as he was able to then I'd be fully out to it under the table).
Sad really, he was trained as an organic chemist and he knew full well that his liver was being destroyed as it struggled in its first-pass attempt to eliminate the alcohol (that being the partial oxidation of ethanol into poisonous acetaldehyde).
That I can attest to. Only two weeks ago a longtime friend of mine died of cirrhosis of the liver and it was doubly horrible as it was very difficult to visit him in hospital due to COVID restrictions (although he wasn't infected as such).
The amount of alcohol he could put away horrified me. I'd often see him at functions and if I poured him a drink and I didn't fill his glass to the brim then he'd get irritated. The amount of alcohol he could consume and still remain coherent staggered me (if I'd consumed the same amount in a single sitting as he was able to then I'd be fully out to it under the table).
Sad really, he was trained as an organic chemist and he knew full well that his liver was being destroyed as it struggled in its first-pass attempt to eliminate the alcohol (that being the partial oxidation of ethanol into poisonous acetaldehyde).