Brokeback Mountain: Our Community's Common Bond > Heath Ledger Remembrance Forum

Heath Ledger's Accidental Overdose - Discussion Thread (Was: Breaking News)

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delalluvia:
I'm pretty much on board with Verona and Snavel's and others' similar theories as to how poor Heath likely medicated himself to death.  It's pretty understandable and very reasonable and actually quite normal behavior for many people.  His family has said - and we don't have the reports of how much of each was actually in Heath's system - that the amounts of each pill were very little. 

I can't tell you how many people I know who take one over the counter med then a few minutes later feeling like it's not working - try another without letting the other med get out of their system first.  My sister-in-law routinely mixes alcohol and sedatives to relax on airplane flights when all the warnings on the meds tell you and tell you not to do something like that.

I can easily see Heath, being a young strong man thinking the same, it's prescribed, or it's OTC so it's OK.  He's frustrated at 4am with no sleep, so he takes another pill, later, gets up, feels his allergies coming on, so he takes an antihistimine, later, decides to take a nap, pops another pill, later still, maybe, gets so groggy he can't recall when he took what or how much and takes another...

Rumor has it Marilyn Monroe OD'd this way, she was too loopy to remember the pills she had already taken.

This could have easily happened to Heath.

However, as others have said, I'm not sure who would prescribe such strong painkillers as a sleep aid, when there are so many actual medicines for insomnia that work.  Had Heath been injured previously?  Maybe those were just leftovers from an earlier medical treatment and he recalled that they would knock you out, so he tried them.  No report has mentioned how old all these prescriptions were.

I assume we'll get more info on this as time goes on, maybe?

delalluvia:

From http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080207/ap_en_ce/heath_ledger

"...Kuhn said some of the drugs are long-lasting and Ledger could have taken them over a period of several days. The medical examiner's office wouldn't say what concentrations of each drug were found in Ledger's blood.

"What you're looking at here is the cumulative effects of these medications together," said the spokeswoman, Ellen Borakove.'

nakymaton:

--- Quote from: moremojo on February 06, 2008, 07:29:35 pm ---"There was some open space between what he knew and what he wanted to believe, but there was nothing to be done about it, and if you can't fix it, you've got to stand it."

God bless you, Heath.

--- End quote ---

Amen.  :'( :( :'(

Verona:
Experts said the combination of sedatives and the other medicines likely combined to suppress his brain function and his breathing.

That's what I figured. Your brain needs to tell your lungs to breathe... if you're numbing out those signals, and your respiratory system is also being suppressed...

 :-\

underdown:
Australian ABC documentary ... study by a Sydney micro-cardiology research unit.

Just a thought, but there is a lot of assumption in the report that meds were the cause of Heath's death.
Are we jumping to a conclusion that is unfair to Heath?  Maybe the meds aggravated an underlying condition that was a time bomb, as the below report is about ?

It seems just too easy to follow the hype and think that Heath, who was bright enough to have achieved so much, would not have been careful. If he had been taking these meds for a while, wouldn't there be a good chance there were some earlier signs, and that he would ask his doctor about them when getting scrips ? We shouldn't for a moment think that he would be foolhardy, as some reports try to imply.  Anything to involve drugs and make the story sensational at Heath's expense ?
There seems to be a lot of such sensationalism. Great press fodder, but not necessarily true.

The following Australian ABC documentary, aired last night, is very interesting. It concerns a current study by a Sydney micro-cardiology research team of why so many seemingly healthy young Australian men (generally under 35) suffer various kinds of fatal heart attacks. The study has shown that they are surprisingly common, largely unexplained by autopsy, have been traced to certain inherited heart genes and are often seemingly brought on, or aggravated, by physical activity or stress. It has been called Sudden Unexplained Death Syndrom, similar to SIDS in babies, which has been shown to involve heart genes. (Incidentally, one of the young men mentioned in the report was named Heath ... that was a bit scary).

http://www.abc.net.au/7.30/content/2007/s2156082.htm
 

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