This isn't a caregiving issue because I'm not this person's caregiver, but it's been mystifying and upsetting me for the past two days and since I don't have a blog and don't want to derail someone else's blog, I'm posting it here.
Yesterday, I saw a news item about a mail carrier in my area who'd been charged with DWI. She was in her mail truck, was seen almost hitting another car, then slammed into a stop sign.
Her blood-alcohol content was just under .30 -- that's more than 3 1/2 times the legal limit. It's pretty much "she should be taken to a hospital" level. According to google, .30 can put you in a coma, and .40 can kill you.
It was 11 a.m.
The woman was my childhood best friend.
Same name, including middle name, same date of birth. She lives near where we grew up. A couple of TV stations had the police mug shots. She didn't look good, but it was definitely her. Very haggard, angry. But then, who looks good in a mug shot when they're super drunk and just had a car crash.
It is so weird I can hardly get my mind around it. We were best friends as little kids, then again in junior high. Her family lived next to mine, so I knew the whole family pretty well, including her 5 sisters. Then they moved to a different town. We reconnected in college, lost touch again, then reconnected about 18-19 years ago when we discovered we were living in the same part of town and had sons the same age. She was married, working as a flight attendant, had the one son. She was always extremely responsible, hardworking, frugal, etc. She drank, but just a normal amount.
After we'd hung out on and off for a year or so, she mysteriously stopped speaking to me. No explanation. She moved from our neighborhood to a suburb about 10 miles away without even mentioning she was moving. I haven't seen her since.
The few people I've talked about this with seem to assume her worst problem is the DWI. It's not. She will have a record, may go to jail for a few days, will lose her license for a while, etc. She'll lose her PO job, and losing a job at 59 is a problem.
But if you're drinking heavily enough to have a .30 BAC at 11 a.m. -- you've got a serious, serious problem. Like a potentially fatal problem.
One of the news stories quoted an anonymous friend saying she'd had some hard times lately. But what?? What could have caused her life to go so wrong?