Decidedly Grim

Today’s Dizzy and Confused Yet Truly Morbid Fact!

The speed of exsanguination, as bleeding to death is known, depends on the source of the bleed, says John Kortbeek at the University of Calgary in Alberta, Canada, and chair of Advanced Trauma Life Support for the American College of Surgeons. People can bleed to death in seconds if the aorta, the major blood vessel leading from the heart, is completely severed, for example, after a severe fall or car accident.

Death could creep up much more slowly if a smaller vein or artery is nicked – even taking hours. Such victims would experience several stages of haemorrhagic shock. The average adult has 5 litres of blood. Losses of around 750 millilitres generally cause few symptoms. Anyone losing 1.5 litres – either through an external wound or internal bleeding – feels weak, thirsty and anxious, and would be breathing fast. By 2 litres, people experience dizziness, confusion and then eventual unconsciousness.

“Survivors of haemorrhagic shock describe many different experiences, ranging from fear to relative calm,” Kortbeek says. “In large part this would depend on what and how extensive the associated injuries were. A single penetrating wound to the femoral artery in the leg might be less painful than multiple fractures sustained in a motor vehicle crash.”

Culled from: New Scientist
Generously submitted by: Aeron

When I was a distraught, suicidal teenager … and when I was a distraught, suicidal adult… I used to think that bleeding to death was my raison d’etre! Well, I was a cutter, so I guess it goes with the territory. I thought that there could possibly be no better way to go than leaving a dramatic, vivid swath of red in my wake. Ah, the lost dreams of youth… I have since succumbed to the idea that I’ll probably die of something as unglamorous as sepsis, thrombosis, a heart attack, or (perish the thought!!) in my sleep of “natural causes”. Sigh…

Facts

Okay, there’s finally a light at the end of the tunnel with my latest work project, so I thought I’d write to tell you all about my latest morbid obsession. Has everyone heard about Jade Goody? She’s an infamous 27-year-old U.K. reality television star who was diagnosed with terminal cervical cancer and has been allowing her cancer treatment to be filmed to be broadcast as a series in the U.K. She had a highly-publicized wedding ceremony last weekend where she married her convict boyfriend (also a reality show star), who was allowed to spend the night with her before being placed back on home arrest. The wedding was filmed and will be shown on U.K. television. Goody says that she is selling the rights to the footage on behalf of her two young sons; it will be used to finance their education.

Although she was able to stand during most of the wedding ceremony, in the last week since the wedding, Goody’s condition has continued to deteriorate. She has spent the last couple of nights in a hospice after she was hallucinating terribly on her pain medications. She has been given maybe six weeks to live, but she seems convinced that it may only be a week or two. I check the news every day to see the latest updates… about someone I didn’t even know existed two weeks ago!

You see, like most (all?) of us, I have long found terminal illness – especially when it strikes the young – exceptionally captivating. I can spend hours on My Death Space just perusing all the cancer victims and reading their diary entries. It’s fascinating to watch their tragedy unfold: the early, hopeful posts about how they are determined to “beat this thing,” the valiant battles with sickness caused by chemotherapy and other treatments, the hopefulness giving way to an unbearably sad realization that the treatments are not working and they are going to die, the final goodbyes. Sometimes, there are no final goodbyes: just a void in their communications followed by the words of a loved one telling you that they passed away on a certain day at a certain time. After reading an entry like this, I’m always left with a sense that, as Morrissey once said, “time is a mere scratch” and that I should get off my lazy ass and make something of myself before it’s too late. And then I inevitably go back to sitting on my lazy ass again.

So I will continue to follow the daily updates regarding Jade until her weary heart stops beating. And then I will be sad, but life will go on without her. Not very fair, is it?

Here’s the CNN feature that first introduced me to Jade’s story:

Sundry