To wonder how my Aunty Margaret is still alive?

[Marie2023]

My Aunty Margaret has just turned 70. She’s 15 years older than me and all the time I’ve known her she has been an alcoholic. She hasn’t been invited to any family gatherings since the 90s because she always gets drunk, causes a scene and ruins the event. She hasn’t had a job for years but has a partner who looks after her financially.

Aunty Margaret currently drinks a litre bottle of vodka during the day and more drinks when her partner gets home from work. She also smokes around 60 cigarettes a day. She rarely eats and is stick thin.

Recently Margaret wasn’t feeling very well so her partner took her to the doctor. The doctor ordered some tests which came back fine. His summary of the situation was: “Margaret is as fit as a fiddle, although should probably consider drinking and smoking a bit less.”

🤔

I am honestly amazed she’s still alive, let alone “fit as a fiddle”. Why is it that some people can abuse themselves like that for years with no consequences?

I have a similar relative. Chain smoker , Pack of 20 a day, sometimes two packs. A cheap bottle of supermarket whisky each evening. They’ve been poorly with a smoking related lung condition since 1998 and yet they’re still here. They’ve had heart attacks , cancer , they’re almost yellow from the years of heavy smoking, but they’ll still be at the shop this morning getting their daily fags and booze.
I do wonder why they’re still alive , Whilst my dad - fit , healthy , non smoking, only occasional drink, did exercise and a balanced diet died in his early 50s.

Absolutely! My DB and I have this conversation regularly, we are fucked as far as our genes go. Heart disease, congenital heart defects at birth, high cholesterol, chrones disease & bowl cancer are rife in our family. I’ve never smoked a cigarette in my life, hasn’t stopped me developing medical issues that smoking is supposed to cause. DBs been a strict vegetarian for 30+ years tried smoking as a teen but never took to it, he still got my high cholesterol and other heart related medical issues.

Grandad died at 59, other grandad made it into his 60s, 3 uncles from different sides of the family died at 55, one of these uncles had a heart transplant at 45, another uncle just died at 57, this uncle had his first triple bypass by the time he was 30, had another uncle die at 29 with heart disease. Sadly the women aren’t any better.

Yeah there are also more cancer-related deaths in and around port cities (attributable to pollution from commercial shipping). I often wonder that this isn’t a bigger focus of money donated to tackling cancer.

My father in law has had 20 a day most days since he was 14. 60 years later, he's got a bit of cancer but he's alive. He was also the type of drinker that used to fall over/out of things. If he hadn't fallen out of a London cab at the end of a night, it hadn't been a good one. (Pure comedy). He's quite Ill now but my god, that man has lived. He has no teeth and wrinkles and mad professor hair, and swears like a trooper, always with an accompanying opinion. When he departs this mortal earth it'll be sad, but he got to his mid-seventies partying like no tomorrow.

Absolutely! My DB and I have this conversation regularly, we are fucked as far as our genes go. Heart disease, congenital heart defects at birth, high cholesterol, chrones disease & bowl cancer are rife in our family

I agree that's a poor hand, genetic-wise. But these are multi-factorial diseases, and so eating well, eating greens, taking statins for high cholesterol (if you have cholesterolaemia in the family there are specific drugs for this), attend bowel screenings.

Am amazed how many people genuinely don't think there's a correlation between lifestyle factors like smoking and drinking and exercise and living longer. Actually quite worrying.

Well it’s an appealing theory isn’t it and a hotter take than all the obvious stuff about living a healthy lifestyle 🤷🏻

Often the issues arise when the drinking and smoking consumption reduces. Definitely down to genetics.

Women also live more of their life in chronic ill-health than men, and this is exacerbated by poverty. It's not true people party on and then just drop down of a lovely heart attack they don't know anything about. The sights I've seen of older chronically ill people in hospital have convinced me the best thing to do is to keep weight ok, do a tiny bit of exercise and eat ok too. It's absolutely horrific what some people go through. If you are not scared of that, crack on!

And Sunak attacked Khans plan to expand ULEZ !

What is he thinking !

I remember hanging around the waiting area of the cardiac ward in the late 80s, waiting for my turn to see my dad. The leaflets were full of stories about people smoking 60, 80, 100 a day. Admittedly far cheaper then, and easier to do when smoking was still accepted in most public and workplaces.

My dad stopped the smoking, but his heart got him a few years later, aggravated by stress, drinking, lack of fitness and an increased sweet tooth from stopping smoking.

I'd rather not be cut off in my early 50s and my maternal line seems to have decent genes, so I'd rather work with the odds and live as well as I can for as long as I can. I'm in my 40s and losing grandparents in their 80s-90s. Late old age isn't looking terribly fun right now, but if I'm going to spend the last few years of my life in poor health anyway, I'd rather get more active, healthy years in first before the inevitable catches up. If I'm really unlucky and something gets me prematurely, at least I lowered the odds and lived well anyway. I don't want to spend my 40s/50s/60s in a clapped out body if I can help it, and being an Aunty Margaret doesn't appeal anyway.

I can't compute getting up at 6am, full stop.

I don't know, OP. I have been having the same thoughts this week. I have been raging with anger that my lovely, lovely friend will die soon from cancer. He has never put a foot wrong in his life health wise, always eaten healthily and done loads of exercise. On top of that, he's an absolutely dream of a person, very interesting and interested in others, curious, accomplished, kind and a loving partner and a wonderful friend. His body has betrayed him, and I am so, so angry. Why people who both abuse themselves and contribute nothing positive to anyone else around them get to live long lives is beyond me.

Yes, but rich people in the countryside also have all of these. Do they live longer than rich people in cities? (Obviously they have different issues like distance to doctor and hospital).

@MoirasSaggyBundles I am so sorry. My husband died young of cancer, so I know how random the universe can be, your friend sounds wonderful. All I would say is that seeing my husband die young of a rare cancer makes me want to live a nicer healthier life if I am going to live! I don't want to go of a horrid avoidable disease in my 50s or 60's or even 70s.

Well, it isn't agood thing.
Giving antibiotics for every infection to someone with dementia is something we need to stop doing.
I was a carer for a lady who needed three people to wash and dress her/ turn her/ get her out of bed, because she fought and screamed throughout the process, calling for help etc. It was awful.

The person in charge of her care still insisted on her having antibiotics when she had chest infections.
This was despite a DNR.
The DNR failed to mention treatment for infections, though. But the lady had no quality of life whatsoever.

@Highdaysandholidays1 I am so sorry that your husband died young. 💐

My friend's wife is equally as wonderful as my friend, and I am heartbroken for her. But she's like you, determined that her life will go on, and that she will make it a good one. X

It happens I had a great Aunt smoked cigarettes constantly for years. She died aged 90 from something else, lungs clear according to GP. I know others who have COPD in their 40s. Luck and genetics.

A lot of it is down to lack of stress. From my own research into longevity, the longest living people tend to have very good family and community support. From my experience, no stress reduction techniques come close to having the security of knowing there are people close by.

I remember hearing an American o the radio who had been smoking over 100 cigarettes each day. People questioned the mathematics and he explained that he had techniques for smoking while eating, driving and even in the shower - apparently, his wife moaned when he first smoked during sex, but ultimately accommodated his nicotine fix.
My 100 year-old uncle has perfect blood pressure despite drinking half a dozen cans of Special Brew to get to sleep when 40 years of shift-work wrecked his body clock.

She's not a chain smoker or an alcoholic but I have a perfectly fabulous Aunty Margaret and I did a bit of a double take at your title

My grandparents were both chain smokers and died in their 60s so... 🤷🏼‍♀️

My family seem to be just the opposite, particularly the males.
They're all either dead or in very poor health by the age of 70 despite them all being non-smokers and virtually teetotal and having reasonably active lifestyles and manual jobs.

A relative of my husbands drinks 3 beers and 2 full glasses of whiskey after work every single day. On Friday and Saturday night he drinks a full bottle each night. Up until 70 he was ‘fit as a fiddle’, still working full time. Then he suddenly collapsed one day, and at 72 has a mass growing on his liver. They’re not sure how long he has left.

Ian grew with most people saying genetics and luck, but maybe it just hasn't hit her yet.
Maybe a slow decline isn't something Auntie Margaret will be subjected to but maybe it will hit her reasonably fast one day, just not yet.
She might not be a a slow burner having her organs shut down gradually or having hardly any symptoms.
Hopefully this will not happen to her, but people can be riddled with cancer/disease and not know until later/at all.
Having said that, I can't imagine feeling chipper and fresh with that cocktail.
Imagine how dehydrated she must feel!
I think I'd feel like an unwashed pub carpet after all that.

*I can agree

For the same reason that some healthy people drop dead at 30. Statistics is an average, there are always outliers at either end