Eli5 how come you don’t usually die from regular seizures but the risk of death is way higher when it comes to alcohol and benzo withdrawal seizures? Also what is a seizure?
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There are many different types and causes of seizures, but overall they tend to last a very short amount of time and have little risk of damage on their own. More often people get hurt when they have a seizure while doing something else like driving or walking down stairs. Really long seizures can damage the brain though, especially when someone’s very young and their brain is still developing. People trained with epileptic patients and especially parents of children with epilepsy will usually time a seizure and call 911 or give medicine if it lasts too long.
The risk of death from alcohol and benzo withdrawal is related to the heart, not the brain. Alcohol and benzos reduce electrical activity in your body but over time you get used to it, and create more electrical signals to compensate. When you suddenly stop drinking or taking benzos there’s wayyy too much activity which can cause seizures, but these usually last a very short time like I mentioned before.
Your heart also beats using electrical signals, and these can be affected in the same way except when these signals get interrupted they don’t go back to normal very easily. The way people die from alcohol and benzo withdrawal is called “sudden cardiac death” and it’s due to a disruption in the electrical signals that tell your heart to pump in rhythm. This can stop it completely or make it pump so out of sync that it’s not enough to move blood properly and keep you alive.
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