However, the student at the University of Nevada-Reno survived and is writing about her experience to warn others not to make the same mistake.
“I had a tube down my throat and my hands were restrained so I couldn’t pull it out,” she writes on her blog. “I was unable to talk with the tube down my throat, making it hard to tell my parents and the nurses that it was extremely uncomfortable. I had to pass a respiratory test to prove I could breathe on my own before they removed it. I failed the first respiratory test I took, and I had to wait several hours to take another test. When I passed the second test and the tube was taken out, the doctors and nurses told me how lucky I was to be alive. They told me that they didn’t think I would make it through the night. They asked me if I was trying to kill myself by drinking so much.”
The blog has now been read at least 350,000 and republished at several outlets, including The Huffington Post. She talks about how six people die every year from alcohol poisoning and how many others’ lives changed forever.
“This situation could have been so much worse,” she writes. “I could have easily been taken advantage of when I passed out. I could’ve been left alone to ‘sleep it off.’ I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard the phrase, ‘Let them sleep it off, they’ll be fine in the morning,’ but I’m alive today because my friends got me help.” (Hanna Lottritz, USA Today)