A Man Inhaled Paint Thinner And It Ruined His Life

All references below. Inhalant misuse is well-documented to cause permanent damage to the body. The neurological damage can be acute, and continued misuse will progress to multi-organ damage. Sudden cardiac death is also known to happen with this misuse, along with a variety of additional problems.

More music inspired by R Prince

Some images by Getty Images

These cases are patients who I, or my colleagues have seen. They are de-identified and many instances have been presented in more depth in an academic setting. These videos are not individual medical advice and are for general educational purposes only. I do not give medical advice over the internet.

References:

Syndromes of toluene sniffing in adults. Ann Intern Med. 1981;94:758-762.

Laboratory approach for diagnosis of toluene-based inhalant abuse in a clinical setting.

Inhalant Misuse in children and adolescents. UpToDate. Accessed 28 Mar 2023.

Goldfrank’s Toxicologic Emergencies. 11th ed.

[pulsarpilot]

A friend of mine tried to get me to huff paint. I kind of distanced myself from him. A few months later I found he was living in a state hospital with no hope of recovery. He was 14 years old.

[pterodactylpilot]

Liver: I filter waste for you!
Heart: I pump blood for you!
Lungs: I breathe air for you!
Brain: Let's huff paint thinner

[Linda-jllx]

I used to be a painter. I actually had to argue with other coworkers why I needed safety gear while working with certain types of paint. People can be quite ignorant when it comes to safety

[MrKnight]

I've smelled paint thinner.
it's insane to think someone didn't hate the smell enough to not use it a drug.

[SOSPainting]

I was a painter for 17 years. I sprayed often and never wore protective equipment. I began to feel weak after working out. Then I noticed I could only work 4 hours before I just couldnt work anymore. Eventually, I ended up sick and often bed-ridden for months! I couldnt shower or cook or exert my body without it completely shutting down afterwards. Even mental strain resulted in my being unable to get up. I totally prepared to die.

I am not entirely sure what happened because the doctors could not find the issue but I believe the consistent inhalation of paint fumes (including industrial coatings) damaged my liver.

I cleansed the crap out of my body and i seem to have recovered. I dont feel 100% but I am currently able to work again.

Putting anything into the lungs that wasnt meant to be there is dangerous.

[rangerismine]

I worked in a military industrial paint shop briefly. The head painter had been there for almost 40yrs. He could hardly breathe, barely made sense when he spoke, had no teeth, and had the mentality of a child. He also never wore PPE when spraying or handling chemicals. He was my motivation for finishing school and getting a better job away from chemicals.

[joedressler]

I really like this guy. I have been a ER doc for over 30 years and I am also a Forensic Pathologist (not currently practicing Pathology). There are no You Tubers that deliver Medical scenarios in such a comprehensive and rapid manner. I learn something new I can actually use in my practice each time I watch an episode. Bernard, keep up the good work.

[johnl]

I had a friend who sprayed xylene at a car part factory. One day he told a story about being at work spraying, and according to other people, he turned to them and asked "can you hear that?" "Hear what?" "It sounds like chimes, like angels singing." They ended up having to drag him out of the booth into fresh air. I think he quit that job not long after that.

[josephpacchetti]

Years ago I was a painter for an industrial company and the United States Government, On a weapons system {Anti-Tank Missiles} This was all spray paint and some of it was quite toxic, however, I demanded that they supply me with the proper respirator and filters for the type of paint I was applying, the filter cartridges, two per respirator, were $9.00 each, and the life of each, when exposed to air was 20 hours, regardless of whether you were breathing through them or they were hanging on the wall, which is what the previous painter did, but when I took mine off for lunch or breaks and before going home, I keep them in an airtight bag, they didn't like having to spend that much every 20 hours, but I told them to buy them or find another painter, they continued to buy them, Thank You Dr, Bernard.

[MannyBrum]

It doesn't surprise me how much damage things like this do to the body, but what is surprising is how much the body can take and still survive. In these videos people do stuff many orders of magnitude worse than what you'd think the lethal amount would be and many of them survive.

[midnightmosesuk]

When I was in my late teens a friend of mine used to sniff glue regularly. My friends and I would tell him it'd kill him one day, we'd hear about all sorts of stories about glue heads dying on the stuff, but he didn't listen. I suppose he couldn't stop. He was found dead behind a supermarket just off of Peckham High Street, he'd choked on his own vomit. I suppose he'd fallen unconcious, vomited and breathed it in somehow. He was a lovely bloke, but a demon for the glue. A pitifully sad way to die. It absolutely destroyed his mum.

[maddiejoy]

I needed to hear this. I'm pregnant and my weirdest pregnancy symptom is an INTENSE craving for the scent of things like gasoline, rubber cement, spray paint (which has paint thinner in it), car exhaust, and certain markers. It's so hard not to give in to the craving, but the knowledge of just how dangerous it would be for my baby and me makes it a little easier. I'm going to give birth in 3 weeks and this craving going away is one of the biggest things I'm looking forward to. It went away after my first pregnancy, so I'm guessing it will this time too.

[garylewellen]

I've been battling drug addiction for 30 years. Now nearing 3 years sober. I have learned so much from your videos. Great work!

[ajr]

This is actually a pretty good warning about VOCs in general (Volatile Organic Chenicals). Everything from the new car smell, to paint chemicals, to household cleaners, to cooking at high temperatures, and even furniture can cause significant long term damage over time. It's not as acute as this case but you can easily imagine how 30 years of inhaling low doses of chemicals like this can cause organ damage and cancer. I strongly encourage everyone to get a VOC monitor and implement VOC mitigation to avoid these substantial health hazards that people carelessly underestimate.

[joeb]

My father owned a metal plating shop that I worked in and we used trichloroethylene as a degreaser. It worked amazing in that regard, but my dad had a guy that was unbeknownst to him, taking cups of it home and huffing it. He did this for about 2 weeks and one day he didn’t show up to work. They did a wellness check on him and found him dead in his apartment. Apparently, the trichlor literally dried up his lungs and killed him. Don’t huff anything but air, seriously.

[joshuaday]

As a teenager, some of my friends would buy cans of Scotchgard, the stuff used to waterproof fabric and such. They would put it in a bag and inhale it and just be gone to some other dimension for short periods. Well the natural curiosity and wanting to see what all the Hubbub was about, I tried it a couple times. I found it to be pretty horrific, the buzz wasn't worth the side effects to me. The final straw was watching one friend inhale nothing but these fumes untill he passed out, starting having seizures, put his head through the drywall on the way to the floor. Just as I picked up the phone to call 911, he started to come out of it. I helped him sit up and he couldn't speak English, imagine the worst drunk you've ever talked to eith a massive head injury! Nothing was coherent, one massive vowel movement, almost like he was vomiting his own words. Even in this condition, he was desperately pawing at the bag and trying to get more.i obviously didn't allow it and he was filled with this animalistic rage! I didn't do it ever again. We had another friend who would sit in his shed for hours huffing gasoline. He would be in absolute cartoon land when he came out talking what we could understand about living as a cartoon character. It really really affected him. Not to be, harsh, but he was already a bit slow. This ruined him, he couldn't get past 8th grade, tried 3 times. He became a horrible horrible Alcoholic. While on work release from jail, he gets so drunk while driving back to the jail, he loses control of his car and died. Leaving 3 beautiful little girls without a father, a devasted family, and his daughters mother had never gotten over it almost 20 years later.

[Itsssss_eli]

“EA, is a 15 year old boy, presenting to the emergency room☝️ with happiness. He had just consumed 10 chubby emu videos in just one week”

[darrenstone]

A recovering solvent abuser here. Its hard to believe that just 6 months ago I was doing the very same thing. I was regularly inhaling thinner 5-10 times a day. I was left with visual problems in both my eyes.
I just want everyone to know that this isn't jut some teen fad but is a serious addiction just like all other addictions. For whoever is struggling with addiction please know that you can get through this just like so many of us did.
Stay clean guys❤

[danibissonnette]

I love the chemistry lessons you do with these. They make the chemical reaction process make so much more sense when there is a tangible, relatable issue to tether the theoretical math to.

[damienwit]

I knew this guy who worked in an industrial paint factory for 10 years. He never wore any kind of protection to stop the fumes from getting in and the damage was clear. He often spoke incoherently and stumbled around because his muscles were weak. Don't put anything in your lungs that shouldn't be there.