Why you should NOT drink…OMG!!!
80% of all adults drink alcohol.
Low to moderate consumption of alcohol defined as 7-14 per drinks per week or 2 drinks per day. Study of 35K people in UK. Evidence of loss of neurons in brain!
Alcohol can pass directly into EVERY cell. It is both water and fat soluble. This is the main reason for its widespread damaging effects in your body.
Alcohol breaks down in the liver to a poison called acetyl aldehyde and to a fuel source called acetate.
1st effect. Prefrontal cortex. Decrease in top down inhibition. Impulsive behavior increases and good judgment decreases. Suppresses memory formation.
2nd effect. Negative effects carry over even after you stop drinking. Leads to chronic behavioral changes. Neural circuits change. Impulsive behavior, judgement issues and memory suppression continue even when NOT drinking.
Chronic alcohol intake effects your mood, feelings of well being and self image. There is a temporary increase in hormones such as serotonin and melatonin with drinking. The “feel good” response…but then this wears off. There is a resulting rebound effect with chronic use in that, when neural circuits of mood are changed with alcohol, there is a rebound decrease in serotonin, dopamine and therefore melatonin when NOT drinking. As a result, this can lead to depression and sleep disorders.
Chronic drinkers have a disruption of the pituitary-adrenal circuitry. The pituitary gland sends signals to the adrenal glands to produce adrenaline, epinephrine, or cortisol. As a result of this disruption, there is a resulting increase in cortisol at baseline when NOT drinking. This increase in cortisol makes you feel MORE stressed and diminishes your mood and feelings of well being. Chronic alcohol use causes a long-term plastic alteration in neural circuitry.
Alcohol disrupts the gut-liver-brain axis and has a negative effect on the gut biome. Your liver breaks down the alcohol to a “poison” which stimulates the release of reactive inflammatory chemicals. This process can temporarily cause leaky gut syndrome.
Chronic alcohol use can fundamentally change the architecture of your sleep. You get something called Pseudosleep. Waking up a lot. No deep REM sleep. Quality AND quantity of sleep disrupted.
So what do you think of all that?
Maybe it’s time to make a few changes…
Listen to the Huberman Lab podcast for more information.