Alcohol vs food calories

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healthylady88
healthylady88 Posts: 81 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
A few times a week I plan on having wine and I always work it into my calories by planning ahead. I am noticing though that even though it is within my daily allowance I notice i don't lose as much as when I eat food calories. I am to the point where I may just give it up completely. Is it worth it? What am I doing wrong? I have been losing very slowly and it's frustrating. Does alcohol metabolize differently than food? Any advice would be appreciated :sad: :drinker:

Replies

  • bradphil87
    bradphil87 Posts: 617 Member
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    Alcohol is seen as a toxin by the body, so for the time it is in your body everything else gets put on the back burner while your liver trys to get rid of the poison. It harms fat loss to a good extent....
  • Game8
    Game8 Posts: 442
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    Most studies show that more than one drink a day will put your weight loss goals in jeopardy. Alcohol IS metabolized differently than other foods. It doesn't get digested like carbs, fats and protein.

    To your body, alcohol is a toxin and it treats it as such. When you have food in your system and you add to that alcohol, your body forgets about digesting the food and it turns its full attention to alcohol in order to process it and get rid of the toxins out of your system.

    Thus, any food you have consumed is not digested properly and is instead stored into fat. This is only one way in which alcohol disrupts your normal diet. It has many other negative effects on the body (including dehydration, restlessness, inflammation, and screwing up your hunger hormones)
  • shelbyfrootcake
    shelbyfrootcake Posts: 965 Member
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    http://www.leangains.com/2010/07/truth-about-alcohol-fat-loss-and-muscle.html
  • EdTheGinge
    EdTheGinge Posts: 1,616 Member
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    I've found in the past that if I continue to drink whilst trying to lose weight it doesn't fall off quite so quick but more importantly I didn't notice the weightloss so much. However, when I cut out drinking altogether I physically notice the loss more as I'm no longer being filled with empty calories and bloated.

    My advice would be to try going a month without alcohol and see if you notice anything, just an idea.

    Good luck
  • DopeItUp
    DopeItUp Posts: 18,771 Member
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    How many calories a day are you allocating to your wine? I've found that with weight loss and alcohol your diet (outside of the alcohol) has to be great. You're already eating at a deficit - depriving your body of nutrients. Then you're cutting that even more by filling in with empty calories (alcohol). This means that the remainder of the diet has to be nutritious and spot-on or you're going to be hungry and tired and weak all of the time.

    Myself, I allocate roughly 20% of my calories to beer (roughly 500 a day) and the other 80% is lots of high-nutrition stuff. Lots of meat, eggs, nuts, whole grains, you name it. For reference, I'm down about 74lbs in a year and a half and I drink beer every single night. It's definitely very doable.
  • whitneyas
    whitneyas Posts: 95 Member
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    I am so glad you asked this question! I was thinking the same thing too.

    My husband and I decided that as of today we were going to go without any alcohol until Thanksgiving to see if that has any affect on our weight. (Which obviously it will!) I don't usually drink much during the week but on the weekends I like to go out and indulge a bit...well a lot! And once I have been drinking I want to eat everything in sight... and eat all day afterwards. I know that stopping is probably going to make me feel so much better. Good luck! And thanks to everyone
  • Charloo1990
    Charloo1990 Posts: 619 Member
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    Funny that cause I've noticed that I have alcohol instead of food for my calories, I can't stop peeing and seem to lose weight quicker. I rarely do this though.
  • HurricaneElaine
    HurricaneElaine Posts: 984 Member
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    Alcohol interferes with the fat-burning process. The body turns its attention to metabolizing the alcohol first.

    I think I should cut out alcohol until the next holiday, just to see how much weight comes off....
  • lyttlewon
    lyttlewon Posts: 1,118 Member
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    I have not had it hinder my progress, but if you think it is hindering yours then the easiest thing to do is stop drinking for a period of time and see how it works for you.
  • baptiste565
    baptiste565 Posts: 590 Member
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    just make sure ur allocating the right amount of calories 4 the alcohol. moderate drinking does not effect fat loss to a great degree.
  • Brunner26_2
    Brunner26_2 Posts: 1,152
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    http://www.leangains.com/2010/07/truth-about-alcohol-fat-loss-and-muscle.html

    Let me start out by saying that I'm not claiming that this guy is right or wrong, but I would be cautious of believing this. I checked out several of his references and they don't back up what he's trying to use them for.
  • baptiste565
    baptiste565 Posts: 590 Member
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    http://www.leangains.com/2010/07/truth-about-alcohol-fat-loss-and-muscle.html

    Let me start out by saying that I'm not claiming that this guy is right or wrong, but I would be cautious of believing this. I checked out several of his references and they don't back up what he's trying to use them for.
    it made alot a sense to me
  • shelbyfrootcake
    shelbyfrootcake Posts: 965 Member
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    http://www.leangains.com/2010/07/truth-about-alcohol-fat-loss-and-muscle.html

    Let me start out by saying that I'm not claiming that this guy is right or wrong, but I would be cautious of believing this. I checked out several of his references and they don't back up what he's trying to use them for.

    To be honest, I mostly just liked the cocktail recipe.
  • stuffinmuffin
    stuffinmuffin Posts: 985 Member
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    I've been out drinking once a week, every week, since starting MFP over a year and half ago and it didn't make any difference to my weight loss apart from feeling a bit bloated the day afterwards. Don't weigh in after a drink, leave it a few days and stick to your normal routine. I also did ensure I had a good buffer of spare calories through 'banking' some mid-week exercise and doing big/long workouts at weekends - which has now just become habit.
  • graysmom2005
    graysmom2005 Posts: 1,882 Member
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    Basically ditto to what many of these people said. Your body will burn alcohol before anything else. So it's going to take a long time to finally get to burning fat. It also slows down your metabolism by something like 75% for awhile. Even if you exercised. If you drink, all your body's energy is going to go straight to burning off that beer, wine etc. For me, it's just not worth it...plus it's drinking your calories....which I'd rather use on chocolate cake. LOL! Seriously though, give it a shot. You will almost certainly see weight loss by nixing it.

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