Alcohol - your opinions

I no longer use mixers. Instead of lots of cheap mixed drinks, I now slowly sip premium spirits on ice. Quality over quantity. No hangovers and it's easier to pace yourself. There's approximately 70 calories per ounce in whiskey, rum, vodka, gin and Tequila. Drink the good stuff and look at it as a special treat.

I suggest only weighing in on Fridays (or whatever your weekly weigh in is) and not weighing in on a Monday after drinking. You are most likely going to be bloated from the weekend and seeing that on the scale can only hurt your motivation.

I'm not a huge alcohol drinker but occasionally I like to drink or eat a bit higher on the weekend. I plan my week's calories around this. If I know I'm going to drink 300 calories in alcohol on Saturday (or whatever your average is) then I try to lower my calories a bit over the week. While large amounts of alcohol can be unhealthy, moderate drinking won't destroy your weight loss goals as long as you work your calories around it.

Alcohol is not only a diet killer, it is a life killer. So much better not to have to think about it. Nothing good comes from alcohol consumption. Even though I've never had a DUI, or been to rehab, I feel fortunate to have been able to eliminate it from my life completely (8 years ago). Then I got addicted to oxycodone, due to a back injury and then was able to kick it. Maybe I have an addictive personality. I workout when I am stressed.

The most important part about dieting for me is that it needs to be applicable to real life. Alcohol is bad for you... I don't think there is anyone who knows what they are talking about who would argue otherwise. For me, alcoholism in college is one of the things that led to me gaining a whole lot of weight in the first place and and was one of the things I had to tone back quite a bit to begin dieting. But honestly, what are you gonna do, be a hermit and stay in on Friday nights when your favorite band is playing downtown because you're afraid that you're going to drink too much? Of course not... If you drink, you should plan ahead.

If I drink Alcohol, I log it, and understand the effects of what I've done to myself. In fact, I usually log beers ahead of time, in anticipation of how much I think I am going to drink that night, knowing that I will possibly go over. That way I don't have to whip out my mobile app at the bar and log stuff in front of people. I keep a number in my head of how many beers I'm going to drink (I tend to stay away from the hard stuff because it makes my self control dissipate) and I try to stick to that. One thing to be careful of... Most alcohol on the MFP database is user added, and only the calories are there. It doesn't take into account sugars and carbohydrates, make sure you look at the nutritional information before you add it to your diary.

Alcohol is obviously served a bunch of different ways, with varying nutritional values. If you're going to drink liquor, you shouldn't drink it with pop. Try vodka and soda with Lime juice or something. It doesn't taste the same but you aren't drinking extra calories along with it. You also wont be so hungover in the morning.

If you are drinking beer, stick to light beer. If you are planning on going out and having an average evening (for me that would be like 4-5 beers over several hours), you can usually get an "extra beer" for the calories if you are drinking light beer as opposed to full calorie. For those of you who count carbs, I know my last statement isn't true at all. I feel like a weenie ordering a Coors light (since I probably should just be adding it to my cups of water/day count ), but I feel better about it in the morning.

One last thing... Dieting in general requires a lot of self control. One thing I have found since I've decided to change my ways is sometimes I have a lot more fun If I'm not absolutely hammered, and girl's attitudes have definitely changed a little towards me when I'm not rambling about useless BS because I'm drunk and its the first thing that comes to mind. You don't have to drink to have a good time, and other people notice and tend to be respectful about your decisions.

These days I log what I drink, once in awhile it'll be a couple glasses of wine or vodka with diet soda. In college we must have gone out 2-3 nights every week, lots of binge drinking, then lots of pizza. I still somehow managed to lose 75 lbs, though over a few years. It probably would have been faster without all that. It boggles my mind how it was possible to lose anything that way, I certainly wouldn't be able to nowadays!

I want to know more about this. Because I've started working out and dieting just more than a month ago, and since then I haven't had alcohol. Well, I had one bottle of ready-to-drink cocktails two weeks ago but that's it.

And that's kinda my problem since it's summer here and I'm expecting a lot of beach trips and summer parties. I don't want to be a party pooper but then again, I don't wanna screw up my diet. I want to know how much alcohol would be okay.

It's fine if you can do it in moderation, like no more than 4 drinks per week. You won't gain fat from it if you keep it within your calorie goals (although it will make you retain water, which will show up on the scale).

However, if you drink more than that and still keep it within your calorie goals, I'd worry about not getting enough nutrition. Alcohol is one of those empty calorie treat deals, and in my experience it's good to keep your intake of them to less than 20% of your calories.

Well, that's a relief. I think I'll only drink twice a month. I will try to exercise as much control as I can. Thanks so much!

just drink spirits with calorie free mixer. very thermogenic

I like to have a wine with dinner- not every night but a couple times a week. I have had no problem fitting that into my calorie goal. In my opinion, if you account for it and you drink in moderation it's not a problem. I'm fairly new at this but it hasn't affected my progress thus far. My tip would be if you are going to drink switch to something lower calorie. I'm also for only weighing in once a week as others have mentioned.

I'm glad it's not just me that doeas this. Its not so much the drink but the bad food that tends to go with it. I have learnt not to worry so much as by the Tuesday I'm back down to the pre-weekend weight and then make further weight loss before the next weekend.

So long as I keep heading in the right direction I'm Happy to blow a bit at the weekend.

Alcohol does not turn to fat. It can not be stored by the body. Your body spends all of its energy trying to get rid of alcohol after you drink and therefore can not burn fat while doing so. Alcohol itself is rarely the problem (this is why you see skinny alcoholics. However alcohol increases appetite in many people, either the day of or day after drinking. Also, alcohol is often mixed with soda or juice which adds empty calories. Therefore it is not the alcohol itself, but the added food/mixer calories that truly cause the problem.

not much of a prob for me. i do shots of straight liquor or put it in diet soda and count it as dinner instead of having a meal. im a lightweight so it only adds up to about 300 calories by the time im wasted lol.

I had about 8-10 shots of vodka late last night. How I'm feeling right now is reason enough for me to know I don't want to do this all the time.

I'm normally really good 95% of the time, so when I have a day like this I don't beat myself up over it. And like I said, I don't feel fabulous today like I have the past week, and I want to feel fabulous.

I do drink wine though, about 1-2 glasses maybe 3 times a week. I'm perfectly content with that level of consumption. Red wine is good for you anyway in moderation.

This is such a hot topic with me and my friends right now. We all work stressful jobs where happy hours and drinking is not frowned upon but almost expected and all of us drink moderately and in the past-- extreme. I am happy to say that I no longer abuse alcohol to help with stress, I stopped drinking beer during the week last year and lost NOTHING. My other friend used to drink an entire bottle of wine a night and she stopped and lost nothing as well.

However it brings up interesting points. If one was to give up soda, they would lose weight. Someone mentioned that the calories from a night out of drinking would be like eating cookies and I agree but my body doesn't. If I EVER ate the caloric equivalent in cookies to the calories consumed from some of the beer I drink-- I would gain immediately.

So, I don't believe its a diet killer unless the behavior leads you to make poor food decisions or feel so horrible the next day that you completely mess up the nice rhythm you had going on before the splurge.

Also, once I was doing an extreme diet and was struggling with the last 5 lbs. I added 4 oz of red wine at night and I hit my goal.

Either way, I personally want to begin to eliminate alcohol. I feel better without it but I can't say I am going to stop.