Alcohol question

i drink wine almost every day and i am completely healthy - i also have a pretty solid midsection....alcohol gets a bad rap.IMO
i am not encouraging getting wasted but in moderation, i think alcohol is fine. i am bummed that i have to quit enjoying my wine with my upcoming competition but i think i will miss a lot of things.
to the OP if you want to lose weight, try lowering your carb intake, increasing your protein and lifting some weights. change in body composition is better than numbers on a scale. just sayin.

Nuff said

You are correct, Doctors are not always 100% correct, but your body does not lie. If your labs are off and your sent for an ultrasound and can visually see your liver with fatty streaks in it for yourself, than it is the truth. I do not mind people drinking, I am not a person who thinks everyone should not drink either.

I just know what it does to me and my body and posted why I do not drink on a TOPIC - Alcohol Question.

So to all of you - keep enjoying and continue to eat healthy and lose weight.

I hate that my first post on MFP is a bummer, but here it is. I have for the last 6 years drank 2 glasses (large) of Wine a night. Three weeks ago I went to Dr. for a regular check up. CBC came back with high (slightly elevated) liver enzymes, high cholestoral and my hypo-thyroid was triple the normal range. The Doctor then sent me for an ultra sound of my right quadrant. I have been diagnosed with a FATTY LIVER from ALCOHOL.

I am 5' and 125 lbs. In order to get healthy again and reverse the damage I inflicted upon myself due to alcohol consumption, I have to eat a healthy, low fat, low carb diet with plenty of fresh food - not processed. Thank GOD what I have is reversable if I make those changes. If I do not I am slowly killing my liver / body.

Needless to say I have chosen the healthy life and completely given up alcohol. I was so amazed when I read about Fatty Liver Disease that Obesity, Insulin Resistance, Alcohol and Cholesterol all play a major part in it. Even social drinkers can get FLD.

Sorry to be a downer - but drop the alcohol and enjoy losing weight the healthy way. FLD is usually a silent disease until it progresses in the more dangerous zones.

I find it incredibly difficult to believe 2 glasses of wine a night over 6 years caused any damage to your liver.

Ofocurse it would, any amount of alcohol causes damage to your liver duh.

The liver also repairs itself. So, yes, you're correct, it would cause some damage, though in a healthy individual, the damage should be offset by the fact the liver heals faster than the damage being done by moderate alcohol intake. Which was my point! DUH!

I dont think 2 glasses every single night is moderation. 1 glass a few nights a week is moderation so the liver probably woodnt have time to repair itsself when more alcohol is being added every single night. I think if her doctor says her liver is damaged he knows a tad more than you. Idiot.

2 glasses a night isn't moderation? So what, you think all of France, Italy, and Spain are alcoholics? They generally average several glasses of wine a day. And they are all generally much healthier than the average American.

2 glasses a night isn't moderation? So what, you think all of France, Italy, and Spain are alcoholics? They generally average several glasses of wine a day. And they are all generally much healthier than the average American.
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Here is a long answer to your short statement. Alcohism is a real problem in Europe.

Alcohol in the European Union
page 5
The impact of alcohol on health
Peter Anderson
Introduction
Apart from being a drug of dependence, alcohol has been known for many years as a cause of
some 60 different types of disease and condition, including injuries, mental and behavioural
disorders, gastrointestinal conditions, cancers, cardiovascular diseases, immunological disorders,
lung diseases, skeletal and muscular diseases, reproductive disorders and pre-natal harm,
including an increased risk of prematurity and low birth weight (Anderson & Baumberg, 2006).
In recent years, overwhelming evidence has confirmed that both the volume of lifetime alcohol
use and the combination of frequency of drinking and amount drunk per incident increase the
risk of alcohol-related harm, largely in a dose-dependent manner (WHO Regional Office for
Europe, 2009; Rehm et al., 2010) with the higher the alcohol consumption, the greater the risk.
For some conditions, such as cardiomyopathy, acute respiratory distress syndrome and muscle
damage, harm appears only to result from a sustained level of high alcohol consumption, but
even at high levels, alcohol increases the risk and severity of these conditions in a dosedependent
manner. The frequency and volume of episodic heavy drinking are of particular
importance for increasing the risk of injuries and certain cardiovascular diseases (coronary heart
disease and stroke). Although there is a protective effect of light to moderate drinking on
ischaemic diseases, overwhelmingly alcohol is toxic to the cardiovascular system.
Alcohol is an intoxicant affecting a wide range of structures and processes in the central nervous
system which, interacting with personality characteristics, associated behaviour and sociocultural
expectations, are causal factors for intentional and unintentional injuries and harm to both the
drinker and others. These injuries and harm include interpersonal violence, suicide, homicide and
drink–driving fatalities. Alcohol consumption is a risk factor for risky sexual behaviour, sexually
transmitted diseases and HIV infection. Moreover, it is a potent teratogen with a range of
negative outcomes to the fetus, including low birth weight, cognitive deficiencies and fetal
alcohol disorders. It is neurotoxic to brain development, leading to structural changes in the
hippocampus in adolescence and reduced brain volume in middle age. Alcohol is a dependenceproducing
drug, similar to other substances under international control. The process of
dependence occurs through its reinforcing properties and neuroadaptation. It is also an
immunosuppressant which increases the risk of communicable diseases, including tuberculosis.
Further, alcoholic beverages and the ethanol in them are classified as carcinogens by the
International Agency for Research on Cancer.
Alcohol as a carcinogen
In 2007, the International Agency for Research on Cancer concluded that there was a causal link
between alcohol and cancer of the oral cavity, pharynx, larynx, oesophagus, liver, colon, rectum
and female breast (Baan et al., 2007; IARC, 2010). All these cancers showed evidence of a dose–
response relationship; that is, the risk of cancer increases steadily with greater volumes of
drinking (Rehm et al., 2010). The strength of the relationship to levels of average alcohol
consumption varies for different cancers. For example, with regard to female breast cancer, each
additional 10 g of pure alcohol per day is associated with an increase of 7% in the relative risk of
breast cancer, whereas regular consumption of approximately 50 g of pure alcohol increases the
relative risk of colorectal cancer by 10–20%, indicating that the association is stronger for female
Alcohol in the European Union
page 6
breast cancer. Conversely, the relationship of average consumption to cancer of the larynx,
pharynx and oesophagus is markedly higher than the relationship to both breast and colorectal
cancer (more than a 100% increase for an average consumption of 50 g pure alcohol per day).
Among the causal mechanisms that have been indicated for some cancers is the toxic effect of
acetaldehyde, which is a metabolite of alcohol.
Cardiovascular disease
Alcohol use is related overwhelmingly detrimentally to many cardiovascular outcomes,
including hypertensive disease (Taylor et al., 2009), haemorrhagic stroke (Patra et al., 2010) and
atrial fibrillation (Samokhvalov, Irving & Rehm, 2010). For ischaemic heart disease and
ischaemic stroke, the relationship is more complex. Chronic heavy alcohol use has been
associated uniformly with adverse cardiovascular outcomes (Rehm & Roerecke, 2011). But, on
average, light to moderate drinking has a protective effect on ischaemic diseases (Roerecke &
Rehm, in press).This effect is found to be equal for people who just drink beer or who just drink
wine (Di Castelnuovo et al., 2002). More and more, however, it is being understood that a large
part of this effect is due to confounders (Roerecke & Rehm, 2010), with low to moderate alcohol
use being a proxy for better health and social capital (Hansel et al., 2010). In any case, the
protective effect totally disappears when drinkers report at least one heavy drinking occasion per
month (Roerecke & Rehm, 2010); there is no protective effect for younger people, for whom any
dose of alcohol increases the risk of ischaemic events (Juonala et al., 2009); and, in older people,
a greater reduction in death from ischaemic heart disease can be more effectively obtained by
being physically active and eating a healthier diet than by drinking a low dose of alcohol
(Mukamal et al., 2006).The detrimental effects of heavy drinking occasions on ischaemic
diseases are consistent with the physiological mechanisms of increased clotting and a reduced
threshold for ventricular fibrillation which occur following heavy drinking (Rehm et al., 2010).
Death
It is mostly the middle-aged (and men in particular) who die from alcohol (Jones et al., 2009;
Rehm, Zatonski & Taylor, 2011). Taking into account a lifecourse view, however, the adolescent
brain is particularly susceptible to alcohol, and the longer the onset of consumption is delayed,
the less likely that alcohol-related problems and alcohol dependence will emerge in adult life
(Norberg, Bierut & Grucza, 2009).The absolute real risk of dying from an adverse alcohol-related
condition increases linearly with the amount of alcohol consumed over a lifetime, with no safe
level (Rehm, Zatonski & Taylor, 2011). In many societies there is no difference in the risks
between men and women. Australians who regularly drink six drinks (60 g of alcohol) a day over
their lives as adults have a 1 in 10 chance of dying from alcohol (National Health and Medical
Research Council, 2009).
The annual absolute risk of dying from an alcohol-related disease (accounting for the protective
effect of ischaemic diseases) for people aged over 15 years across the population of the WHO
European Region is shown in Fig. 1. The risks increase from the consumption of 10 g alcohol a
day (one drink, the lowest data point) so that at a consumption of 60 g/day, men have a just
under 9% annual risk of dying from an alcohol-related disease and women an 8% risk. At any
given level of alcohol consumption, men are at greater risk than women. The lifetime risk of
dying from an alcohol-related injury across the total population aged over 15 years rises
exponentially with an increasing daily alcohol consumption beyond 10 g of alcohol per day, the
first data point (Fig. 2). At any given level of alcohol consumption, the risks are much higher for
men than for women.

http://www.leangains.com/2010/07/truth-about-alcohol-fat-loss-and-muscle.html

There is no metabolic pathway to turn ethanol into stored fat, however, while your liver is busy processing the alcohol, it is *not* processing the sugars that go along with your drink, or any food you eat while your liver is busy, lending those macronutrients to get stored instead of burned.

Go ahead, have a drink, have two, just don't load up on greasy pizza when you give your liver the task of turning ethanol into a harmless waste product.

Alcohol has a triple whammy effect even if you only drink say once a week and stay within your calorie targets -

1) It's empty calories with no nutritional value and wont fit in your macro targets
2) It increases your appetite causing you to eat more or make unwise choices
3) Most importantly it STOPS YOU BURNING FAT - The liver sees alcohol as a poison and prioritizes getting rid of it first and fat burning is put on hold, therefore even if you are within your kcal limits and/or exercise a lot, you won't lose weight.

So I'm afraid alcohol is off the menu

Good article here http://www.builtlean.com/2012/11/26/alcohol-weight-loss/

YES, THIS. Excellent article link, thanks!

THIS Article IS VERY GOOD!!

I can't wait to hear what people say. I bet they say cut out all booze period. It is easier said than done. I know I so look forward to my beer after a long day. It literally feels good & tastes good. I have been watching what I eat and try to limit myself to 1 beer a day. This weekend we are going out- I'll have more, but will try to walk more calories off Saturday and Sunday.

I'll start that bandwagon and say drop the alcohol. Empty calories on a 1200 cal/day diet isn' t healthy at all.

Replace alcohol with something else that takes stress away... like a treadmill.

I don't know what lemon scented pledge you've been using lately, but the last thing that I would do to destress is run.. inside.. in the same place.. watching myself in the mirror.. for hours.. count the minutes.. tick.







tock.

But some people find running very refreshing

If someone could invent an alcoholic based drink that didn't instantaneously halt weight loss, they would be a trillionaire. Whenever I have even one drink, weight loss stops immediately for that day, and a few afterwards I'm learning. Even if it is included in my calorie count.

fatso954 wrote: »

If someone could invent an alcoholic based drink that didn't instantaneously halt weight loss, they would be a trillionaire. Whenever I have even one drink, weight loss stops immediately for that day, and a few afterwards I'm learning. Even if it is included in my calorie count.

I drank virtually every day when I was losing weight. As long as I hit my calorie goals, I lost weight.

I've found if I can drink without eating, I'm ok. If I can't, I have to cut it out. I drank everyday all weekend (visiting my parents) and still had a loss on the scale this morning. My highest calorie day was Sunday at 1300. The scale this morning said 1.2lbs lighter than it did last Tuesday.

And you say that you are under/or at 1200 calories with the booze. If you REALLY were you'd lose the weight. Sounds like your logging is off.

I'm in the a calorie is a calorie boat, where ever it comes from. So if you can stick to a deficit while drinking, great, do it. If there's something in your road, stopping you from getting where you want to be, you figure out out a way to tackle it.

dumb_blondes_rock wrote: »

Also stick with clear liquor and like tonic or whatever diet drink they have at the bar

You do realize tonic is pretty much the same calories as regular pop right?

My guess you're underestimating the calories you're actually taking in. Eating more does not make you lose more in any world