Wine/alcohol - as a macro?

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burnsjulia
burnsjulia Posts: 50 Member
in Introduce Yourself
I've noticed that when I drink, I seem to lose nothing. I was reading about macros tonight and one website suggested that alcohol is a macro in itself and when you drink, your body prioritizes metabolizing the alcohol first --- which seems to fit my experience.

Does this sound right to anyone else? How do you measure this in MFP?

(Yeah, I know -- stop drinking. But it's good for the soul.) :blush: -)

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  • CyberTone
    CyberTone Posts: 7,337 Member
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    Alcohol provides about 7 Calories per gram; whereas the three major macronutrients provide about 4 (Carbs and Protein) and 9 (Fat) Calories per gram. Your liver will metabolize alcohol quicker than any of the other macronutrients. You should log all of your alcohol consumption in your Food Diary, similar to logging all drinks that contain Calories. Mixed drinks have the added issue that many of them contain mixers that add even more Calories to the drink than just alcohol alone.
  • Alatariel75
    Alatariel75 Posts: 17,959 Member
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    Now there's a macro I'd like to hit ;)
  • jenglish712
    jenglish712 Posts: 497 Member
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    You'd need to eat five bowls of Total to get the nutrition in one bottle of Wild Turkey...
  • ZiggySquish
    ZiggySquish Posts: 87 Member
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    As a bartender, giving up alcohol is really challenging, especially when you get free shift drinks! However, I just had shoulder surgery a few weeks ago and can't work for a few months, so i took it as a good time to cut back drastically, and I've only had two glasses of red wine in almost a month!
    I always feel like alcohol sabotages my diet, mostly because after a drink or two I tend to "live only for the moment" and will then eat whatever, dance forever (or until I fall down and hurt myself again) and continue to drink more. It's awful! Except for the dancing part, I love dancing!!
  • SomeGirlSomewhere
    SomeGirlSomewhere Posts: 937 Member
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    I meet with a registered dietitian regularly and when I saw her last week I asked her the exact same question about alcohol that you are asking here in the forums. Her answer: drinking alcohol in and of itself does NOT slow down or stop weight loss, BUT a) most people don't eat fewer calories on the days they drink leading to a higher calorie total and/or b) people lose their judgement and inhibitions after a few drinks and, as the poster above me said, end up overeating/not logging everything. Either or both of those things make it APPEAR as though consuming alcohol is the cause of slow or no weight loss, but it isn't the alcohol itself that is really causing the problem.

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