Alcohol and weight loss

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Dee_D33
Dee_D33 Posts: 106 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
I’ve always gone by by CICO but here lately I’ve been told that I’m inhibiting my weight loss by drinking... Mind you, I am not a heavy drinker whatsoever. I hate the dizzies when you go to sleep and I hate the dehydration and hangover. I tend to drink 3-4 days a week and by drink I mean 2-3 5oz glasses of wine or maybe a couple vodka & diet soda. I know there’s a lot of misconception floating around on the internet and this is where I go for verification. I’m not really sure of the “science” behind these people’s claims but it was something along the lines of your body will burn the calories from alcohol first and put the food calories on the back burner. I mean I don’t necessarily believe it but I’m not exactly sure how to work the response next time I’m drinking and talking about my diet and being told trying for nothing.

Orrrr... maybe I should just not try and talk to people about my diet while I’m drinking.

Replies

  • bpetrosky
    bpetrosky Posts: 3,911 Member
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    If your alcohol consumption is preventing you from maintaining a calorie deficit or crowding out more beneficial nutrition sources then you would be well advised to limit your drinking or cut it out entirely.
  • Falklang
    Falklang Posts: 220 Member
    edited February 2018
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    If I remember correctly Alcohol calories are the equivelant to fat calories, so is a pretty high dense calorie wise especially since they are empty calories too. I would perhaps put the booze on the back burner whilst trying to lose fat and perhaps have 1 or two small glasses of win a week instead.

    I think the claims you have heard are pretty much correct, don't quote me but i think alcohol acts a little bit like sugar calories and yeah i guess the body would use though calories first, but end of the day CICO :)
  • PAV8888
    PAV8888 Posts: 13,730 Member
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    https://rippedbody.com/alcohol/
  • NextRightThing714
    NextRightThing714 Posts: 355 Member
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    Thoughts on this quote from the article? I'd never thought of limiting dietary fat. Is this true? Widely applicable? By this logic, if you plan to exceed maintenance calories (for any reason) it would make sense to limit dietary fat.
    PAV8888 wrote: »
    Fortunately, we can take advantage of the fact that the body has trouble storing anything but dietary fat in the short term when we go over our calorie balance for the day.

    So, on days that you know you are going to drink a lot:

    Keep your fat intake very low,

    ...

  • heumpirej
    heumpirej Posts: 12 Member
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    https://www.t-nation.com/diet-fat-loss/muscleheads-guide-to-alcohol

    https://www.t-nation.com/diet-fat-loss/lifters-guide-to-alcohol
  • fr33sia12
    fr33sia12 Posts: 1,258 Member
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    I think it was if you want to cut down the fat in your body, your body will burn off any alcohol before turning to the fat stores in your body. I could be wrong I'm trying to remember a TV show I saw about this.
  • james_e84
    james_e84 Posts: 1 Member
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    Don't drink for a month and see what changes. You may be surprised, I was.
  • SLLeask
    SLLeask Posts: 489 Member
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    It's still calories in - calories out, whether you eat or drink them and whatever is used up first is kind of irrelevant. If you are under your calorie goal for the day / week, then you will lose weight no matter what they are made up of. I enjoy my drinks at the weekend, flatly refuse to cut them out because then I would be miserable. If I count the calories in them and stay under my overall calorie goal for the week, I lose weight, if I go over with the total count I don't.
  • CSARdiver
    CSARdiver Posts: 6,252 Member
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    Dee_D33 wrote: »
    I’ve always gone by by CICO but here lately I’ve been told that I’m inhibiting my weight loss by drinking... Mind you, I am not a heavy drinker whatsoever. I hate the dizzies when you go to sleep and I hate the dehydration and hangover. I tend to drink 3-4 days a week and by drink I mean 2-3 5oz glasses of wine or maybe a couple vodka & diet soda. I know there’s a lot of misconception floating around on the internet and this is where I go for verification. I’m not really sure of the “science” behind these people’s claims but it was something along the lines of your body will burn the calories from alcohol first and put the food calories on the back burner. I mean I don’t necessarily believe it but I’m not exactly sure how to work the response next time I’m drinking and talking about my diet and being told trying for nothing.

    Orrrr... maybe I should just not try and talk to people about my diet while I’m drinking.

    Just log alcohol as you would any other food.

    This speaks to lack of scientific understanding and failing to apply the concepts in a meaningful manner. Yes your body does prioritize metabolic pathways, but this is on a molecular scale. The difference is undetectable by instruments and completely irrelevant.

  • janejellyroll
    janejellyroll Posts: 25,763 Member
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    When I was losing weight, I drank just about every night. I logged my alcohol calories and lost as I expected.

    Same with maintaining . . . I've had periods where I've had a drink just about every night, times when I drank just 3 times or so a week, even periods where I wasn't drinking at all . . . my weight seemed to be tied to my calories consumed versus calories used.

    Alcohol and drinking is a subject that many people do have an opinion on. There are people who are adamant about their belief that you can't lose weight while drinking. If it bothers you, I would just avoid discussing it with these people.

    With alcohol, I really think the key things to consider are 1) is the alcohol keeping me from meeting my nutritional needs (3 glasses of wine consumed regularly *could* do this if your calorie goal is very low)? and 2) Do I have trouble stopping when I want to or is the alcohol causing me to eat foods I wasn't planning on eating (this is a big issue for some people, a non-issue for others).

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