Alcohol is formed when yeast comes into contact with sugar from fruit. The longer the fermentation process, the higher the percentage of alcohol. It is a stimulant and will cause more damage than you would like in the long term. Your personality changes, which puts pressure on your relationship. Because your ability to concentrate and intellectual performance decreases, you perform less at work and it can cost you your job. It disrupts many processes in your body, which can cause you to deteriorate both physically and mentally.
What does alcohol do?
It disrupts the functioning of the neurotransmitters dopamine, serotonin and adrenaline and therefore affects your mood.
- After drinking 1-2 glasses it seems to have a stimulating effect. It removes certain inhibitions and you feel more comfortable. However, it also disrupts your fine motor skills.
- After 3 – 5 glasses, your self-criticism decreases. That is why people who have been drinking believe that they can still drive well.
- When you drink 6-7 glasses you get tipsy, you can become emotional and you start talking incoherently. Self-criticism then decreases even further.
- After 7 or more drinks, drunkenness ensues and the hangover follows the next morning with the following symptoms:
- General malaise
- Dry mouth and thirst
- Headache
- Nausea and vomiting
The toxic breakdown product ‘acetaldehyde’ is responsible for the general malaise, while the diuretic effect of alcohol causes a dry mouth and a lot of thirst. This also causes headaches, because the brain sometimes shrinks by 15% due to dehydration. The stomach wall and pancreas become irritated and this causes disturbed food intake, causing nausea and vomiting.
The liver
All kinds of processes take place in the liver and one of them is the breakdown of the toxins in alcohol.
Alcohol enters the liver via the blood and the speed at which it breaks down the alcohol depends, among other things, on your body weight. It is between 100 and 200 mg per kilo of body weight per hour, on average that is one glass per hour. With excessive use of alcohol, the liver is working for quite a few hours. There are no remedies that accelerate the breakdown, so strong coffee, fresh air and a cold shower are all advice that we can send to the realm of fables. Chronic too much alcohol leads to accumulation of fat in the liver and thus causes a fatty liver. An advantage is that the fatty liver disappears when you stop drinking alcohol. Liver cirrhosis is an irreversible process, because active liver cells are destroyed by excessive alcohol consumption and connective tissue takes their place. New cells can no longer form on this connective tissue, so that there are fewer and fewer active liver cells left that can break down alcohol. Drinking alcohol is often accompanied by eating fatty foods: ‘bal sandwich, frikadel, bitterballen, fries with mayo, etc. The liver first goes to work breaking down the alcohol because it does not contain any necessary nutrients, but it does contain many harmful substances. The fat is therefore stored in the adipose tissue and this is how the beer belly is created. A somewhat misleading name, because the abdomen is not thick from fluid, but from fat that has been stored around the organs.
Vitamin deficiencies
Alcohol in the blood has an inhibitory effect on the absorption of vitamin B in the blood. Vitamin B1 deficiencies cause ‘Beriberi’, with symptoms such as heart weakness and psychological confusion. Vitamin B3 deficiency leads to ‘pellagra’ which causes skin rashes and inflammation. Fatigue complaints arise and in very serious cases pellagra leads to irritability, memory loss, depression, later culminating in dementia.
Vitamin K deficiencies can also occur. This is produced in the body itself with the help of bacteria from the intestine and stimulates the build-up of clotting factors, which takes place in the liver. If the liver is damaged by excessive alcohol consumption, blood clotting is disrupted.
Alcohol poisoning
When the concentration of alcohol in the blood becomes very high, the nervous system can become strongly anesthetized so that the respiratory center can become paralyzed. This creates an acute danger to life. The development of alcohol poisoning depends on the amount of alcohol drunk, but also on the fluid content of the body, the physical condition and the extent to which the stomach is full. If you have eaten a lot, the absorption of alcohol into the blood is slowed down slightly. The lower the fluid content in the body and the poorer the physical condition, the faster the alcohol percentage in the blood rises.
Conclusion
Use alcohol in moderation. The advice for a man is to limit himself to 2 to 3 drinks per day, for a woman 1 to 2 and not to consume alcohol at least 2 days a week. If you drink too much, avoid alcohol for a few days.
Don’t drink if you have to study or if you have to drive.
