The Health Risks of Drinking Alcohol Explained And How to Limit Them

So now you know some of my favourite tips on how to be successful at drinking moderately. Remember nobody is perfect and gets it right all the time so don’t be afraid to ask for help and get support if you need it. There are many online support groups such as the Club Soda Mindful Drinking Facebook group can be a useful source of support, members sharing tips, experiences and what moderation means to them personally. If you feel like you want to read up more about alcohol moderation I have recently listed my list of the best books for alcohol moderation.

Alcohol Use: Conversation Starters

You can lower your health risks from alcohol by drinking less or not drinking at all. Through understanding the different ways ‘drinking in moderation’ can look, you can decide how you’d like that to look for you. Drinking responsibly will not only result in longer-term health pay offs, but lovely added bonuses like fewer headaches and hangovers, too. And our final tip is When you do imbibe, shoot for healthier drinks that help mitigate some of the health impacts of alcohol. Generally, these healthier options will be low in (or free of) added sugars.

Fact or Fiction: Is Mindfulness the New Panacea?

Your buzzed self will actually have more fun and thank you later since it no longer has to do “on the spot thinking” about how much to drink. Many people find that through observation, they discover they frequently drink one or two drinks more than what is actually their true pleasure point. By reframing your drinking target as a “magic number” that is about your pleasure rather than as a “limit”, many people are able to embrace alcohol moderation as a friend rather than a foe.

• The heart-protective theory was based on the finding that moderate drinkers had better cardiovascular health than both nondrinkers (by a little bit) and heavy drinkers (by a lot).
• Also, drinking before bed often disrupts sleep later in the night — and poor sleep and stress both contribute to heart disease.
• He told Healthline that one drink per day raises the risk of certain cancers, especially for females.
• Learning to drink in moderation can be the goal, or it can be a way station on the way to abstinence.

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Plan the non-alcoholic beverages you’ll order or make instead of alcoholic versions. Enjoyable, non-alcoholic alternatives include virgin mojitos, kombucha, mocktails, and soda with fresh fruit or lime juice. John C. Umhau, MD, MPH, CPE is board-certified in addiction medicine and preventative medicine. For over 20 years Dr. Umhau https://ecosoberhouse.com/article/why-does-alcohol-cause-bruising/ was a senior clinical investigator at the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). In addition, older people tend to take more medicines than younger individuals do.

When the pain and suffering that irresponsible drinking becomes great enough, you will become willing to do what it takes to make an honest self-appraisal and make behavioral changes. Drinking in moderation means that you can still enjoy a few drinks with friends and family without being worried that you will lose self-control. It means that you are in control of your behavior… the alcohol is not in the driver’s seat anymore.

• The surgeon general’s recommendation suggests that even moderate alcohol consumption could raise the risk of at least seven types of cancer.
• Second, “heavy” drinkers may not be alcoholics, but they can still feel the negative health effects of their alcohol use.

Can I Moderate Alcohol

I still get to enjoy my coveted Cabernet once in a while, but having some loose rules for myself has made it easier to reduce my intake. This reflects a lot of progress in our understanding of Alcohol Use Disorder problematic drinking. For centuries, people have known that excessive drinking could damage the liver, cause long-term health problems, and lead to alcohol dependence. The US temperance movement of the 1800s and early 1900s sought to eradicate those personal and social harms and briefly succeeded in outlawing alcohol during the Prohibition era. Subsequent studies appeared to affirm the correlation, strengthening the belief among the general public about the benefits of red wine.

Public Health

Or maybe this means there is a part of you that doesn’t like the idea of observing drink counts? Not to be a buzzkill, but alcohol can negatively influence our health in a few different ways  in how to drink moderately both the short and long term. You might think having a few drinks regularly is harmless, but even consuming alcohol in moderation carries some risks. You might wonder if there’s a healthy way to drink, how much alcohol consumption is considered moderate, and how much is too much. Drinking too much alcohol too frequently is unhealthy and can lead to liver disease, weight gain, and alcohol use disorder (AUD).

It is a fantastic opportunity to begin a moderation journey to increased health and wellbeing. In my practice I work with a great many people who fall into the mild to moderate alcohol use disorder spectrum who bring their drinking down to much safer levels on a permanent basis and live much happier and more fulfilling lives. Establishing a healthy relationship with alcohol means something different for everyone. Some people make the choice to change their drinking habits over time without seeking treatment.

Drinking in moderation vs. abstinence

If you’re an occasional or social drinker, it can be easy to participate in binge drinking and feel like it doesn’t have an effect on your health or how well you function. When, in reality, the health risks of binge drinking are present regardless of how often it occurs. A similar mindset shift is necessary when on vacation or around the holidays when it’s easy to relinquish controlled drinking and consume more than one or two drinks. A study in the April issue of the journal Addiction notes that recent large, multicountry studies have contested the cardiovascular benefits of alcohol use, suggesting that the safest amount of alcohol may be none. Even if light-to-moderate alcohol use isn’t a problem, occasional binge drinking (more than five drinks within a few hours) reverses any possible protective effect, the authors note. Drinking more than moderate amounts of alcohol on a routine basis can raise blood pressure and also increases the risk of heart rhythm problems such as atrial fibrillation.