How Much Alcohol Is Safe? |
|
|
|
|
||
|
A woman about 5 feet 6 inches tall who weighs 120 to 130 pounds should be able to consume daily a glass or two of wine, a mixed drink containing 1 1/2 ounces of whiskey, or a couple of beers. At a cocktail party, she should not exceed one alcoholic drink or glass of wine per hour. Larger people can drink proportionately more; for example, a 6-foot 3-inch, 190-pound man can probably safely consume a third as much. He could drink about one and a half drinks per hour.
Any dinner, office, or cocktail party can easily provide a week's worth of calories from alcohol. Two glasses of wine at a holiday celebration is hardly excessive, but keep in mind that most adults exceed their legal limit to drive if they consume three drinks within one and a half hours.
Alcohol consumed excessively (more than a drink per hour), particularly at lunch, can cause trouble during the remainder of the day. That is because it forces the body to set other caloric materials, namely sugar and fat, aside while it metabolizes the alcohol to carbon dioxide and water.
This type of drinking causes blood sugar shifts and encourages fatty deposits in the liver. A drop in blood sugar increases irritability which usually drives the person to seek stimulants, more alcohol, or even candy. Often, doctors, not fully understanding what is going on, will encourage people who feel down or irritable in the afternoon to suck on hard candy. Sucking on the candy keeps the blood sugar up but is simply hiding the problem, while speeding the emergence of Type 2 diabetes, liver difficulties, and even periodontal trouble.
People sometimes think that taking extra B vitamins as supplements will speed the body’s process of eliminating alcohol because the B vitamins are critical to alcohol metabolism. This reasoning, however, is faulty. Drinking alcohol too rapidly makes the alcohol and its by-products build up in your body faster than they can be passed out; you'll feel lousy until they're gone regardless of the amount of vitamin B in your system.
Exercise helps hasten alcohol’s elimination from the body because it speeds up metabolism. However, alcohol makes it harder to exercise. Who goes to a gym after a three-martini lunch?
A hangover is usually the result of dehydration caused by excessive alcohol consumption and the elevated blood sugar that often follows. Together, these often cause fitful sleep and a severe headache the following morning.
Some people claim that drinking water when they have a hangover makes them tipsy; it’s really water intoxication that their dehydrated brain is experiencing as it returns to its normal hydration level. Drinking one glass of water for every drink prevents most of these problems, but decreasing the booze is the best approach overall.
|
||