There are many side effects of alcohol, some are good and some are bad. Drinking is fast-acting. Alcohol is ingested so quickly by your body it is almost akin to injecting an I.V. into your arm… in other words, alcohol goes straight into your blood so some effects are acute and some happen over time after chronic use. The most well-known side effect is that alcohol can create a sense of euphoria (i.e. it makes you feel good).
Alcohol is a depressant, so a person’s hesitation, inhibition, self-doubt and restraint are subdued while drinking (giving alcohol its alias “liquid courage”). Furthermore, alcohol can initially stimulate the heart, adrenal and skeletal systems which can make you feel temporarily active and energetic. There are a lot of negative aspects to consider when tying one on. The second most well-known side effect of liquor comes in the form of a hangover. The rest of this site covers this topic in length, and a summary of hangover symptoms can be found here.
Moving beyond the hangover, alcohol can lead to weight gain. Unfortunately, alcohol is high in calories (only fat has more calories per gram). Also, drinking too much at once can cause you to pass out and lose consciousness. This is the result of alcohol poisoning. Here, breathing slows dramatically with cold skin and a blue complexion. Beyond this is the possibility of heart or lung trauma that can lead to death so overdoing it is just plain stupid.
Furthermore, a number of illnesses and problems can occur with chronic alcohol use. Over a period of time, the effects of alcohol can raise your blood pressure and lower immune resistance, making it more likely for you to get sick.
The possibility of cancer increases with chronic alcohol use. This is most common in the upper part of the body (mouth, throat, etc.) but is not limited to any one of your organs. People who drink more than double their chance of skin cancer and female drinkers are more likely to get breast cancer than ladies who do not drink.
Then there’s the liver, of which alcohol has a huge impact. A healthy liver can process one drink each hour. Repeatedly exceed this rule and you could end up with liver issues like hepatitis, cirrhosis, and cancer.
Becoming an alcoholic is a condition in which you cannot control how much, when, or whether or not you drink. Alcoholism can take ten years off your life and increases your chances of the health problems we’ve already discussed.
If you continue uncontrolled revelry you might end up with bodily deficiencies, lack of appetite, impotence issues, stomach problems, poor memory and nerve damage. In short, enjoy yourself and be a responsible drinker and you can avoid a lot of the negative side effects of alcohol.
What Causes Hangovers?
You already know what causes hangovers… it is the digestion of alcohol. You take a sip of your favorite drink and swallow it. The liquid goes down your esophagus and enters your stomach. So far you are probably pretty safe unless you are drinking Everclear or 151 straight up, in which case there is a good chance you have already irritated your throat. Now the fun begins…
Gastronomical Distress
When the alcohol hits your stomach it immediately begins to irritate the stomach lining. Alcohol also causes your stomach to secrete something called hydrochloric acid. If you fill your belly with too much booze this acid will trigger a message to your brain that you are harming yourself. This message comes in the form of feeling nauseous. Although puking is never that fun, it might be in your best interest if you have been drinking heavy because there will be less alcohol in your system to process.
Dehydration
If you do keep the liquor down it eventually enters your bloodstream, which triggers your pituitary gland to stop the creation of a chemical called vasopressin. I’ll spare you from the biology lesson here, but in short this chemical tells your body it is time to start releasing fluid. This loss of fluid is also what causes hangovers. This is what us drinkers call “breaking the seal”. Most of the liquid you consume from this point forward goes directly to the bladder instead of getting absorbed into your body… leading to dehydration.
Brain Shrinkage
Your body will now try to protect itself. In fact, it will try to let you know that you are getting dehydrated, often times in the form of a dry mouth. Unfortunately these signals usually cause you to drink more alcohol (instead of water). Your internal organs will attempt to replenish themselves by stealing water from your organs (including your brain). When your brain is robbed of fluid it shrinks and pulls on membranes which connect to your skull. Hello headache!
Electrolyte Loss
As you continue to piss the night away (pun intended) salt and minerals are also lost.
Loss of Glycogen
Furthermore, your continued consumption of alcohol begins to turn your body’s supply of glycogen into glucose and sends it (along with salt and minerals) out of your body in your pee. This loss of electrolytes and glycogen is also what causes hangovers, subsequently limiting your energy reserves in the morning.
Reduction of Glutamine
If you have really tied one on you probably will not get restful sleep. When alcohol enters your bloodstream it reduces a protein called glutamine. However, once you stop drinking your body will try to compensate for this reduction in glutamine by producing more. The surplus of glutamine created from this yo-yo effect now over-stimulates your brain and messes with your REM sleep (severe glutamine rebound can even cause tremors, anxiety, restlessness, and increased blood pressure in some people).
Toxins
To put it bluntly, if you feel poisoned in the morning it’s because you have basically just poisoned yourself. Congeners, acetaldehyde and (in some instances) histamine are also what causes hangovers.
Acetaldehyde is an organic chemical compound that is commonly associated with hangovers. It is naturally prevalent in our environment. It can be found in coffee, fruit and other organic substances. It is inhaled from the air you breathe (especially when second-hand tobacco smoke is present), ingested from alcohol, consumed through the consumption of food, and produced in the human body during the metabolism of alcoholic beverages.
Alcohol gets metabolized into various metabolites through a multi-step process. The first step in metabolizing alcohol is the conversion of alcohol to acetaldehyde. This toxin is approximately 30 times more noxious than alcohol and as such plays a central role in the toxic effects of alcohol. The liver does its best to convert this substance into acetic acid. Unfortunately, the liver quickly reaches a saturation point (after the consumption of just a few drinks)and this toxin begins to escape into the bloodstream.
When in excess, it exerts its toxic effects by inhibiting mitochondrial function. This weakens the body’s ability to break it down to acetic acid and can ultimately end up causing you liver damage (including hepatitis and cirrhosis).
When it reaches the brain it can restrain enzymes designed to convert certain nerve transmitters from aldehydes to acids. In turn, the nerve transmitters that can build up due to a lack of this conversion form compounds that are remarkably similar to certain morphine-type substances. This has led researchers to believe that this build-up might be one of the reasons that alcohol is so addictive.
Research also indicates that this organic chemical plays a significant role in the development of certain types of cancers and as such is currently classified as “possibly carcinogenic” by the International Agency for Research on Cancer.
There is some truth in the claim that what causes hangovers is what type of alcohol you drink. Red wines and dark liquors such as brandy, scotch, tequila, bourbon, and whiskey contain the greatest amounts of congeners. White wines and clear liquors such as gin, vodka, and clear rum will have fewer congeners comparatively. As a result, some people will find that they feel worse the next day from consuming dark-colored alcohols compared to lighter-colored alcohols. Want to learn more about what causes hangovers regarding different types of alcohol? Click here.
As mentioned above, when alcohol is finally broken down in your liver you are left with a toxin called acetaldehyde. Acetaldehyde is actually more toxic than the alcohol you’ve consumed, so it is quickly attacked in your body by two compounds (acetaldehyde dehydrogenase & glutathione) working together to form acetate. If you only drank a small amount of alcohol you’ll be okay… but you probably would not have read this far if you are a tea toddler and unfortunately for you, your liver only has a limited amount of glutathione. So guess what? At this point, you and your liver are now enemies.
Lastly, histamines (which are found in the skins of grapes) will increase the severity of hangover symptoms in some people (if they are sensitive to histamines). Red wine will affect a histamine-sensitive drinker more than white wine because red wine has spent more time in contact with grape skins.