When you make the choice to give up alcohol, not only are you making a financially wise decision, but you’re also smartly looking after your personal health. In fact, some of the health benefits that can be had from quitting drinking start virtually instantly after you’ve made the choice to take your final sip.
Recently, the Canadian Centre on Substance Use and Addiction made headlines when it revised its weekly drinking guidelines. Their recent findings indicated that no weekly amount of alcohol consumption could truly be considered “safe” and that low-risk drinking should now be considered having two drinks per week (at maximum).
In short, when it comes to alcohol, less is always better from a health perspective. If you make the choice to cut back on your alcohol consumption, these are some of the health benefits that you could attain.
Improved Liver Health
With the liver being the primary organ that metabolizes alcohol, it’s no secret that it bears the brunt of the damage that this substance can have on the body. However, by abstaining from heavy alcohol use and eating a nutritious diet, you can give your liver more time to heal itself and stay free of any irreversible damage to it from drinking.
If alcohol is repeatedly abused over a long period of time, healthy liver cells can become gradually replaced with scar tissue (also known as fibrosis), leading to serious liver diseases. It’s important to evaluate your drinking patterns and ensure they’re in line with recommended guidelines to lower your risk of liver damage from alcohol.
Better Sleep and Mental Clarity
Heavy alcohol use is also known to disrupt effective sleep patterns, reduce mental clarity, and even damage cells in the brain over time. By cutting back on your drinking, you may find yourself getting better rest at night and having more energy during the day. You also will better protect your brain from any damage that this substance can do to it.
Alcohol impedes good sleep by causing normal and healthy sleep cycles to become interrupted. With fewer sleep cycle interruptions and more quality rest, your body is able to more effectively repair itself and be adequately prepared for the next day.
Weight Loss
Drinking copious amounts of alcohol can also end up adding multiple extra calories to your weekly caloric intake if left unchecked. This can result in weight gain and an unhealthy BMI, which can cause other health issues to arise. Obesity can cause a person’s risk of heart attack, stroke, diabetes, and cancer to increase. Problems with joints and bones may also develop.
Cutting back on drinking can be a crucial strategy to help maintain a healthy weight. By taking in fewer calories via alcohol (particularly by limiting sugary cocktails or craft beers that are especially high in carbohydrates), you can better regulate your BMI and prevent some of the health risks associated with excess weight.
Better Heart Health
When you make the decision to quit drinking, your heart is another key organ that benefits. In the short term, alcohol affects the heart by acting as a depressant and can lead to serious complications by slowing down your heart rate to dangerous levels if too much is consumed.
Even if the short-term effects of alcohol on the heart happen to be avoided, its long-term effects can also cause problems. Alcohol-induced cardiomyopathy is a condition where the structure of the heart is altered permanently due to too much drinking over a long period of time. Another risk of prolonged alcohol use is chronically high blood pressure. When you decide to stop drinking, you give your body the chance to regulate its blood pressure more healthily and limit the amount of structural damage it can do to your heart.
Reduced Cancer Risk
Drinking less is also associated with a lower cancer risk. Alcohol can play a direct role in an individual developing intestinal cancers or those of the head and neck, just to name a few. By exposing the cells in these regions to harmful free radicals over time, excessive alcohol consumption can disrupt cellular DNA sequences and make it more challenging for normal replication to take place.
Being aware of how much alcohol you drink (particularly as you age) is a key way to help prevent cancer. While it’s virtually impossible to completely eliminate your cancer risk, making conscious daily choices in the best interest of your health can help immensely in keeping you disease-free.
Less Potential For Bodily Injury
When an individual consumes too much alcohol, their inhibitions are lowered, and their decision-making may become worse. Being excessively impaired can even lead to violent injuries to either the person themselves or others, which is why it’s imperative to drink responsibly. For example, drinking too much alcohol can cause you to have trouble walking properly, which could result in an injury like a sprained ankle or cracked toe.
By limiting how much you drink, the possibility of your inhibitions becoming impaired is reduced (as is your probability of suffering an alcohol-related injury).
As we’ve discussed, beyond just the liver, virtually every part of your body benefits from reducing or eliminating your alcohol intake altogether. It’s important to be aware of the risks of heavy alcohol use and make the best health choices you can as a result.
If you’re struggling with alcohol and are interested in getting professional assistance, look no further than Alvarado Parkway Institute. Our behavioral health clinic specializes in treating a variety of mental health and addictive disorders, including alcohol use disorder (AUD). Learn more about our services and how we can empower you on your recovery journey today by giving us a call.
