It’s a gradual thing.
You used to enjoy a glass of wine with dinner or when out socialising with friends.
But now you’ve noticed that red wine seems to always leave you feeling more hungover and fuzzy-headed than in the past.
So, you switch to white.
All good, except little by little you find your tolerance for white wine fading too.
You try the drops your friends recommend to fix the problem. But they don’t work, no matter how much you try to convince yourself that they do, and no-one seems to know what the ingredients are either.
Your options now are to either put up with the symptoms, curtail your drinking to an occasional beverage, or decide to quit alcohol altogether.
Let’s take a look at why this happens.
Your marvellous liver.
Your liver is your largest internal organ and does a fabulous job undertaking over 500 different functions, helping to support metabolism, immunity, digestion and detoxification. This busy organ enables us to break down alcohol into acetaldehyde, then acetate and finally carbon dioxide which allows it to be removed from the body.
Whenever alcohol is consumed, your liver prioritises breaking it down first but it can only effectively metabolise one standard drink per hour.
The other important fact is that the by-product acetaldehyde is a Group 1 carcinogen.
The more you drink, the more acetaldehyde produced which explains why alcohol is linked to seven different types of cancer including mouth, throat, oesophagus, liver, breast (in women) and bowel.
It’s the acetaldehyde that makes your face flush when you drink, which can be quite pronounced in some people. It’s what contributes to that yucky hangover effect and damages your DNA (hence the cancer risk).
The impact of liver ageing on alcohol tolerance.
1. Your liver shrinks.
The liver reduces in volume by between 20-40% with age. Hepatic blood flow also drops by around 10% each decade and by age 75 may have reduced by 30-40%. These two things combine to reduce the liver’s ability to metabolise alcohol, meaning it stays in the blood stream for longer.
2. Liver enzyme activity reduces.
This also results in slower breakdown of alcohol.
3. Lean muscle mass decreases.
After age 30, we start to lose between 3-8% lean muscle mass each decade meaning you have less muscle tissue available to retain water. The change in your hydration means consuming alcohol now starts to hit you harder and faster than before.
4. Ageing bodies may be taking medications that can interact with alcohol as well as competing for the liver to metabolise these.
An example of this is if you take blood thinners. Here, drinking alcohol can increase your risk of bleeding.
Also, certain blood pressure tablets don’t work as well in the presence of alcohol increasing the potential risk of stroke.
If in doubt, check with your GP.
5. Alcohol is a sleep poison.
Alcohol fragments sleep. For those aged 65+, alcohol can compound sleep problems that occur with increasing age.
Should you stop drinking?
This is a personal decision.
The better question is to ask yourself about your relationship with alcohol.
Are you drinking at a ‘safe’ level?
While no level is deemed entirely safe, consuming 5-7 standard drinks/week is OK. Though consuming 4+ standard drinks in one night is considered risky drinking.
Do you drink to be social, or to ‘wind down’ or help yourself to cope?
If you recognise you’re using alcohol as a crutch, perhaps it’s time to review what else you could do to make yourself feel better.
The WHO Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test (AUDIT) is a quick and easy way to evaluate your alcohol use.
Easing your liver’s load.
- Giving your liver a break from alcohol has lots of benefits including better sleep, protecting your cognition and overall health.
- Start by determining how much you want to reduce your alcohol consumption by. You could choose to not drink during the week and only have a couple of drinks on the weekend.
- Sobriety challenges like Dry January or Dry July can be a helpful trigger to ease into being alcohol free, so you can experience the difference for yourself.
- Or set a date to quit and tell your family and friends of your decision. Their support will make all the difference to your success.
- When drinking, try alternating alcoholic drinks with water or soft drinks. This helps to maintain your hydration and curbs the total amount of alcohol you’re drinking if thirsty.
- If you’ve been prescribed medication, check with your health provider if any of them interact with alcohol.
- Try a non-alcoholic alternative like soda with a slice of lime or a sensational mocktail. (Though I’ve yet to find a non-alcoholic wine that doesn’t taste of cat pee.) It used to be socially awkward not drinking when out socialising. Not any more. Many people have successfully curbed or quit alcohol, so you’re no longer the outlier in social situations.
- If quitting seems hard, look for alcohol free ways to enjoy your social life or talk to a health provider. Finding the support that works best for you will help you develop new lifestyle habits to keep you healthy and your liver happy.
If you’ve made changes to your relationship with alcohol, I’d love to hear your story.
